There's a common cultural myth that if you 'find your passion' then you'll find your place in the world. I'm currently reading a book that directly contradicts this notion. I've only just started reading it, but I'm wondering if it'll talk about how finding your tribe can be just as if not more important than finding the work itself... in my own experience, finding the tribe often precedes finding the opportunity. I
Read MoreThere's one book that I've been working on for the past two years (good things take time, I keep telling myself... another favourite line of mine is it's-not-procrastinating-it's-a-process). The book's about taking a lean startup approach to career development. There's another one that I'm planning to ship by my birthday this year. It's a story I've wanted to write since forever, but every time I started it in my
Read MoreTonight was the last session of the Startup MBA. I still can't believe I get to do this as "my job" - it's a joke. I feel incredibly blessed, but also insanely curious as to how we can best maximise what we've already built. How do we deliver even more value to people the next time round? Will there be a next time round? Is that the way to
Read MoreTonight we held an unconference and it was one of my favourite sessions... I've often thought about how the sharing economy applies to higher education and tonight totally brought home to me the power of peer-to-peer learning. I'm still mega-tempted to apply for Stanford's Learning, Design and Technology program, but I can't figure out if it's because of the program or because it's Stanford or because it's San Francisco or
Read More"Fall in love with the problem, not the solution" was a quote I heard on Twitter via Jade and I mentioned it today when meeting with Rob Archer. And he loved it as much as I did. We were speaking about how the minimum viable concept applies to career development and as I started telling him about lean startup stuff in general, I realised for the thousandth time that
Read MorePutting together the Escape School newsletter is such a fun part of my week. Sometimes I play this (nerd alert) two-second game in my head where I try to imagine that it's all written as a single stream of consciousness. It rarely never makes sense, but I still do it anyway. This week's would have been... Choosing a career path (or changing one) is, for most of us, a confusing
Read MoreI read this piece this morning and really enjoyed it... particularly this quote by Hyrum W. Smith: "The secret to achieving inner peace lies in understanding our inner core values – those things in our lives that are most important to us - and then seeing that they are reflected in the daily events of our lives.” No biggie. It sounds so simple. I think it is that simple. Tonight there was
Read MoreI've lived here almost four years, have been super slack with doing touristy stuff... and the moment that I know my London days are limited, suddenly I'm all about things like going on the Eye when Mum mentioned that she'd like to try it. We piled onto the Ferris Wheel thingie and the incredible views reminded me of the opening sequence of The Apprentice UK. I looked down and
Read MoreI woke up with Billy Ray Cyrus in my head: "I told John he must've been crazy / 'Cause you were just about to say I do / He just gave me a wink and said all he could think / Is it could've been me with you." I still remember Sunday afternoons in Dad's study in Hong Kong as a kid, playing on DOS games... listening to Billy. Mum
Read MoreRunning the Startup MBA has been a big fat reminder on why I doubt I'll ever apply to business school. It just seems like a really expensive badge that only comes in handy if you're planning to ascend the corporate hierarchy. Saying that, I could be totally wrong. I'd love the chance to geek out underneath Steve Blank. Or John Mullins. Or Clayton Christensen. Or Eric Ries. And friends
Read MoreBlogging is weird. I have this love-hate relationship with the art of sharing your private thoughts in a public forum. There's so much crap in cyberspace, so much noise, and to be adding to it feels strange. But blogging can be so useful. I compare blogging to the flipped classroom: when you create meaningful online conversation, it can fast-forward meaningful offline connections. (E.g. I found this blog the other day because Allison and
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