How to Send Effective Follow Up Emails
“I have two professional guests who agreed to be on my podcast. One of them a professor, the other an author. The conversations I had with both guests started out very well. Details were settled. All that was left was for me to tell them when works… No response. I followed up after 2 weeks […]
Celebrate After You’ve Finished the Job
In When You Deliver Work Late, You Invite More Scrutiny, Isaac Morehouse writes: Here’s another reason to get your work done fast (yep, even (especially!) deep, creative work): you’ll get less scrutiny and fewer requested edits…Every day past expectation the project takes, the expectation for perfection ratchets up. From your customer’s perspective, it goes something like […]
Why Non-Tech People Should Work in Tech Startups
“Software is eating the world.” — Marc Andreessen There are several factors that make tech startups the most exciting companies on the planet right now. Dramatically reduced cost of starting one, due to cloud computing. Penetration of software into every corner of every industry. Borderlessness. Instant, global reach. Near-infinite scalability. Explosion of venture capital and […]
“What Do Employers Want?” Is a Stupid Question
“Employers want degrees.” There are so many problems with this popular idea. It lacks imagination, ignores the things employers really want that a degree is sometimes a proxy for, and forgets that divergence from the crowd is more likely to make you stand out than sameness. But it’s worse than that. It’s misleading even as […]
How to Get Your GitHub Profile Ready For Job Applications
If you are going out for a development job or any sort of technical job, especially if you don’t have a lot of professional experience in the field, the best thing you can do is put some of your work on display. GitHub is the most popular place to do that. Here are the guidelines […]
What is Willpower and How Should You Use It?
Every year, The American Psychological Association releases the results of the Stress in America Survey. Regularly, respondents cite lack of willpower as the reason they fail to follow through on a healthier lifestyle and don’t meet their financial goals. So, what is this mysterious trait known as willpower and how do we increase it? For […]
Never Apologize For Flipping Burgers
“Take pride in your work at all times.” -Ford Frick I’ll begin with two brief quotes from two separate friends: Quote #1: “As a hiring manager, Chik-fil-a was always a slam dunk. Everyone I ever hired who had worked for them was awesome.” Quote #2: “It’s better to have to answer “100 happy meals” than […]
Exercise Your Brain Like a Muscle
Even though your brain is an organ rather than a muscle, the practices you set up to strengthen your muscles also work to increase your brain power. My preferred system is: Fuel, Resistance, Rest, Repeat. Fuel In the same way that you’ll “bonk” or “hit the wall” at the end of a marathon if you haven’t […]
5 Ways to Create Value Through a Blog Post
A Praxis participant recently asked me for some tips on how to signal their ability to create value through their writing. More specifically, they wanted to know how to do this without relying on self-help posts that claim to show people the way to enlightenment. As preparation for our advising session, I documented five categories […]
How to Get Work Done: A Primer
Here are the three pillars of getting work done. If you are having trouble with staying on top of your work, chances are that it comes back to one of these three main areas. This is common advice for our participants as they complete their challenging apprenticeships at growing startups. 1. Know what you need to […]
Your Problem is You Don’t Have Enough Problems
The more action you want to take, the more solutions you want to gain, the more you want to achieve, the more problems you’ve gotta have. Problems lead to questions, questions lead to discovery, discovery leads to progress.
2 MORE reasons not to go to college
We’ve written on the Praxis blog a number of times about why you should rethink college. One of our most popular articles, by Praxis CEO Isaac Morehouse, makes among other points the case that college no longer signals what it used to and that most people have no idea what they want out of the […]
5 Skills I Acquired Working at a Tech Startup
The following is a repost from the blog of Praxis participant Nicholas Kleinhuizen. A couple of months ago, my life drastically changed. I went from being a college dropout who lived at home to working at a tech startup across the country. Over the past few months, here are 5 lessons I’ve learned. Lesson #1: The […]
4 Things You Can Do Today To Make Yourself More Valuable
You’re young, hungry, and want to jump-start your career. You don’t have much experience outside of classrooms, but you know you’ll need more than some grades and government paper to succeed in the marketplace. Awesome. Here are a few very simple things you can do right now – today in fact! – in less than […]
3 Reasons Why You Should Learn Out Loud
You’re in the middle of an interesting online course. You just started reading a fascinating new book. You stayed up all night watching a series of talks by a provocative lecturer. Nobody knows. It’s a secret between you and your brain. One day, however, you’re going to surprise everyone. Maybe you’ll make an appearance on […]