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We all need to look a little deeper and learn more about our work-related habits -- especially those of us who are caught up on our favorite TV shows.
6 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Have you found yourself complaining about how busy you are, possibly to a spouse, friend or coworker? If you’re like most of us, you do this on a regular basis. You almost can’t help it, especially when others start talking about how busy they are in their lives.
“I know, right? I feel like I can’t get anything done.”
It’s a phenomenon referred to as busy bragging, and it’s common throughout Western culture. Is that because, as a culture, we tend to value people who are busy? Is it because we're afraid of looking lazy if we aren’t as busy as our peers? Is it because we're fishing for more congratulations and support for our work? Or are we stretching the truth to get out of some responsibility? Chances are, it’s some combination of these factors.
Still, with the demands of the modern world and the fact that "stress" is a subjective experience, it’s easy to blur the line between being busy and feeling busy. So, how can you tell if you’re not really busy -- you’re just "busy bragging" -- and what can you do about it?
Look for these signs:
1. You’re getting plenty of sleep.
It’s recommended that we get between 7 and 9 hours of sleep every night, but the average person gets less than that, presumably due to conflicting obligations or a lack of prioritization. If you find yourself getting a full 7 to 9 hours of sleep every night, good for you -- you’re taking care of your body and setting yourself up to be more productive. But at the same time, your schedule probably isn’t that full.
2. You work less than 47 hours a week.
The average full-time employed American works 47 hours per week. If you’re working fewer hours than that, you’re statistically less busy than the average person. That doesn’t mean you should be aiming for 47 hours a week -- any more than 40, and you might be overstraining yourself. This is just a gauge you can use to compare yourself to the “average” population.
3. You aren’t sending or receiving as many emails as your peers.
Ask around the office and see how many emails your peers are sending and receiving each day. The average is near 121 emails each day, though this may vary depending on your role and industry. Email is a fantastic indicator of your workload and productivity, since it’s involved at least indirectly in almost every task you’ll need to accomplish. You can check your email productivity using one of these email productivity tools.
4. You’re childless.
I don't have kids, but many of my friends do; and it's enough for me to see that having a kid is a massive time burden. Parents automatically have dozens of hours a week occupied with feeding, clothing, transporting, entertaining and generally taking care of their kids -- even if they have some help on the side. If you don’t have a child to take care of, you’ll feel silly about how busy you felt once you do have one.
5. You see your friends and loved ones regularly.
The busiest people in the country don’t have time to spend with their friends and loved ones. Their friends gradually drift away from them, and their romantic relationships and family bonds suffer. If you get to spend quality time with the people most important to you on a regular basis (i.e., a few times a week, or even every day), you’re ahead of the curve.
6. You’re taking breaks and vacations regularly.
Breaks and vacations are important. If you keep trudging through work without giving yourself a chance to decompress and reevaluate your life, your productivity will suffer and you’ll head toward burnout. That said, if you have the time to take vacations regularly -- at least a week’s worth of days off in a given year -- you probably fall squarely into “average” levels of busyness.
7. You’re caught up on the latest episodes of your favorite TV show.
This may seem like a strange sign, drawn from our current preoccupation with addictive TV shows, but it’s an important relative measure of how busy you are. When you’re watching TV, you’re relaxing, and the average American watches nearly five hours of TV every day. That’s a flabbergasting amount of leisure time to people whose schedules are truly packed. So if you’re all caught up on TV and are used to watching it regularly, you might want to rethink how busy you really are.
This shouldn’t suggest to you that being busy is a bad thing, or that you should make an effort to either increase or decrease your workload. In fact, psychological research suggests that people are actually happier when they’re busy than when they have nothing to do. The most important point here is that you should be aware of how busy you are and why you’re busy; why brag about how busy you are when your responsibilities are actually relatively limited? Why have you chosen these responsibilities in the first place?
For many companies, being green isn’t just about doing good, but about boosting customer loyalty too.
Last year, for example, a study conducted by Unilever -- a company that does have an admittedly vested interest in knowing this kind of information -- polled 20,000 consumers in five countries and 33 percent said that given the option, they would choose to buy from brands that are focused on sustainability.
Recently, there have a been a spate of initiatives from major companies about what they are doing to to help the environment.
At the beginning of April, Apple announced that it was now run entirely on clean energy -- including its stores, offices and data centers in 43 countries -- and that 23 manufacturing partners were also on board.
The company also detailed a number of wind and solar energy projects in locales ranging from Nevada to China, along with a recycling robot in Texas. “We’re going to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible … because we know the future depends on it,” said CEO Tim Cook.
Lyftco-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green said that starting this April, every Lyft ride is carbon neutral and characterized it as a multi-million dollar investment that was a top priority.
“By committing significant financial resources to these offsets, we’re building into our business a strong incentive to pursue shared rides and the displacement of gasoline-powered vehicles,” Zimmer and Green wrote. “The more shared rides and clean vehicles on the platform, the fewer carbon offsets we will need to purchase.”
Embattled restaurant chain Chipotle shared its goal of to divert half of all of its restaurant waste from landfills by 2020. According to a release put out by the company, they are already trending in that direction, with a 40 percent diversion rate in 2017.
What initiatives have you and your business put together for Earth Day? Let us know in the comments.
Here's your explanation of today's biggest headlines, including a data-mining controversy, company terms and 4/20. Stay in the know in 60 seconds.
1 min read
"Terms and conditions" for companies everywhere might be translated into plain English as per the European Union's new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which will go into effect in May. (For reference, PayPal's terms and conditions are currently longer than F. Scott Fitzgerald's book The Great Gatsby.)
While we're on data: JPMorgan hired a security expert to keep an eye on bank staff, but there's controversy about whether or not he went too far -- using software by Palantir, Peter Thiel's data-mining company, to collect GPS locations, phone conversation transcripts and more.
Finally, it's 4/20, but marijuana marketers still aren't allowed to promote ads on platforms like Facebook and Twitter.
"Do-it-for-me" is the next evolution of the on-demand economy.
5 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Today’s consumers value their time more than ever. With the proliferation of on-demand apps, there is virtually no need to wait in lines or even to leave your house if you’re that much of a homebody.
You know the drill: Amazon for your groceries, Netflix for date night, Handy for that light bulb you just can’t reach and even on-demand car services to care for the car you hardly ever drive because you ride-share everywhere. Yeah, welcome to the future.
Yet, as with everything, change is constant. So, if you think today’s adults require instant gratification, think about the high demands the next generation will have. For this reason, those building a business they hope will last should consider shifting from providing goods to providing ... services.
Spend money to buy time
A recent study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggested that people who spend money on time-saving services feel happier. "What we found is that people who spent money to buy time reported being almost one full point higher on our 10-point [happiness] ladder, compared to people who did not use money to buy time," wrote Elizabeth Dunn, an author of the study and a professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia. “People from across the income spectrum benefited from ‘buying time.’”
One consumer expert has labeled this phenomenon the "do-it-for-me" movement. That expert is Scot Wingo, cofounder of ChannelAdvisor and CEO of Spiffy, an on-demand car care service. Wingo says that the future of consumerism is no longer do-it-yourself (DIY), but do-it-for-me, or DIFM.
DIFM
“The do-it-for-me consumer mindset disavows DIY,” Wingo told me in an interview. “The DIFM consumer discovered the power of convenience through the on-demand economy and never looked back," he continued. "[These consumers] prioritize spending time with their kids or their hobbies over mowing the yard, cleaning the house or washing their cars. Importantly, the DIFM consumer is willing to spend money to save time."
Others are starting to agree. To research the future of the on-demand economy, I listened to an interview with Vikrum Aiyer aired on the Penn Wharton Public Policy Initiative podcast. Aiyer is the strategic communications and public policy lead for Postmates, Inc., the on-demand logistics and delivery platform.
During the podcast, Aiyer explained that Postmates had actually seen its retail partners increase their sales three to four times over their previous level once it -- the company -- started using on-demand delivery.
“This goes well beyond food, because we’re actually servicing hardware stores and beyond," Aiyer told his interviewers. "And that’s actually because of a new reach of their customer potential, in which geographically if they were located on one side of town, they’re now reaching customers at another side of town.
"This validates," he continued, "the thesis that the on-demand economy and automation are going to really change, and are changing, the way commerce is connecting communities."
The lesson for entrepreneurs
So how should entrepreneurs and business leaders respond? They should target consumers who are willing to spend money to save time. As entrepreneurs, we can use that information to shape marketing messages, ad copy, new products. Whatever product we're creating or selling, we should incorporate into it the fact that consumers are willing to spend money to save time.
“When you look at GDP in the U.S., products or goods represents 20 percent of GDP, and services represent the other 80 percent,” Wingo told me. “Using those broad strokes, I think [the trend for] ‘services go digital’ could be four times as large an opportunity as ecommerce.
"In the next five years, I think it will feel as archaic as using the Yellow Pages to have to ‘call’ a service provider. Your phone will be the remote control for your life, and you will have a myriad of products and services available to you at your whim in a completely transparent and digital way.”
While some detractors will argue that DIFM is a luxury exclusive to the wealthy, that’s not actually the case. DIFM is beneficial for anyone who can benefit from time saved. “We thought the effects might only hold up for people with quite a bit of disposable income, but to our surprise, we found the same effects across the income spectrum,” Dunn shared.
Giving consumers the ability to ‘buy back’ an increasingly scarce resource -- their time -- is the future of consumerism. Sounds a bit like the sci-fi thriller In Time (lLOL), but in order for on-demand companies to move past the ‘Uber of…’ era, a huge market opportunity will consist of consumers looking for DIFM options.
"Moving people up on the ladder of life satisfaction is not an easy thing to do," Dunn said. "So, if altering slightly how people are spending their money could move them up a full rung, it's something we really want to understand, and perhaps encourage people to do."
In this series, Open Every Door, Entrepreneur staff writer Nina Zipkin shares her conversations with leaders about understanding what you have to offer, navigating the obstacles that will block your path, identifying opportunity and creating it for yourself and for others.
When Roberta Scherf’s daughter Rowan was young, she struggled with language. But her good grades made it tough for Scherf to convince her school district to evaluate Rowan for Autism Spectrum Disorder.
After Rowan received an autism diagnosis, Scherf knew that there was work to do to help her daughter and others like her. So she put her researcher hat on and read up on every aspect of ASD and cognitive neuroscience. “All of my work came out of needing to create an opportunity, basically needing to create a lifeline for myself and my daughter,” Scherf recalls to Entrepreneur.
Out of that drive for answers came the idea for Scherf's 12-year-old company, PrioHealth, and a program called MeMoves, which uses music, patterns and movement to help teach children and adults like Rowan to calm their nerves and make connections.
Today, the patented system is used in more than 5,000 schools districts, therapy centers, hospitals and homes in the United States and Canada.
“The thing that I'm happiest about is the fact that it's changing so many people's lives,” Scherf says. “I continue to have a lot of what I call two Kleenex box days where stuff is so amazing and remarkable in terms of the changes that we're seeing in people's lives that it still makes me excited to wake up the next morning.”
Scherf shared her insights about the power of curiosity, the importance of an off-the-beaten-track perspective and why you should never count yourself out.
Can you tell me about a time that you needed to create an opportunity for yourself or others? How did you approach it?
In 1992, I gave birth to who I think is the most amazing daughter in the world. She was born on the autism spectrum and 1992 was the first year that autism spectrum disorder appeared as a term in the literature. It was also before many girls with autism were diagnosed correctly. Rowan was struggling with language and social interaction [and she was] so overwhelmed by every piece of sensory information in the environment that she just couldn't function and no one could tell me why. No one could tell me how to help her effectively.
One of the challenges was that I kept getting glimpses of this really incredibly little girl but just couldn't get her out. That's when I started to learn everything I could about autism spectrum disorders. I studied body cognition, music therapy, behavioral cognitive neuroscience -- everything I could learn about the role that the nervous system and our body plays in our health and emotional well-being. I ended up 20 years ago working on the very first version of what would become MeMoves. [With it,] she went from a child who couldn't hold a single letter in her head to someone who was able to read words and sentences and chapter books and able to effectively communicate with people around her.
[The doctors all told] me not to expect too much, that she probably would never learn to read.
But Rowan’s somebody who is just completely present now. The change in her was so great. She's now 25-years-old. She is hilarious and brilliant and wonderful. She's high functioning Asperger's, she's working part time as a vet tech. She became fluent in Japanese. She's finishing her degree. MeMoves changed her life, it gave her a life and that gave me my life back. And I thought OK, so there's something here and I need to do something with it. I started working on this tool to help Rowan, which helped me, and it ended up helping countless people all over the world.
What personal traits or strategies do you rely on to create opportunity for yourself and others?
What saved me and what helped Rowan was that I am incredibly curious. I mean I will suck up every piece of information that is out there. I am really passionate. I will fight to get things done. And I'm very persistent. I just do not give up.
[A few years before Rowan was born]In 1989 I was leading a pretty normal life. We lived in rural Wisconsin and on one of the coldest nights of the year, I was seven months pregnant with my first child and my husband and I went to bed one night and our house burned down. The fire inspectors actually classified it as an unsurvivable fire. But we all made it out. It was miraculous.
But I also ended up then with a panic disorder, agoraphobia and PTSD and it was really difficult. I could have gone forward and lived the rest of my life kind of managing my trauma through medication and talk therapy. But I didn't want to do that. I wanted my life back. For me the way to get back was to start investigating my own nervous system, which almost 30 years ago was sort of difficult because we had a tenth of what we know now. But I dug in. Then that [research] led to the other place I needed help in a big way, which was [with Rowan].
When you experience a setback, what do you do to keep going? How do you get unstuck?
What I've always done is to look at the impact that my work has been having on other people. I call it my Frank Capra, "It's a Wonderful Life," moment. So on the days when it seems really too hard for me to keep going I think about all of the people whose lives have been changed by the work. And I think about how I have to keep going.
People who want to advocate for themselves don't know always know how. What are actionable steps they can take to make themselves heard? What steps do you take?
Find allies and connect with people. Affiliation is really important. Find someone like yourself. Find someone who is working on some of the same things and build relationships. You can move from there. One voice can be really strong but a chorus is usually stronger, louder and more beautiful.
Has there been a counterintuitive or surprising way you've opened doors for yourself?
Being an outsider seemed to me very counterintuitive but it turned out to be a gift. When I started working on this stuff the biggest challenge that I had was that I didn't come from a university setting or research background or a corporate setting. But I discovered this thing, it's a term called the Einstellung effect. [Basically] you've got somebody who's an accomplished expert who really knows all these things. But the body of knowledge and their processes of work actually prevents them from seeing a new path.
You've got these people who have been so hardwired into their silos that they absolutely [think they] know what the outcome is going to be. So for me one thing that I have been really grateful to have and to use is that I have frequently come to look at things from the outside, because of that I see things really differently. In one way it's sort of good to always have that childlike perspective.
Was there a blind spot that you had about leadership and opportunity you worked to change within yourself?
The biggest blind spot I had about leadership was that I never felt like I was a leader or could be one because I didn't ever set out to do this. I had this brilliant life plan, which was completely different from where I am now. I didn't ever see myself as someone who could develop, who could travel, who could speak [and hold workshops].
Over the past 20 years that I've been doing this, I would say that is one of the biggest blind spots I see, especially in a lot of the women that I am working with and come into contact with. They listen to the no's. "No, you can't do this." "No, we haven't done this before." "You can't try that." And they believe it. If you agree with people who say you can't do something you've lost already and you've failed. So by trying, even if you fail, you're not any worse off. You have to give yourself a big yes and just go forward.
The opportunity to pursue a passion without sacrificing a meaningful business role and salary has been the impetus for many business leaders to swap careers.
7 min read
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Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
According to the National Center for Charitable Statistics (NCCS), more than 1.5 million nonprofit organizations are registered in the United States. However, during most of my career in real estate private equity, had someone had told me that I’d leave that world to oversee the not-for profit NHP Foundation (NHPF), developing low-income housing, I wouldn’t have believed it.
But being involved with a nonprofit helping people in desperate need wasn't alien to me, either. For a number of years, I had been on the board of Project Hope, which operates a shelter and provides services for homeless women and children in Boston. There, I'd found it highly gratifying to help raise women out of poverty and find them work and affordable housing.
That's why the foundation's approach made me reflect back on the positive impact made by Project Hope. I could use my prior experience to address the critical shortage of affordable housing for people in need.
However, like many executives transitioning to the nonprofit world, I knew I couldn't make this decision lightly; I needed to bring my “A-game.” The organization Nonprofit HR notes that, “Nonprofit sustainability occurs when a nonprofit attracts and effectively uses enough, and the right kinds of money necessary, to achieve [its] long-term outcome goals.” Overall, sustainability comes from achieving talent sustainability, the article said.
As for my own transition to the nonprofit sector, the question was, could I parlay my experience and acumen to bring in the right talent to manage millions of dollars’ worth of complex private-public partnerships, resulting in thousands of affordable rental units for the working poor, families and seniors?
I finally decided that the answer was yes.
What happened when I made the move to the nonprofit world.
For the nine years I've spent so far at NHPF, I've found it both challenging and rewarding overseeing an organization providing quality housing for those in need. And, finding and retaining a smart inter-generational team with experience in housing and other industries has been key.
We are continuously creating innovative ways to increase our nation’s supply of housing and to bring a robust array of services to improve the lives of our residents. Because of federal regulations, we also get to reinvest our net income and development fees in new projects.
Affordable housing truly is an “impact investment” -- a term that covers any socially meaningful investment. We make the most of available government programs and incentives to create affordable units, even as we provide a return to our social impact financial partners.
I'm hardly alone in this: The opportunity to pursue a passion without sacrificing a meaningful business role and salary has been the impetus for other business leaders to swap careers. The impact investing industry, after all, is a $114 billion sector, and success stories abound:
Katy Sherrat
While leading global projects for management consultancy Accenture, Katy Sherrat began volunteering for Back on My Feet, a national organization operating in 12 major cities coast to coast combatting homelessness through the combined power of community support and essential employment and housing resources.
Sherrat became connected because Accenture had a workforce development partnership with the nonprofit. After a few months of volunteering and after almost 10 years in corporate/private industry, Sherratt was given the opportunity to join the executive team at Back on My Feet.
“I jumped at the chance,” Sherrat told me; and six years later, she holds the title of CEO and has had a tremendous impact on the organization’s success. Since she was appointed to her leader post, the organization’s programming has increased by more than 75 percent, and funding has increased by over 50 percent. Said Sherrat: “We are particularly proud that Back on My Feet has gone from early-stage startup to sustainable organization and is now a leader in the workforce development and homelessness services space nationwide.”
Bill Henson
After a successful 32-year investment banking career, Bill Henson, a decade ago, made the transition to inner city education, initially joining the board of Cristo Rey New York High School, a private Catholic college preparatory high school that educates children of all faiths.
For the last seven years he has served full-time as president of Cristo Rey Brooklyn HS, which educates minority students, mostly immigrants or first-generation Americans of modest means. Although all families contribute something to the cost of their child's education, the school 's innovative Corporate Work Study Program covers most of it. All students work one day per week in real jobs at companies like American Express and JPMorgan Chase, with their earnings going to the school.
Henson told me he fell in love with the Cristo Rey mission and model "of a hand up, not a handout." He said he knew he could translate his corporate experience and connections to provide tangible benefits to his young beneficiaries. The proof is in the results: Cristo Ray kids from low-income neighborhoods like East New York, Brownsville, Crown Heights, East Flatbush and the South Bronx are attending college at Princeton, Duke, Cornell, Georgetown and other prestigious institutions.
Is the nonprofit world right for you?
There are as many paths to passion and profitability as there are professions. But I believe that there are some simple things to know whether as a socialpreneur you could help make a positive change:
1. Decide whether you have the passion for a nonprofit organizations. While their salaries and bonuses have to be competitive to get the talent they need, these operations typically run differently. There are rules of governance for a nonprofit or not-for-profit (there are small legal differences, but the terms can be used interchangeably) that are different from those of a for-profit company; someone new to these enterprises will have to get to know them.
2. Get immersed in the industry you’re entering. Whether founding a nonprofit or considering joining one, get educated about the various options where talented people can find rewarding careers. Start by volunteering, to get a hands-on experience. But also read books and articles by experts in the field, particularly those on aspects of social impact investment. Sign up for industry trade subscriptions (many are free for a trial period), and set up Google Alerts to stay on top of daily industry news.
3. Network with others in the field. Look for contacts on LinkedIn and other sites to reach out to and chat with, as well as relevant group discussions to join. Do research online or among trade publications to find topical webinars, local events or professional seminars to attend, in order to mingle with like-minded individuals. Find ways to discuss career opportunities with management people in nonprofits whose missions interest you.
4. Appreciate the mission and the steps it will take to accomplish it. Correcting societal ills or achieving specific outcomes by working collaboratively can make for an extremely rewarding career, but these missions require long-term thinking and strategy. Embrace the process and be part of the team that creates a plan, with benchmarks and course-corrections when necessary, to help the organization advance.
5. Become an evangelist for your cause. Passion ignites more passion. Once you’ve embarked on the path toward "socialpreneurism," share it with the world. Post to social sites, pen articles, offer to speak at gatherings. "Mission" has its own rewards. Reach out to acquaintances and strangers alike to interest them in your cause. You never know what doors you might open.
Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth has regularly made history throughout her political career. The Iraq War veteran was the first Asian-American woman elected to Congress in Illinois, the first disabled woman to be elected to the United States Congress, the first member of U.S. Congress born in Thailand and as of this month, became the first sitting senator to give birth while in office.
Ahead of her first vote since her daughter Maile Pearl was born, Duckworth put forth the first bill of its kind that would allow babies on the Senate floor, which, despite questions from older members of the governing body -- notably Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch asking, “What if there were 10 babies on the Senate floor? -- was passed unanimously, with support from both sides of the aisle.
I would like to thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, particularly Senator Klobuchar, @RoyBlunt & @SenatorDurbin, for helping bring the Senate into the 21st Century by recognizing that sometimes new parents also have responsibilities at work → https://t.co/jOm9BITC6npic.twitter.com/XR55Dt8XKL
There are currently only 22 women serving in the Senate. And it was only in recent years that female senators were allowed into the Senate pool because a couple of their male colleagues preferred to swim in the nude. There is also an ongoing push from the female senators to update 20-year-old legislation regarding the handling of sexual harassment complaints on Capitol Hill.
Clearly, the hallowed halls of Congress is not the most forward thinking of workplaces, but anyone can make change in their workplace like Duckworth did by simply refusing to do something because that is the way things have always been done.
I may have to vote today, so Maile’s outfit is prepped. I made sure she has a jacket so she doesn’t violate the Senate floor dress code (which requires blazers). I’m not sure what the policy is on duckling onesies, but I think we’re ready pic.twitter.com/SsNHEuSVnY
Andrew Medal sits down with rapper Nipsey Hussle to discuss how gang life catapulted his success, his latest album 'Victory Lap' and his various businesses, including a blockchain-specific startup.
1 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Nipsey Hussle is arguably hip-hop's hottest star right now, with his much-anticipated album release of Victory Lap. Hussle has been making his name from a steady stream of mixtapes including 2013’s Crenshaw, which he sold at $100 a pop, netting $100,000 in the process. He's collaborated with artists like YG, Diddy and Jeezy. His record label All In Records recently partnered with Atlantic Records to increase his distribution, and he's turning the industry on its head by owning the rights to his music. He's an entrepreneur in every sense with multiple businesses including his record label and his clothing brand The Marathon Company, and he's even an early investor in some blockchain-based startups. Hussle kicks off Season 2 of Action & Ambition with Entrepreneur Network partner Andrew Medal.
Technology has made business communication and business travel easier than ever, but it’s still possible to have a minor disaster involving your indispensable devices. Dawn Weir, head of kulula work and a veteran business traveller, offers these tech-savvy tips for road-warriors.
Stay on track
Activity trackers can help you stick to your fitness regime by recording step-counts, distances covered, sleep and nutrition. If you don’t fancy wearing one that looks like it’s from the flight-deck of the starship USS Enterprise, others are available which clip onto your ankle or clothing. Many are water-resistant and rugged, but if you prefer to not buy-one, apps like Samsung Health will record and analyse your daily activity.
A few bad nights’ sleep while travelling can leave one feeling unfocused and tetchy. Some of us sleep better in hotel-rooms than others, and some can be downright noisy. You can try using earbuds, but we don’t all like having wads of foam stuck into our skulls when trying to slip into the arms of Morpheus. One alternative is to load a white-noise generator on one of your devices. A site like www.mynoise.nethas hundreds of soothing sounds, including waves, rain, crackling fireplaces, trickling streams and even Tibetan monasteries.
It might not drown out the sound of the guys returning to the hotel from their “team-building dinner” at 2am, but it’ll help to smooth out the noise of traffic and air-conditioning.
Cancel the chatter and clatter
Many business-travellers now swear by noise-cancelling headphones, which block out distractions and racket and can subtly let fellow travelers know that you’d prefer to not engage in lively conversation. Researchers disagree on the effectiveness of binaural beats for everything from creativity to concentration, but many students, academics and entrepreneurs find that they help with focus the mind.
Stay juiced
Most mobile devices have decent battery-life nowadays, but the size and brightness of their screens and the plethora of apps running on them can drain that very quickly. Save your battery by switching off anything you don’t need: BlueTooth, location, mobile data and so on, as well as apps you’re not using. Switching your phone to Flight mode will also save battery power. Travellers increasingly user power-banks to boost battery-life, but Weir suggests reading users’ product reviews before buying one, as some are far more efficient than others.
Save your important documents – scans of your passport if you’re travelling internationally – as well as hotel reservations and travel itineraries, and take pictures and screenshots of them on your phone. That all-important PowerPoint presentation? Use a file-hosting service like Dropbox to put it in the cloud so you can access it wherever you need to.
Declutter
If you’re a regular business traveller make a point of emptying all your luggage every few weeks. You’ll probably find you’ve accumulated flash-drives, USB adaptors and stationery and other stuff that takes up space and adds weight.
Downsize
Everyone from business travelers to backpackers loves the portability of laptops, but while they’re lighter than ever, those with bigger screens can be bulky. One option is to travel with a tablet, which offers the efficiency of a laptop while taking up less space. If you need to do a lot of inputting while you’re on the road, get a flexible keyboard that can be rolled up until need, or pair your tablet or smartphone with a laser projection keyboard. It’s a clever gizmo that projects a full-sized QWERTY keyboard onto any flat surface, allowing you to type pretty much anywhere.
We’ve all seen the infographics showing how smartphones combine all the devices we once owned separately, like cameras, DVD- and CD-players, and that innovation continues. The Belkin Travel Rockstar combines a battery pack, surge protector and charger. It has three plug-ports (you may need an adaptor, depending on which plug configuration you use) and two USB ports.
Still not high-tech enough? Try Pluggage, a smart suitcase produced by luggage brand www.delsey.comthat has its own app. It’s available in three sizes and its features include fingerprint ID to lock and unlock it (you can also lock and unlock it using the app), interior lighting and speakers. It weighs itself, has integrated USB chargers for your devices, and GPS tracking notifies you when it’s on a luggage carousel at the airport or being loaded onto or off a flight.
To make your business travel that much easier and to find out more about kulula work call +27 (0)11 285 3050, email sales@kulula.com or visit www.kulula.com/work.
Taylor Swift makes certain not one of her fans feels like a number, which is part of why she has more fans than she could possibly count.
6 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
How do you get customers to notice the release of a new product? If you're Taylor Swift, you delete your social media history and then drop a video of yourself in a $10 million diamond bath. Although it's a bit unorthodox, her approach worked.
The “Look What You Made Me Do” video racked up more than 43 million views in 24 hours, according to Variety -- crushing the record for views of a debut video. By the time it became available through streaming services, Swift's Reputation album had already spent three weeks in the Billboard 200's No. 1 spot.
What made Swift's album release so massive? She knows her fan base well enough to create exactly the type of hype her millions of followers respond to best. Brands can follow suit by looking for opportunities to get the attention of their own fans. Swift’s fans follow her religiously on Instagram, but if, say, General Electric deleted its Instagram posts, few people would notice and even fewer would care. Entrepreneurs should first find out where their customers are and what they care about in order to figure out the best way to get them to take notice.
Customers want to feel like they matter, but all too often, they end up feeling like little more than a number. This feeling isn't unjustified. What's the first thing the typical business does when it gets a new customer? It assigns that new customer an account number.
Swift differs from a typical business by looking at her customers as unique individuals, even though her millions of fans far exceed the number of customers of a typical business. Swift broadcasts general information to all her followers, of course, but she also goes out of her way on an almost daily basis to engage at an individual level with at least some of her fans.
In a world where the bar for the customer experience is so low that even the most skilled limbo dancer couldn't slide beneath it, the way businesses interact with customers is more important than ever. Businesses often use size to justify their lack of a positive customer experience. While a startup can offer customers a personalized interaction at the beginning, many businesses find it difficult to keep individualized attention and care a priority as they start to add more customers and hire more employees. There are ways to keep the focus on customers’ experiences, though, and Swift's success in doing this at scale offers three great lessons:
1. Stay true to the “customer comes first” philosophy.
Never forget that a company's success grows directly from the relationship with its "fans." Swift is under no false illusions. The second her fans decide to stop listening to her music, her career is over. This is why she goes out of her way to cultivate her relationship with her fans on a daily basis. Her Tumblr page is a prime example of how she takes fan engagement seriously, and she uses the platform to interact with fans on a regular basis by following their pages, commenting on conversations and even sending flowers to fans who need a pick-me-up.
The same must be true of every employee in a company. If the people who come into contact with customers don't understand and share the enthusiasm for creating a remarkable customer experience, the "customer comes first" philosophy isn't being put into practice on the front lines. Never forget that customers are a brand’s fans, and they keep companies in business. Every employee plays a role in making customers feel special and appreciated.
For her most recent concert tour, Swift announced a change in how ticket purchasing will work. Rather than follow the traditional "first come, first served" model -- which invites bots to snatch up tickets before actual people can purchase them -- Swift's fans will be allowed to compete for a ranking through Ticketmaster's Verified Fan program. In this model, if a fan exhibits increased engagement by signing up for Swift's newsletter and sharing about her on social media, the fan is able to purchase better tickets to the concert.
Like Swift, constantly be on the lookout for fun and engaging ways to let customers know that their business is valuable. This will take creativity and may require extra effort, but the response from customers will be worth it.
3. Reward raving fans.
Many entrepreneurs worry that if they can't create a remarkable experience for every customer, it would be unfair to do so for any customer. This means that no customer ends up having a remarkable experience.
Swift refuses to get tied up in such limited thinking. In 2014, she undertook a project to study the social media accounts of a few of her "superfans," learning what they liked, who they were friends with, where they worked and other personal details. Swift then went shopping for Christmas (or "Swiftmas," as it came to be called) gifts for those fans. These exceptional personalized gifts, sent to only a few dozen fans, were seen by the rest of her fan base as an incredible act of kindness. That made them love her even more, even though they weren't direct beneficiaries of this special treatment.
Showering your best customers with extra love isn't unfair to the rest. Set the bar for customer experience high across the board, but do something extra special for your most loyal fans. They deserve it, after all, and there's no better way to convince a customer "fan" base that they really are more than just a number.
Little compares to the happiness that is felt across the table of a great meal shared with family or friends. Or to that moment when you experience the sights, smells and tastes of a new culture for the first time.
It’s an experience Mr Chai Lekcharoensuk, founder of Simply Asia Thai Food & Noodle Bar, wanted to create when he came to South Africa 25 years ago. Back then, he couldn’t find any Thai food that reminded him of home and so he opened Wang Thai Restaurant, in Cape Town, an upscale establishment that promised an authentic Thai dining experience: mouth-watering meals made by Thai chefs, using only the freshest ingredients.
“The success of Wang Thai inspired Mr Chai to make Thai cooking something everyone across South Africa could enjoy,” says Enzo Cocca, Group General Manager of Simply Asia. “And so, he changed the restaurant format from fine dining to family friendly restaurants – and the Simply Asia brand was born, with the first branch opening in Cape Town’s historic Heritage Square.”
Thai food was not unfamiliar to South Africans at the time, as Thailand was a popular travel destination. But Mr Chai identified an opportunity to bring speciality, authentic Thai food and trading formats to the market and, by 2006, the company had opened 12 restaurants.
Today, customers can experience the taste of Thailand at 64 outlets across South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana, as Simply Asia continues to grow its footprint across the continent. By the end of 2017, the restaurant count will increase to 66 – and 72 by the end of 2018.
Quality and authenticity
Every restaurant in the franchise chain operates on the same values that the very first restaurant was built on: quality and authenticity. It’s these values that Enzo believes sets Simply Asia apart in a market that is now crowded with a wide variety of specialist food styles and trading formats.
“Consumers have a lot of choice today. They can find high-quality, readily prepared food anywhere, from restaurants, to food trucks, to supermarkets. There are a lot of competent local and international traders entering the market every day, many offering similar cuisine.”
So, how does Simply Asia keep customers coming back for more – and appeal to new customers?
The answer to that question is in the question itself: “Customer retention has been key to our growth,” says Enzo. “We have to stay relevant to our customers and still be able to attract new customers every day.”
Employees first
Simply Asia’s growth strategy centres on four pillars: training, innovation, partnering with the right people, and leveraging tools and technology that provide real-time insights into its operations.
“Franchise owners and their teams are continually trained and upskilled to ensure they always offer the best possible customer service and experience,” says Enzo.
He adds that a Simply Asia franchisee is not a hobbyist looking to make an extra buck but is a passionate businessperson who is committed to the values of quality and authenticity above everything else.
“Many of our franchisees own multiple stores and treat their investment as a serious business. We believe this strategy breeds a different calibre of franchisee – one who is driven and understands that the secret to success is hard work, respect and transparency.”
Innovation at all touch points
Underlying all of this is an aggressive approach to innovation, says Enzo. Innovation extends across product offerings and business models and it’s one reason why Simply Asia has maintained its relevance and appeal to new and existing customers.
“Innovation, to us, means delivering new experiences to our customers, whether that’s through more variety and flavours on our menus, our rewards programme that puts cash back in customers’ pockets, or through partnering with service providers like Uber Eats to bring convenience to our customers,” says Enzo.
In a market where customers are spoilt for choice and competition is high, the key to success is having access to the right information, at the right time, says Enzo.
“We control the entire supply chain, from Thailand right to our stores. When you work in the restaurant industry, control of your business processes is important. Information must be real-time and reliable so that you can properly manage your inventory and quickly make the right decisions as situations arise. If you don’t have that information, you can’t see where you’re going.”
For Enzo, the various tools within the Sage Evolution and Payroll solutions give him access to that information and allow him to analyse data in real-time to easily pinpoint issues and opportunities.
“In June 2017, we added 15 new items to our menus across our network of restaurants. As these items were perishable, we needed to optimise the ordering and delivery of fresh ingredients across our production facility, three distribution centres and, of course, all the stores,” says Enzo. “Sage gives us the insights we need, when we need them, resulting in zero wastage and optimal stock levels across the network.”
Transparency, trust, respect
Taking the guesswork out of supply and demand has given Enzo more time to visit Simply Asia stores and to spend time with managers, staff and customers. “At Simply Asia, we’re building more than just restaurants. We’re building opportunities for others and that depends on strong relationships built on trust and respect.”
Enzo has the following advice for anyone looking to either buy a franchise in a chain store, or to franchise out their own businesses: “The key to building a successful franchise group is to fully understand your market and your customers. This is your starting point. If you want to buy a franchise, be sure to interrogate the business model in detail and to get a clear picture of the actual results.”
The people of Thailand place a lot of value on hard work, balanced with friendliness and hospitality. Traditionally, people would greet others by asking if they’d eaten yet. This sums up the Thai way of life, which revolves around sharing and enjoying delicious food in great company.
“When you bring the flavours of another country into your community, something magical happens; a culture is shared between strangers. At Simply Asia, we enjoy nothing more than sharing an authentic Thai experience with our customers.”
*For more on the story, please watch the videohere.
Companies don't just vacuum up data on competitors' prices; some gain advantage by distorting the picture competitors see.
4 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
In January 2017, news broke that Amazon had successfully managed to block bots from Walmart, which would scrape Amazon’s listings “several million times a day.” In the Reuters report, the Chief Executive of Boxed, a New York-based online wholesaler, spoke of scraping competitor prices every 20 minutes and adjusting accordingly, saying, “If we’re not decently priced, we’ll see it almost immediately [in sales declines].”
Web scraping is something of a secret. The original growth hack is used by Fortune 500 companies to stay competitive on price, inform strategy and measure customer sentiment.
What started as a one-way tool to extract web data and increase competition for the benefit of consumers turned into an arms race in which the target websites try to sabotage the data collection in order to achieve a competitive advantage. Third-party services have emerged to help target websites identify and block competitors scraping their data.
More cunning is serving falsified information -- serving bots a higher-than-actual price, for example -- to foil the scraper’s plan, rather than the mechanism.
To avoid the problem of falsified information (also called spoofing or cloaking) or getting blocked, companies have employed proxy networks, which are data-center-based routers through which they route, or proxy, their requests, to hide their identities. However, these networks can be identified by savvy companies. The need for a solution came in the shape of peer-to-peer networks (P2P), also known as the residential IP network.
P2P networks consist of consumers who are willingly routing some commercial requests through their IP in return for benefits (e.g: free use of applications, ad-free browsing, using the P2P network themselves and more). Thus, companies collecting intelligence through such networks can see the web as consumers see it without being at risk of getting spoofed or blocked.
The potential of scraping goes far beyond price wars. The internet is awash with unstructured data just waiting to be tapped.
Some companies generate high-quality sales leads rather than buying contact lists and get higher quality prospects in the process. Some scrape job boards to find companies that are growing, and they monitor social media for firms that have just won funding.
For example, Proven is a skincare company that scrapes customer reviews to create highly personalized products. They’ve built a continually updated database of 8 million reviews, 100,000 beauty products and 4,000 scientific articles about skincare and the ingredients used in products. Their machine learning algorithm discovers the links between these to develop cleansers, creams and toners highly customized to age, skin type, ethnicity and conditions like acne. Customers fill out a questionnaire to fit them into an AI-assisted skin profile and are recommended a skincare regime.
The problem is that when the hackers recognize a publisher is calling their servers, they send a real ad so it appears all is well. If the ad publisher can appear as a regular online user, it will be served the fraudulent ad, which they can then prevent from being published. The ability to scan ad servers as regular consumers is how they keep their audience safe from fraudulent and potentially dangerous ads.
Get creative, and you can disrupt any industry with scraping.
Is it worth the fight? The bottom line is that web scraping is surreptitiously powering more online commerce than you realize. Fortune 500 companies remain competitive by algorithmically adjusting their prices in reference to the market, an impossible task without scraping.
Having these data collection machines be misled by the target websites means pricing based on false information. This is a strong enough motivation for businesses to win this scraping battle.
So, you’re ready to quit your day job for good and to start pursuing your online business full time. Congratulations. Welcome to the club. Someone will show you the secret handshake a little later on and your membership card is in the mail. Are you ready to get started?
When setting up your home office, most of the basic requirements are pretty obvious and straightforward. You’ll want to have a halfway decent computer and a reliable Internet connection. You might invest in some software or you’ll probably want some web hosting. A nice coffee maker probably isn’t a bad idea either.
The thing that most people don’t get about the dot com lifestyle and working from home, however, is that you’re not necessarily working from home all the time. You’re flexing that time and location freedom with the best of them, so outfitting your home office means figuring out what needs to be done when you’re not actually there.
Mailbox Rental Service
This will depend partly on the kind of online business that you run and the specifics surrounding where you live. Part of what I do for a living is review a variety of gadgets and electronics. This means that the good people at Fedex and UPS visit me on a fairly frequent basis. The thing is that I’m not always home to receive those packages, resulting in unnecessary headache and inconvenient rescheduling.
A very simple and affordable solution to this is a mailbox rental service. This is different from a regular P.O. box, because certain couriers and delivery people will not deliver to a P.O. box. When you subscribe to certain mailbox rental services, you are given a real physical address, because it is a real physical office. This means there’s probably a real live receptionist there too, in case your parcel requires a signature.
By subscribing to such a service, you no longer have to wait all day for the delivery guy to come. You’re free to enjoy that time and location freedom, which is especially handy if you’re out of town on a conference or trade show. An example of a company that offers this service is The Network Hub, which offers rates from about $25/month for the Vancouver location.
Smart Camera with Cloud Storage
Speaking of technology and when you might be away from the home office, security is very important too. Depending on where you live, you might already subscribe to an alarm monitoring service. If you want to step it up a level or take matters into your own hands, a smart IP camera could be a good way to go.
With many of these IP cameras, you can access the live video feed through a web browser or a mobile app no matter where you are in the world. However, it’s critically important that you can also review a history of this footage and that the video is not stored locally (as thieves can simply steal your camera). That’s where cloud storage comes into the picture.
Nest cameras typically cost about $100 to $200. From there, you’ll want the Nest Aware service too. The Basic plan for $10/month gets you a 10-day video history with intelligent alerts and timelapses. With the $30/month Extended plan, that expands to a 30-day video history.
If you’re looking for a more affordable solution with similar functionality, SpotCam is worth considering. You can get 1-day recording for free. From there, you can upgrade to 3-day, 7-day or 30-day recording for $3.95, $5.95 or $19.95 a month, respectively. The camera is competitively priced against Nest Dropcam.
Global SIM Card
For the most part, particulars notwithstanding, you can make money online without ever leaving the comfort of your home. Heck, if you keep the laptop handy, you never even need to get out of bed. But that doesn’t mean this is the best or smartest approach. Even if you can go online for most things, you should still attend live events when you can. The networking is invaluable. Instant messengers are no replacement for face-to-face interaction.
You naturally still want to stay connected when you’re on the road, but roaming charges on most cellphone plans can prove prohibitively expensive. You could pick up a local SIM card at every new destination if you don’t travel very often. A more convenient solution, though, is to pick up a global SIM that can be used in international locations all around the world.
The global SIM cards from AlwaysOnline Wireless and KnowRoaming cost almost nothing and they grant you immediate access to the fastest LTE networks with any unlocked smartphone or tablet. Rates will depend on your destination and they can be as much as 85% off your regular carrier’s international roaming rates.
Having the freedom to work from home also means having the freedom to work from anywhere. Enjoy that flexibility. Just make sure you have the logistical pieces in place before you go.
Technology has made business communication and business travel easier than ever, but it’s still possible to have a minor disaster involving your indispensable devices. Dawn Weir, head of kulula work and a veteran business traveller, offers these tech-savvy tips for road-warriors.
Stay on track
Activity trackers can help you stick to your fitness regime by recording step-counts, distances covered, sleep and nutrition. If you don’t fancy wearing one that looks like it’s from the flight-deck of the starship USS Enterprise, others are available which clip onto your ankle or clothing. Many are water-resistant and rugged, but if you prefer to not buy-one, apps like Samsung Health will record and analyse your daily activity.
A few bad nights’ sleep while travelling can leave one feeling unfocused and tetchy. Some of us sleep better in hotel-rooms than others, and some can be downright noisy. You can try using earbuds, but we don’t all like having wads of foam stuck into our skulls when trying to slip into the arms of Morpheus. One alternative is to load a white-noise generator on one of your devices. A site like www.mynoise.nethas hundreds of soothing sounds, including waves, rain, crackling fireplaces, trickling streams and even Tibetan monasteries.
It might not drown out the sound of the guys returning to the hotel from their “team-building dinner” at 2am, but it’ll help to smooth out the noise of traffic and air-conditioning.
Cancel the chatter and clatter
Many business-travellers now swear by noise-cancelling headphones, which block out distractions and racket and can subtly let fellow travelers know that you’d prefer to not engage in lively conversation. Researchers disagree on the effectiveness of binaural beats for everything from creativity to concentration, but many students, academics and entrepreneurs find that they help with focus the mind.
Stay juiced
Most mobile devices have decent battery-life nowadays, but the size and brightness of their screens and the plethora of apps running on them can drain that very quickly. Save your battery by switching off anything you don’t need: BlueTooth, location, mobile data and so on, as well as apps you’re not using. Switching your phone to Flight mode will also save battery power. Travellers increasingly user power-banks to boost battery-life, but Weir suggests reading users’ product reviews before buying one, as some are far more efficient than others.
Save your important documents – scans of your passport if you’re travelling internationally – as well as hotel reservations and travel itineraries, and take pictures and screenshots of them on your phone. That all-important PowerPoint presentation? Use a file-hosting service like Dropbox to put it in the cloud so you can access it wherever you need to.
Declutter
If you’re a regular business traveller make a point of emptying all your luggage every few weeks. You’ll probably find you’ve accumulated flash-drives, USB adaptors and stationery and other stuff that takes up space and adds weight.
Downsize
Everyone from business travelers to backpackers loves the portability of laptops, but while they’re lighter than ever, those with bigger screens can be bulky. One option is to travel with a tablet, which offers the efficiency of a laptop while taking up less space. If you need to do a lot of inputting while you’re on the road, get a flexible keyboard that can be rolled up until need, or pair your tablet or smartphone with a laser projection keyboard. It’s a clever gizmo that projects a full-sized QWERTY keyboard onto any flat surface, allowing you to type pretty much anywhere.
We’ve all seen the infographics showing how smartphones combine all the devices we once owned separately, like cameras, DVD- and CD-players, and that innovation continues. The Belkin Travel Rockstar combines a battery pack, surge protector and charger. It has three plug-ports (you may need an adaptor, depending on which plug configuration you use) and two USB ports.
Still not high-tech enough? Try Pluggage, a smart suitcase produced by luggage brand www.delsey.comthat has its own app. It’s available in three sizes and its features include fingerprint ID to lock and unlock it (you can also lock and unlock it using the app), interior lighting and speakers. It weighs itself, has integrated USB chargers for your devices, and GPS tracking notifies you when it’s on a luggage carousel at the airport or being loaded onto or off a flight.
To make your business travel that much easier and to find out more about kulula work call +27 (0)11 285 3050, email sales@kulula.com or visit www.kulula.com/work.
MBA programs do provide a useful toolkit, but they are better suited for established businesses than rapid-growth startups.
8 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
With a plentitude of resources at our fingertips, there has never been a better time to build a business. Sites like F6S, Appsumo and StartupStash list hundreds of low-cost resources available to businesses of all sizes. But, while available resources make it easy to set up the operations, the more challenging task is actually managing the business.
Traditionally, the go-to resource that has prepared tomorrow's business leaders for the management of businesses has been the MBA. Yet, a recent report from the Financial Times shows that over the past two years MBA graduates have cooled on entrepreneurship, with less than one in five choosing the less stable startup experience. This begs the question: Does the MBA just attract a different breed of people or is it less suited for entrepreneurial endeavors?
While there are many benefits to pursuing an MBA program, this path also comes at a major cost; tuition as well as opportunity cost can weight heavy on an entrepreneur's wallet. The good news is that today, there are options that provide equally as much value at less of a financial hit.
At the end of the day, being an entrepreneur means being able to assess opportunities and risks in uncertain situations. The same due diligence should be applied to assessing the benefits and costs associated with an MBA. Here are three essential items to include in the assessment:
The MBA is not built for growth companies.
MBA programs were originally designed to professionalize the management of the industrializing economy of the early 20th century. Since then, the programs expanded to incorporate the needs of Wall Street, business consultancies and other monolithic businesses. Yet despite MBA programs' evolution, the pattern remains that the program was targeted for scalable, process-driven businesses. As a result, and as the name itself indicates, an MBA is a master in "administering" businesses.
These types of businesses for which MBA programs are built, however, require skill sets that are in sharp contrast to the needs of the entrepreneurial growth businesses of today.
At their core, MBA programs are built to provide predictability for corporate decision-makers. As such, they teach decision-making based on evidence and historical data. The real world of growth businesses, though, is messy and packed with wicked problems. Core business decisions are often questions of judgment, building on a deep understanding of the specifics of customers and the business environment. Since those two elements are changing rapidly for growth businesses, they cannot build on the luxury of predictability and reliance on historical data. Instead, they require a forward-looking perspective and intuition.
Another essential ingredient of MBA programs is the use of standardized tools and frameworks like the Five Forces model or SWOT analysis. While these are helpful to a certain extent, the problem is that they do not inspire original thinking. Standardized tools do not encourage the launch of original products and business models in crowded marketplaces. In contrast, it's more often than not multidisciplinary thinking and a broad perspective, which lead to outstanding products and business models.
Journalist Philip Delves Broughton, recounts in his New York Times bestselling memories of his Harvard MBA experiences how this standardization approach can lead to narrow-mindedness. He recalls, "They liked to think of themselves as renegades and rule-breakers, and yet they struck me as a hardened monoculture. When one of them took up bicycling on the weekend, they all did. If one had pale blond wood in the conference room, they all did."
Ultimately, MBA programs do provide a useful toolkit, but they are still designed for the stable businesses of the Industrial Age.
The principal value of MBAs can be earned in alternative, cheaper ways.
A huge chunk of an MBA's value is implicit, extending well beyond the teachings. One of the most valuable aspects of an MBA is the resulting alumni network that students gain. In an interview with the Financial Times, one entrepreneur and Stanford MBA graduate notes, for example, that one of his biggest customers was a former classmate, with the revenues generated from that client alone being enough to cover the cost of his degree.
While there are apparently cases where the network pays off, the question remains: How much is a network really worth? Most graduates start their careers with a mountain of debt. Let's assume you sell a product with a customer acquisition cost of $100. If we assume the tuition for the MBA to be $50,000 to $100,000 (not considering opportunity cost), then this amount of money could already acquire you the first 500 to 1,000 paying customers.
This does not even take into account that today, the opportunity to build a network outside of MBA schools has multiplied. Meetups as well as conferences enable you to build your real world network, while LinkedIn, AngelList and other business-focused social channels can help you build and maintain your network from your desk -- all at a fraction of the cost of an MBA.
To some extent an MBA provides social proof when looking for VC funding, partnerships or jobs. But, so does work experience with companies like Google, promising growth companies or entrepreneur-in-residence programs, as well as social media influencer activity. When it comes to social proof, you may want to ask yourself why you need to invest in an MBA just because investors, employers or business partners aren't able to judge your skills based on other measures.
Opportunities to gain work experience and learn the relevant functional skills are expanding rapidly. General Assembly, Udemy and Udacity, among others, offer many courses and nanodegree programs, which can help you develop skills in a targeted way.
But, this is not to say that you should skip studies altogether and only take courses. Building a business requires a mix of these technical skills as well as intellectual skills, such as critical thinking, problem solving and lateral thinking. While technical skills take center stage early on in a business's life cycle, it's the critical and original thinking that will ultimately set the business apart. And with AI increasingly replacing many routine tasks, the thinking will remain as a true unique selling proposition. As Mark Cuban suggests, "Knowing how to critically think and assess them from a global perspective, I think, is going to be more valuable than what we see as exciting careers today which might be programming or CPA or those types of things."
To develop this mindset, some form of traditional studies, at least at a BA level, is essential. This can then be coupled with learning the technical skills that one requires for today's jobs. The exact skills that a business requires depend on the type of business as well as the type of business function that they are applied to. Looking at the hiring boards of some successful companies in that space, however, is a quick way to figure out which skills are needed in one particular industry.
Across industries, two big subject themes are of critical importance today. First, software is still eating the world, now more than ever. Computer science, data science and the like not only teach a valuable toolkit in this economy, but they also train critical thinking. The other primary skill is understanding humans. One of the biggest challenges for businesses today is reaching, engaging and converting customers. Accordingly, fields such as user experience design or psychology will be of critical importance to most consumer facing businesses going forward. These skills find application areas across product development and marketing.
While the MBA certainly offers value, it is not well-suited for those looking to the startups and growth companies of today. Rather, entrepreneurs now have the opportunity to develop their skills and networks by tapping into alternative resources that come at a lower cost.
For those who want to build their skills through alternative means, the first step is to look at the hiring boards of businesses in the industry you are active in and create an inventory of requirements. This can be followed by a personal development day. That day would be used to go through available resources such as courses and meetups in order to design a path to unleashing the skill set that best fits the requirements from step one. It's best not to go this path alone, and industry-specific social media groups and forums are a good way to find like-minded companions.
Did you learn skills in alternative ways or did you spot relevant skills that are not included in the traditional curriculum? Share your experience as a comment, tweet or email with the hashtag #FounderSkills.
Thai food was not unfamiliar to South Africans at the time, as Thailand was a popular travel destination. But Mr Chai identified an opportunity to bring speciality, authentic Thai food and trading formats to the market and, by 2006, the company had opened 12 restaurants.
For Enzo, the various tools within the Sage Evolution and Payroll solutions give him access to that information and allow him to analyse data in real-time to easily pinpoint issues and opportunities.
