Nic Bovee

Husband, Father, and Solver of Problems.

blog

    Creating a Fibonacci finder in Rust

    Sat May 01 2021

    I'm learning Rust as a way to sharpen my skills as a developer and push into some areas that I don't normally get to deal with in my web applications.

    I'm reading using The Rust Programming Language as my study guide, and one of the first exercises they suggest doing is implementing a Fibonacci finder.

    The Fibonacci Sequence, as I understand it, is a logarithmic pattern often observed in nature where each number in the sequence is the sum of the two numbers preceding it. For example the first 10 numbers in the sequence would be:

    0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21

    Anyway, I wanted to implement a recursive function to find the number at the nth place in the sequence so I came up with this:

    fn get_next_fib(nth: u32, start: u128, next: u128) -> u128 {
        if nth != 0 {
            get_next_fib(nth - 1, next, start + next)
        } else {
            next
        }
    }
    

    If Rust allowed default args in their functions I would have defaulted the start and next args as 0 and 1 but I had to use a wrapper like this instead:

    fn get_fib(n: u32) -> u128 {
        if n < 3 {
            (n - 1).into()
        } else {
            get_next_fib(n - 2, 0, 1)
        }
    }
    

    This method allows me to generate the 187th number (The largest Fibonacci number that can be stored as an unsigned 128-bit integer) in around 14000 nanoseconds.

    I'm sure this is pretty slow implementation, but I thought it was a pretty clean solution.

    TIL my 100vw needs a max-width

    Mon Jan 25 2021

    TL;DR; If you want an element to be full screen and it's inside of a parent element that is full screen, use width:100% instead of width:100vw to avoid the scrollbar sized white space

    I'm not sure how I haven't come across this,or if I have, I don't remember. I was working on a layout and had a position: absolute; div, and I wanted it to be the width of the screen. I reached into my tool box of css and grabbed my trusty width:100vh;, but after I applied the style, I noticed an odd white bar on the right hand side of the screen.

    This is actually "a feature, not a bug", and it has everything to do with the scroll bar on the right side of the screen. Since the scrollbar is covering up the right 5px of the screen, when you tell the browser that you want your block to be the width of the screen, it thinks it's stealing those 5px away from your design and in response gives you an extra 5px that you can scroll to.

    A couple options I see are to apply a global rule to the body such as:

    max-width: 100%;
    overflow: hidden;
    

    Although this will leave you with some other problems down the road when items inside your 100vw block seem a little too close to the right side of the screen.

    A better option would be to set the max width of the block to 100% or even better, just use width:100%

    Wordpress Safari Date Field Polyfill

    Tue Jan 19 2021

    TL; DR; This is a plugin that includes the date-input-polyfill package to provide a picker for browsers that do not support date inputs such as Safari 13.1.

    Working on a site that uses Elementor, I noticed that their date picker element doesn't work on Safari 13.1 and decided to see if there were any polyfills out there for the date input field. I came across the date-input-polyfill package which seemed to fit the bill and bundled it into a simple plugin you can download here.

    UPDATE: After going through the process of testing this out further, I noticed a "Native HTML5" option in the Elementor date field. Elementor has already solved this problem for me haha 🤦‍♂️.

    But in case I ever run into a situation where I need to make a HTML5 date picker cross-browser ready, I have the plugin for the job.

    Dangerous "As" – Typescript

    Thu Dec 17 2020

    TL;DR

    Do This:

    const car: Car = someObj
    

    Not This:

    const car: Car = someObj as Car
    

    Or This:

    const car: Car = <Car>someObj
    

    I'm still pretty new to Typescript,

    and until today I thought that I should type my objects this way:

    const car = {
      color: "RED",
      drivetrain: "AWD",
    } as Car
    
    interface Car {
      color: string
      drivetrain: "AWD" | "2WD" | "4WD"
    }
    

    It wasn't until I was seeing undefined property errors that I decided to take a look at what the "as" keyword is actually doing here. Up until this point, I thought that what I was doing was typing const car to the interface Car. What the as keyword actually does, is forces whatever object I'm defining into that type.

    What makes this dangerous, is that when you typecast an object like this, the compiler will not warn you of missing properties and will give you a false sense of security because you're not seeing compilation errors. For example, this will still compile even though we didn't include a color property:

    const car = {
      drivetrain: "AWD",
    } as Car
    
    interface Car {
      color: string
      drivetrain: "AWD" | "2WD" | "4WD"
    }
    

    With this in mind here's the code above written in a type-safe way:

    const car: Car = {
      color: "RED",
      drivetrain: "AWD",
    }
    
    interface Car {
      color: string
      drivetrain: "AWD" | "2WD" | "4WD"
    }
    
    How to find available IP addresses when DHCP isn't working (Guide for Macs)

    Wed Dec 16 2020

    I needed to set my laptop to a static ip because the router's DHCP service wasn't issuing me one regardless of how many times I renewed it. I found this Stack Exchange Article that featured a really handy terminal command:

    ifconfig | grep broadcast && arp -a
    

    This produces a list of all devices (and their IPs) that respond to the broadcast. My network was pretty small, and the IPs are in order so you can find a gap that doesn't seem to have a device and try it out.

    Vegan Szechuan Celery Squash

    Sat Sep 12 2020

    A delicious alternative to the Szechuan Eggplant I love to order that answers the question: "What do I do with all of this celery?"

    Ingredients:

    • 1 Tbsp Sesame Oil
    • 1 Tbsp Walnut Oil
    • 1 Tbsp Coconut Oil
    • 1/2 Tsp Red Pepper Flakes
    • 2 Tbsp Fresh Grated Ginger (Divided)
    • 4 Cloves Garlic (Divided)
    • 2 Tbsp Corn Starch
    • 6 Stalks of Celery 4 stalks diced, 2 stalks sliced diagonally
    • 2 Large Carrots
    • 1/8 cup Dark Soy Sauce
    • 1/8 cup Light Soy Sauce
    • 2 TBSP Maple Syrup
    • 1/2 cup frozen peas

    Phase 1 Preparation

    • Heat sesame oil over high heat until shimmering.
    • Add two peeled and crushed cloves of garlic, 1 Tbsp grated ginger and stir and cook until garlic is blackened.
    • Add walnut oil and diced celery, sliced squash, and sliced carrots to pan to stir fry.

    Prepare Sauce

    • With a whisk or immersion blender add red pepper flakes, 2 cloves of minced garlic, light and dark soy sauce, maple syrup, coconut oil, and corn starch. Mix thoroughly.

    Combine

    • When the squash is soft from stir frying for approx. 8-10 minutes, add the sauce mixture and sliced celery to the pan. Stir until all veggies are thoroughly coated with sauce.
    ThreeSixty

    Sat Sep 12 2020

    Today I did a weird and silly thing.

    Seasons

    Thu Sep 10 2020

    For several years now, I have observed a tendency in myself. I go through seasons of incredible motivation and seasons of an incredible lack of motivation. It sounds like it could be Bipolar disorder, though I don't think I can really diagnose this in myself. Besides, I'm not convinced that it's something worth knowing for sure. I did think it would be interesting to use the blog as a little bit of an experiment. Blogging daily no matter how big or small is something I believe I should be able to do as long as I stay motivated. I believe that the amount of content I put fourth on my blog may serve as an indicator of the kinds of mood cycles I got through, and may also be useful for for someone diagnosing me in the future.

    Creating a CSS Garden

    Wed Sep 09 2020

    I've always wanted to have a simple test bed for trying out new CSS, and recently heard of this concept of the "digital garden." I finally created a place on my site where I can create cool things, and try new CSS.

    Check it out.

    Multitasking Myths

    Tue Sep 08 2020

    Some stories I tell myself:

    "This automated task is going to take a while, I guess I can watch this quick video, or browse reddit while I wait."

    "I can leave this video on while I work, it's nice to have something to listen to."

    "This content is educational."

    Some better stories:

    "This automated task is going to take a while, I guess it's time to find a low-overhead task to complete in the mean time."

    "If I can leave this video on while I work, I'm accepting that the work I'm doing isn't very valuable, and neither is the video."

    "This work is educational."

    Shipping Art

    Mon Sep 07 2020

    I'm 6 days into my "Sacred September", and here are a few of the things I'm implementing into my life:

    • 90% Vegan diet
    • Lower than 1% processed sugars diet.
    • Awake before 6.
    • Asleep before 11.
    • Journal every day.
    • Create something every day.
    • Cold showers.
    • Run every morning.
    • Reduced meaningless phone usage.
    • Leave phone behind.

    Each one of these has been fairly consistent with a few slip ups here and there. What I'm finding is that in spite of a heavy lack of motivation that I've been feeling for the last 2-3 months. I'm not sure which of the above items is most responsible for these emotional changes I'm feeling but I can say that in my life taking cold showers has been a common thread for me during seasons of positive change. If Steven Pressfield is right, by taking a cold shower every day I stand on the battle field every morning and face the resistance of experiencing the cold water. That iota of victory over the resistance takes a toll on my psychology and reminds me that I have to fight this same resistance in other areas of my life.

    As part of my creative output, I have been thinking a lot about this site. Diving back into some Seth Godin, I was reminded of this idea of blogging every day as a way to ship art. I'm not sure blogging every day is in the cards for me as a new dad with a full time job and moonlighting code-slinger, but I do like the idea of getting back into producing something creative on a regular basis. For me that was what my "Sacred September" was all about.

    If it's anything like my previous attempts at a regularly scheduled blog creative endeavor, I know that the first one is the easiest. We shall see if I fall victim to the resistance in the future.

    Quickbooks documentation did not work for me, but this did.

    Sun Apr 05 2020

    The Problem

    In Quickbooks Enterprise 2019 I could start in Single-user mode, but if I tried to start in multi-user I could not. I ran through every single utility in the QBTool kit to no avail.

    When I scanned for the company file in the QB database utility, I'd get a message the QBDBMgrN was not running. In services.msc, the two main Quickbooks services would not start even after setting them all to keep trying after all consecutive failures. I also reconstructed the file.

    My firewall ports were fine.

    After reading this article from Quickbooks, and trying all of the recommendations, I resorted to uninstalling the application.

    This still didn't work. I kept getting the same exact error when I tried to switch to multi-user mode. I realized that I had a bunch of Quickbooks files left over even after uninstalling so I deleted all of the files in:

    C:\ProgramData\Intuit
    C:\Program Files x86\Intuit
    C:\Users\$userprofile\AppData\Temp\Intuit
    

    Deleted all qb users on the server.

    After reinstalling this still didn't work.

    The solution:

    Uninstall with Revo Uninstaller. Use the advanced scan to check the registry and nuke all of the leftover QB garbage. Then reinstall the app. Hopefully this helps someone out.

    Related errors

    Error 6175,0 QuickBooks was unable to back up your company file

    Fat Cat

    Fri Feb 03 2017

    I would definitely like to spend some more time getting the shadows to look better. I definitely like the concept. fat cat-02

    Screen Shot 2017-02-03 at 9.54.48 AM

    A professional cameraman's tips on choosing gear.

    Fri Feb 03 2017

    I happened to be in the right place at the right time to meet a cameraman working for a local new station. During this fortuitous encounter, I got to ask a few questions about his gear, and tips.

    Camera choice: Panasonic GH5

    While he was fairly adamant about Sony fs5 and fs7 being great for the professional, he was just as passionate about the GH5 as an option for professionals and enthusiasts.

    Why? It's an affordable mirrorless camera that shoots 4k. He got into the technical details, but I'm not even going to try to discuss what advantages and disadvantages there are to the camera. I did learn a bit about the MFT (Micro Four-thirds) system, which is very intriguing and gave me some insight on the varying specs across the board.

    Tip 1: Buy used on Lens Authority.

    I had never heard of them before, but if you're looking for a way to buy a camera on the cheap and don't like eBay, this is a good place to go.

    Tip 2: Use a white balance card and adjustable light panels to get the right temperature for your shots.

    When I walked in the room, I felt like I was stepping onto a TV set, because I was. The bright LED panels made all of the difference and are one of the reasons television looks more professional. I always associated temperature with the weather, but in film-making, it means a whole lot more. Understanding temperature and making the appropriate lighting adjustments is crucial for getting a professional look. The white balance card lets you adjust the lighting to be conducive for the best shot by showing you a perfect white vs a reflective white that picks up other colors.

    Tip 3: Check out Philip Bloom

    He's a great resource for learning about what gear to use, and how to become a better filmmaker.

    These may be extremely basic tips, but for me, they were all new and very helpful as an inexperienced filmmaker.

    Hydro blast

    Thu Feb 02 2017

    If you know me, you probably know that I love Hydroflask and use their bottles to keep my thirst quenched and my mind PUMPED. Today's design is a tribute to my love with a loud retro colors scheme that I hope will punch your eyeballs in a good way.

    Hyrdo blastScreen Shot 2017-02-02 at 9.40.59 AM

    some like it-05 Hydro do you even-04

    Mahlkonig Grinder

    Wed Feb 01 2017

    For the month of February, I'm uploading a daily design to sharpen my skills.

    **Why? **Lately, I've been coding ALOT. I love working that part of my brain, but I've been missing spending time in illustrator just making stuff.

    I'll upload stuff for clients or for personal projects, but the point is I'm forcing myself to ship something.Image result for Mahlkonig

    Today's design is inspired by the really nice Mahlkonig EK43 Grinder I sit across from all day every day at the coffee shop I work out of. It's truly a beautiful piece of machinery and I had a blast making this really simple side profile illustration of it. I included all of my revisions to show the thought process as I moved towards the finish. I started with basic shapes and moved through various iterations until I came to something acceptable.

    GRINDING

    How to fall asleep when your mind won't stop running.

    Wed Feb 01 2017

    I've been up since 5. It's 12 pm and I've got 5 more hours before I have to get up and do the whole thing over again.

    • No, I didn't drink too much coffee.
    • Yes, the room is dark and free of clutter.
    • Yes, I've tried breathing exercises.
    • Yes, I've tried counting down in a linear fashion from 1000(actually this method usually helps me out a lot).
    • Yes, I have two cats that wait until 12 to sprint around the house and knock everything over.
    • No, I haven't checked social media even once today.( This has been something I've been working on since September)

    Despite my knowledge of late-night snacks being a terrible decision (really tired people do this to avoid drinking water),  I'm hunched over my kitchen counter pounding the keys on my computer while eating a bowl of ramen and pita chips. So what's my problem?

    The Problem: Tomorrow's grass looks greener than today's grass.

    I'm excited for tomorrow. It's like being a kid on Christmas Eve. When you start to realize the opportunities you have, and you are inspired to do something about them, you just feel the need to start creating things. I dabble in a ton of different creative mediums so it can feel almost overwhelming to consider all of the possibilities for my day. At the same time, I'm **stressed **because I have a ton of other stuff going on that needs my attention.

    Here are the two ways to solve this problem:

    1. Blog, journal, whatever floats that boat and lets you plug into your creative outlet. – I have discovered that I can usually end up with more sleep if I just knock this one out. Rather than trying to bore yourself to sleep by reading Don Quixote, or counting sheep, try creating something.
    2. Acknowledge and write down your expectations for tomorrow. – If you're tracking with me so far on the super eagerness for tomorrow, then I think this tip is really helpful. Take a sec to write down the 5 things you want to see happen tomorrow. I feel like it's a way to give myself permission to sleep and let tomorrow worry about itself.

    Here's my 10:

    1. Finish the algorithms section of freecodecamp.com
    2. Create and share my first design for my new month resolution of 28 days of graphic design.
    3. Create a basic user flow sheet for the new ghettifish site.
    4. Get my client work knocked out early in the day.
    5. Follow up with everyone I'm working with.

    That's it. Stupidly simple, and yet I feel like somebody lifted a uhaul truck off of me.

    night.

    Questions for someone who moved to Alaska

    Thu Dec 15 2016

    [caption id="attachment_686" align="aligncenter" width="2048"]img_9814](https://nicbovee.com/questions-someone-moved-alaska/img_9814/) Photo by @youngbex[/caption]

    Hi it's Nic.

    As always with my on-again-off-again style of maintaining this blog  I'm now back at it again with a new post. I'm eager to get back to writing and feel like I've been telling myself the classic story of "too busy: a procrastinators tale" over and over again for the past month and a half now.

    I'm structuring this post a little differently than my previous posts. I absolutely cannot afford to give myself the 1-2 hours I usually take to write the blog and ship the blog. Because of this I've decided to create a time constraint and a subject constraint to help me communicate as much as possible with as little text as needed.

    Today's blog is brought to you by my good friend Todd Anderson who (without realizing it) reminded me that people out there care and want to know how we are doing with the newly married life, Alaska living, and all of the other craziness that comes with life transitions. He asked a few questions that I feel necessitated a proper response. There are so many people out there who have supported both of us through this transition and so I feel like I owe it to everyone to give you somewhat of an update. I'm giving myself 30-mins. to write it.  Here we go:

    img_4435

    How are you?

    This is a question I get asked almost every single day, and I think the "canned messages" center of my brain is probably tired of handing out the typical "I'm fine" or "I'm great" responses. My honest to goodness answer when I consider all of the aspects that matter in my life is that it just depends on the day of the week. Dani and I have adjusted well to married life (although I know there's work on my end to be the man that she needs). Because I'm a new business owner, my mind puts me in a valley in between the: "I'm going nowhere with my life and should probably just work at Starbucks for the rest of my life" and "This is scary but I can really make something of this business if I really go for it." I think stress bleeds through from this aspect of everything into the rest of my life. Overall things are peachy and I couldn't be happier to be living with Dani in such a beautiful and dark place of the world.

    How's work?

    Ever since March, I have been pushing harder than ever to build my business into this "dream job" I had envisioned when I started the thing off. It's been 9 months now and I feel like I'm at the place I wanted to be in two weeks when I started. It's been a personal journey more than anything else and it has been anything but a stable typical job. It's the "starving artist" lifestyle with the freedom, experiences, pain, and joy that come along for the ride.

    Community?

    The community in Anchorage is cool. I think something I noticed early on that I really appreciate is that it blends a city with the wildness that occupies the outlying territory. There are ton's of college kids all super focused on their studies, and at the same time you have people who are working their butts off to come up with something that will stabilize the economy now that the oil industry is not as great for AK as it used to be. Dani and I are apart of the Alaska Chamber Singers which has given us a really cool view inside of some lives that have been here for over 50 years. It's really amazing to hear some of the history told from someone else's perspective and then get to look around and imagine how different the territory was when they got here.

    Friends?

    Dani and I both were really nervous about this when we left. Moving 3000+ miles away from everyone you know, to a place where you only two people is something that neither of us could fully grasp. At first it was just us. On days when one of us would be at home alone we would both experience homesickness and constantly dwell on everything we left. It was out of desperation one Sunday morning that I went and visited a church that happens to be a block away from where we live. It was here that I met most of the people we have grown very close to in a short period of time. I was invited to workout with the group and I just feel like the Father has been answering prayers and needs within my heart left and right.

    Don't wait... CREATE

    Fri Oct 07 2016

    You probably don't feel ready.

    No one ever is.


    Most people wait to "be creative" because they are holding out for the perfect idea, the polished final product, or the right time to come along.  Creative people most of the population refer to as "original" aren't doing it by chance. These are people who got inspired by their heros and made something that they thought their heroes would make. Eventually they discover their own blend of creativity and that's where the magic happens.

    Two thoughts:

    Accept that you are influenced by others.

    Use those influences to mix and create your own thing.

    1. Don't judge it, and let it fly before it's ready.

    In this way you give the world the greatest gift: a part of your unique identity and interests.


    If you are the type of person who wants to be creative (you are and just don't know it yet), _I strongly encourage you to check out the book [Steal Like an Artist](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0761169253/ref=asli_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0761169253&linkCode=as2&tag=ghettifish-20&linkId=af6268e776076d6163a270c5d9e0d1f8).


    BTW, the new episode of Tread Wonder is up!

    Tread Wonder-Part 1: Goodbye

    Fri Sep 30 2016

     Tread Wonder Episode 1 is here!

    We I'm so excited to finally have this ready for people to look at. Dani and I have had a marvelous time since we left and we are continuing our adventures everyday.

    It's hard to believe it's almost been **two months **since Dani and I got married and moved to AK. We've had so much fun and have appreciated the support from everyone who has joined us in the process.

    We are so excited to be sharing our first episode of _Tread Wonder _with you today!

    I hope you enjoy and share with people you think could also enjoy it.

    [embed]https://youtu.be/Bzvn3Ajhb_o[/embed]

    We have a name picked

    Fri Sep 23 2016

    My wife (Still getting used to saying this after a month of being married) and I have been working for a while now on coming up with a name for our vlog.

    We've been filming our experiences since we started the process of getting married and moving to Alaska. The goal of this vlog is to remind us of how much joy you can find in everyday life if you are looking for it, and to inspire people along the way. Getting married and making the jump to Alaska when neither of us have ever lived out of the state felt huge, but it is turning out to be the best decision we've ever made.

    Today I'm excited to announce that we have a name, and a logo.

    Tread Wonder

    Two words.

    "Wonder" happens within every single person on the planet if we let it. Dani and I are tasked with searching the planet  to find new bits of it in our everyday lives. We are both so excited to finally be getting into sharing some of the experiences we've had together with everyone who has been so supportive in making the transition happen. I'm hoping to have the first episode completely finished by the next time I publish my blog and will be posting the link everywhere including our instagram profile: @treadwonder

    The best part:

    Since the first episode isn't 100% ready, we thought the least we could do is share our intro sequence with you.

    Trading media for time

    Fri Sep 16 2016

    Today marks three weeks of my Month Minus Media.

    On the 25th of August I pledged to unplug from social media for a month.

    Since I made this change I've been able to look at my schedule and see 2 hours every day spent doing things that provide value to others. Where I would normally fill in: "watched YouTube", or "looked at Facebook".

    I spent on average 14 hours a week minimum on activities as a consumer of media. At this rate by the age of 80 (if I even get to live that long) I would have spent 5 years of my life consuming media online.

    Our time SHOULD be the most valuable thing in our lives, but it isn't.

    Worldly resources, whether or not they are valuable in monetary form always lose their value when their owner runs out of time. Worldly resources are always available to those who do what needs to be done to acquire them but there is no way to buy more time.


    Social Media is special makeup for humans like you and me who want to know we're accepted.

    In order to be accepted we create clothing made from only the best parts of our reality. We don them as we casually stroll down the streets of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. It gives us a place to see all sorts of people. It helps us find out where (we think) we stand in our hierarchy of life.

    Are you in a better position than they are?

    Are you in a worse position?

    Everyone wants to know where they fit into their world.

    At the cost of the only thing in your life that is truly valuable, you can find out too.

    Is it new, or is it you?

    Fri Sep 09 2016

    Moving to a new place is weird. Everything that is new to you is just part of the territory.

    My first day in Alaska people were cutting me off over and over again. I thought: "This is new for me, Alaska is wild. People must drive like this because that's the territory". When I brought this up to a local at the store,  they told me: "That isn't a quality of an Alaskan, that's the quality of a jerk who's in a hurry".


    Through the lens of the untrained beholder everything is accepted as a native part of the environment. Through that lens everything stands out, thus nothing stands out.

    Whenever we learn something new, we try to recognize patterns to help us discern the normal from the abnormal. Through the eyes of a beginner there are no challenges, just uncharted territory. When it comes to our lives, we use everyone else's life to build our patterns. We gage our position based on where we think everyone else is.


    Our life is now familiar territory. Everything new that we face is something that WE have to "deal with". "How could this happen to me?" and "My life sucks"  have become the anthem that we gladly sing any time we have the chance.

    The alternative is to live as someone who has never experienced life before. That person could glide over the same territory the rest of us trudged through, unknowingly conquering that which was deemed impossible by everyone else.

    Why I need to subtract

    Fri Sep 02 2016

    "Weniger, aber besser"

    -Dieter Rams


    In english: "Less, but better"

    Build small, then refine.

    "Not enough" is a state of mind

    fabricated by those who sell "more".


    **"Not enough time", **

    becomes:

    "Better, in less time".

    Groove in life, and don't let it get "thrown off"

    Thu Sep 01 2016

    It's tough to pickup a groove.

    Rhythm can be heard or written into music, the musician is responsible for getting in a groove.

    There is no way to describe the groove, and the only way you know you where in it is when it's thrown off. Grooves help the musician make decisions without having to think too much.

    Four things that get me into my "groove":

    1. **No Media. - **This hasn't been something I've always been specifically conscious of. I recently had the realization that I'm a media addict. Eliminating media and primarily shifting my mentality from "consumer" to "contributor" has given me a very black and white code to live by.

    1. **Consistent Delivery- **I found small things to deliver on in the morning. For myself it's getting a brief work out in. Since I've been married, I have found that making breakfast and lunch before taking her to work is also something that I can be consistent on. It sets the tone for my day and pulls me into "my groove".

    1. **Timing- **I have a monkey brain and find it hard to concentrate sometimes. When I set a time for myself I'm creating an estimate for how long I think something will take. With the time ticking down it's hard to get off track. I'm a big believer in using time rather than spending it.

    1. **Recording- **Time just like money should be tracked and managed in order to effectively harness the power that comes with it. That's why I record my time to look back and see what I did. No one likes to look back on a day and say: "Where did my day go?" No one likes to look at their bank account and say "I wonder what I spent it all on?"

    It's not a perfect groove by any means but these are very small things I've noticed over the year when I've been operating at peak performance.

    My groove

    It's day 6 of my "Month Minus Media" and I finally feel like I'm getting used to ignoring it. I've been very close to hopping on YouTube, or checking Facebook, but so far I'm staying strong.

    This morning for the first time I pulled myself out of bed at a time I am relatively proud of: 6am. It gave me enough time to get a quick workout in and make a good breakfast for my wife and I.

    As a result, I'm feeling amped today and excited to tackle my first project of the day: Goals for September.

    Getting in the groove is easier when you aren't watching everyone else's grooves.

    Perhaps tomorrow my groove will wake me up even earlier.

    Ghettifish inc. psst-03

    Day 5

    Wed Aug 31 2016

    Day 5 and I've slacked a little on writing posts everyday.

    My last post discussed a schedule that I would like to adhere to in order to get into a routine. The day I wrote that was the day I went to pick Dani up at 1am. Needless to say "Wake up at 4:45" became a dream.

    I have been keeping up with a regular exercise regimen which has been beneficial. My next step is creating a habit of charting out my day.

    I've been reading the book SCRUM which has taught me a ton of interesting info about how people especially teams work together to get things done. I've been using this knowledge to create "sprints" for myself through out the day.

    Example:

    Sprint objective: Write wordpress post that can be read.

    Time: 10 minutes

    Completed?: Yes.

    Another Day

    Sun Aug 28 2016

    Feeling better today with getting more into the swing of not constantly looking at media all day. I'm interested to see what this will do on my work week.

    Yesterday I thought about the importance of routine. I'd like to make part of my daily blog a report on exactly how that routine works.

    Proposed routine

    • 4:45am - Rise and shine, make the bed, drink Water
    • 5am - Run for 15 minutes, upper body work out for 10 minutes. Cool down walk for 5 minutes
    • 5:30am - Read the bible/pray
    • 5:45am - Cold Shower
    • 6 am - Day plan blocks for the day. These blocks must result in something that someone ineteracts with.
    • 6:45am - Start breakfast
    • 7:15am - get Dani up
    • 7:45am - eat breakfast
    • 8:15am - Check email and get to Inbox 0
    • 8:45am - Get everything together, take Dani to work.
    • 9:15am - arrive at coffee shop/Start Block 1
    • 10:15am - Start Block 2
    • 11:15am - Start Block 3
    • 12:15pm- Head home for lunch
    • 12:45pm- Head back to work
    • 1pm- Start block 4
    • 2pm- Start block 5
    • 3pm- Start block 6
    • 3:30pm - Pick Dani up
    • 4pm - Start block 7
    • 5pm- Make Dinner
    • 6:30pm - Start block 8
    • 7:30pm - Review The day's sprint
    • 8:00pm - Done with computer, switch to reading/cleaning/ anything else.
    • 9:00pm - Bedtime

    In theory this should work great but things always come up so it's important to leave some blocks open until later in the day.

    I'm looking into the scrum method and seeing if there is any way to implement this into my life even though I am just one individual. Went to a new church today. Great people. Might have made a few friends.

    No Content Found

    Sat Aug 27 2016

    First day out and I'm not good at this. I can tell already I'm going through withdrawal from all of the distractions I'm used to filling my time with.

    I desperately look for things to fill my time with to avoid being productive on anything that matters. Articles, books doodling, whatever it takes to keep me from doing the work.

    I ignored my alarm clock and slept till 8. Went for a walk. It's now 10:30 and I'm sitting down to start working. My goal today is to finish one of the most stressful and large project I've ever taken on.

    I need a routine.

    Consumption to Contribution

    Fri Aug 26 2016

    Here's a quick update on my life since my last post.

    • Quit my job and started a company.
    • Got married to the love of my life.
    • Moved 3,000 miles away to Alaska.

    During all of this I've been feeling my life running away from me, like I never have enough time and I'm not living a life I can be proud of. I'm 100% positive that I'm not the first person to try this and definitely not the first person to make this observation:

    Media is killing me.

    I only have so many hours in my life. Media is eating those hours away like a corrosive acid robbing me of experiences, and taking me away from other people in my life.

    I work on a computer so distraction in one form or another is imminent. The most pernicious of all forms of media is inspirational media. These are videos, images and posts all aiming to help us improve our lives. I have spent hours if not days watching these types of videos. I go through them like crack cocaine seeking the next video fix to help me feel like I'm making a positive change in my life.

    These videos suck me in.

    Once I watch one video, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc. they all know how to keep me hooked with videos that I will want to watch appearing right in front of me.  The challenging thing for me is that I actually work on these platforms creating media for companies and getting helpful info out to their audiences. I'm coming to a new conclusion about all of the videos that I spend my time on. There is nothing out there that will help me achieve a better life full of rich experiences. I don't care who the speaker is or what the message is. I am making a new oath to be a creator/contributor not a consumer/viewer.

    For the next 31 days I am committing to not watching videos, not looking at Facebook images, not watching movies.

    For some people these platforms are great and they are able to use them in moderation. That is not the case for me. I've lied to myself about why I haven't been doing very well financially, blaming it on the amount of work needed to get ready for my move and my wedding. Well now here I am in Alaska and I'm realizing that I am and have been the problem all along.

    I'd like to use this month to create for people, write posts, make videos, and actually get work done.

    As I move through this process I will take as many notes as I can to track and see how much of a difference this really has on my life. This is in order to take back my life, and do things that matter.

    My manifesto:

    From today August 26th until November 1st I'm reclaiming my life, reaching for my goals, and striving to help those in need around me by eliminating toxins from my day to day activities. I will remove and refuse to absorb anything from the following sites and activities:

    • YouTube
    • Twitter
    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • Snapchat
    • Reddit
    • Video Games (Including Phone apps)
    • Podcasts
    • Movies
    • Television Shows

    My life is too valuable to spend on these sites unless I'm actually doing the hard part in making a real contribution. I'm grounding myself to stay away from all of these platforms with the exception of making posts for work using third party apps to publish content.

    Signed - Nic Bovee

    [embed]https://youtu.be/Q2M5l16z2iA[/embed]

    Unlock 2,496 Vacation Hours.

    Fri Nov 20 2015

    File_005

    (tips are at the bottom)

    I’ve always had this idea that vacations have to be difficult.

    Growing up, my family always got really stressed out whenever we had to drive somewhere. My poor parents had to stay focused on avoiding all of the insane cross-country drivers and traffic jams from most people's nightmares. Meanwhile my brother, sister and I entertained each other by converting the back seat of our green Plymouth Voyager into a UFC fighting ring. It was never easy for my parents on trips and it made me feel like there was no way of traveling without stress. This isn't a post about traveling anywhere you want in the world with young kids. Even though I'm not a parent, I'd imagine that there would be a challenge to that no matter what "life hack" you have working for you. This is post about getting over a few hurdles that are holding people back from doing, creating, and discovering new and incredible weekends, and adding 2,496 hours of vacation time to your year.

    "I feel like going on a road trip but I don't know when we would go or where" My friend Robby said over a basket of boneless garlic parmesan wings. "What if we went to Mount Rushmore? It's only 6 hours away from Denver, and a friend of mine tells me it's a pretty cool road trip."

    None of us had any vacation time, and since it was already October we were running out of opportunities for snow-free driving. If we wanted to do it that year we were going to need to get on it, and make it happen.

    "What if we went this weekend?" I said half-jokingly.

    That's all it took.

    We left Saturday Morning and got back Sunday night. I got to see Mount Rushmore, and the (still uncompleted) Crazy Horse monument all over a short period of time that would have normally consisted of me binge watching Netflix in my underwear.

    Since then I've never been afraid to saying yes to the idea of a two-day adventure, and no to all of the things I would normally do over a weekend. This year we did a trip to the Grand Canyon from Colorado Springs Colorado.

    2 day weekend + 24 hours of driving + awesome landmarks + friends + snacks = an experience I'm glad I was willing to go after.

    File_001

    I emerged on the other side of this journey with some great pictures, a few stories, and a few little bits that I will chew on the next time I evaluate whether or not to do something like similar in the future. I’ll throw these out to you to consider the next time you have a weekend, a few friends and a destination in mind. If you’re a parent I’m sorry if this post doesn’t help you make road tripping easier, but perhaps you will find some other value in here that can add to your next road trip.

    Here are a few stories people tell themselves:

    • Planning a trip is difficult
    • Why would I go somewhere just to turn around and come back
    • It's going to feel like I didn't even get a weekend
    • I only have two days
    • I don't have the money for that

    When is the last time you had something other than "good" to say in response to the question "how was your weekend?"

    It's time to go do that thing you've always wanted to do but "never had the time for."

    Agenda's for the most part are useless for this kind of experience. Part of unlocking these two days will require accepting the events as they come, and embracing them as part of the story.

    We didn’t have an agenda or a schedule setup to make this trip happen but if we did it would look something like this:

    • 10:30pm Thursday Night - Meet roommate at Walmart to gather snacks
    • 11:00pm Thursday Night - leave for AZ
    • 2:00 am Friday Morning - Arrive in Gunnison Colorado to Pick up my girlfriend
    • 11:00am Friday Morning - Arrive at Grand Canyon National Park
    • Friday during the day - Frolic around and enjoy the wonders of the Grand Canyon
    • Friday night - Stay at hotel in Flagstaff
    • 8:00 am Saturday Morning - Head home
    • 9:00pm Saturday Night - Arrive at home

    Of course even though that was the idea, the actual trip ended up like this:

    • 10:30pm Thursday Night - Meet roommate at Walmart to gather snacks
    • 11:00pm Thursday Night- Roommate doesn’t feel well and isn’t sure he is going to be able to boot and rally
    • 12:00am Friday Morning - leave for AZ
    • 12:15am Friday Morning - Stop at Taco Bueno for their awesome 60 Cent taco deal
    • 1:00am Friday Morning - Finally on the road
    • 4:00 am Friday Morning - Arrive in Gunnison Colorado to Pick up my girlfriend
    • 6:30 am Friday Morning- Stop and get pictures of the sunrise over the beautiful colors of the aspens.
    • 12:30pm Friday Afternoon- Stop at four corners (another monument I’ve wanted to visit.
    • 3:00 pm Friday Afternoon - Arrive at Grand Canyon National Park
    • Friday for the remaining day- Enjoy the grand canyon, get pictures go to the gift shop and then head out for flagstaff.
    • Friday night - Go out on the town and stop at a dairy queen, then go to see the Martian, then stay at hotel in Flagstaff.
    • 8:00 am - Grab coffee with a friend who attends college in Flagstaff
    • 11:00 am Saturday Morning - Eat breakfast at an awesome diner
    • 12:30pm Saturday afternoon- head home
    • 2:00am Sunday morning - Arrive at home

    [caption id="attachment_497" align="alignright" width="300"]Victor and Robb](http://nicbovee.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/File_007.jpeg) Victor and Robb[/caption]

    Everybody knows that trips never go the way you think they are going to go, but that’s not what’s important. What is important is recognizing that no matter what happens during the journey it’s up to you to accept everything that’s out of your control as the current reality, and focus your attention on all of the incredible upsides to the places you are experiencing and conversations you are having.

    In order to make this trip happen I needed to live with two ideas:

    I can live with less sleep for a few days

    The joy from traveling has less to do with the destination and more to do with the journey to the destination

    [caption id="attachment_501" align="alignright" width="300"]Great place to grab breakfast in Flagstaff](http://nicbovee.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/File_009.jpeg) Great place to grab breakfast in Flagstaff[/caption]

    I recognize that lack of sleep and sitting in a car for 24 hours is tough, but sitting at the end of my life thinking about all of the things I wish I could do is a lot harder. The trip to the Grand Canyon was a lot of fun and offered some incredible scenery, conversations and experiences. I realize now that this trip opened my mind up to a new realm of possibility. For most people, it’s un-thinkable to donate the few days you have free from commitments to creating an experience that will last your lifetime. You may not be able to change the things you are committed to during your work week, but you do have the ability to change your thought process about what you can accomplish over a two day break.

    Overlooking the Grand CanyonWith this new level of thinking I look at my weekends in a whole new light. Instead of “chilling out” watching Netflix, and dreading Monday morning, I see a chance to do something crazy. I can build something, go somewhere, learn, write, and explore.

    All of these things are available for you too.

    File_000 I offer a simple challenge: Take a look at what you’ve done for the last 5 weekends. Now design a weekend that is completely different from the average of your 5 past weekends. In this way you can come away from the weekend with a new outlook on life, and greet your Monday morning with stories about a weekend you dared to create.

    Here are 5 simple rules to follow to create memorable weekend experiences:

    **Pick a destination - **Choose a place that's outside of your comfort zone. a place that takes twice as long to get to as the usual place you might visit over a weekend.

    **Go with friends- **Find a few people you love spending time with who will go with you on this incredible journey. Make sure that these are people you get along with well. If you get 4 people together and are willing to share, the cost of a hotel room becomes a whole lot less.

    **Don't plan too much- **Stuff happens, and there isn't anything we can do about most of it. During a trip like this you must be willing to not take things to seriously and do your absolute best to focus your energy on only that which you can actually control.

    **Be prepared to not sleep- **Sleep as much as you can leading up to the trip, but recognize that in order to add some hours to your life you have to be willing to trade some of your time. You may not need to do this for closer locations, but anything over 8 hours away starts to wear on you. ( Having friends with you also helps here because they can take on some of the driving.)

    **Pretend like you are leaving the day before you actually are - **This seems really obvious but it's amazing how much better my adventures go if I pretend like I'm leaving the day before. Having a list helps with packing, but it's nice to not have the weight of hurrying to get ready to leave. No one wants to be the person that holds up the group.

    Bonus! See the beauty in everything - Focus on the beauty all around you. You may not live where there are lots of pretty things to visit fairly close by, but I'm sure there is somewhere that is different from what you are used to. Go find that place and look for the beauty that exists there. I know you can do it!

    Grand Canyon overlook

    New Actions for New Results

    Fri Sep 25 2015

    I'm sure you've experienced a similar frustrating scenario before:

    You're running late. You do one last check before leaving and notice that you are missing your keys. You run around your house frantically looking "everywhere" for a while. You then realize that you have looked in the same place on the counter almost 4 times now. It's like you created a Nascar track in your house and you keep running it over and over. At this moment when I experience this the phrase: "Insanity is defined as doing the same action twice and expecting a different result". The keys you are looking for are always in the place you look at for the first time.

    It's such a simple realization in the moment. I have to wonder how many of us get up in the morning, go and live our days and then wonder why we aren't living the super satisfying lives we always dream about. I think it's time to stop hoping that at some point in our search, the keys will be on the counter, and time to start exploring places we know we haven't checked yet.

    It seems weird to live by focusing on what you have already done, and then doing something completely different. I think it is exactly what we need to find the thing we have been looking for all of these years.

    Three things I've learned about the art of rising early

    Fri Sep 18 2015

    I've been an on again off again morning person for a while now. The process of waking up early for me seemed to go like this:

    1. Pick a number that will make people cringe, and set your alarm for that time everyday.
    2. Create a morning process that will pull you out of bed.

    3.Repeat this process everyday.

    There are two problems with that approach.

    Most people have lives that constantly throw new things at them making it difficult to create a pattern.

    You are more likely to create a pattern of failing like a failure when you don't jump out of bed exactly on time. There isn't room for consistency.

    I was a person with a standard of living and rituals that included Netflix, late nights with friends almost every night, waking up 10 minutes before I needed to leave for work, and drinking coffee to do it all over again. There are a ton of amazing books out there to help you become a morning person and seize the day, but I want to talk about the three most powerful discoveries I have made for myself in the process. Remember why you want to be a morning person in the first place. When you come up with a solid reason for why you are waking up, you can start to build a morning habit that actually works for you.

    The reason to try this: I need to invest in myself before my day begins. In this way I can elevate my mood and am better equipped for whatever the day has to throw at me.

    The basic ritual: Wake up at least 2 hours before my first appointment of the day. Go to sleep in order to allow myself 7 hours of sleep every night.

    The most crucial part to my success with this so far has been the night time ritual. Do yourself a favor and set a bed time, and isolate yourself from screens and people at a specific time. It's way easier to be intentional at the end of the day, so set yourself up for success.

    Here are three things to keep in mind if you're like me and want to see your days become more positive.

    Thing 1

    It's a fight against the body's feeling.

    Your body will tell you that you need to spend those hours sleeping because it isn't what you are used to. If our physical feelings when we wake up are mostly determined by chemicals in our body we must recognize that we are not fighting to get out of bed, we are fighting the chemicals that want us to stay down.

    Thing 2

    The value of waking up isn't in the number on your alarm clock.

    The value is in the lifestyle you create for yourself. The name of the morning game is "positivity". The value of your morning is up to you. The more enriching moments you create for yourself in the morning, the more "valuable" your morning can be. So be intentional and make a note the night before of the things that have the ability to make you feel happy.

    Thing3

    Accountability is a must.

    Find someone or something that will be waiting for you. Periscope has been an awesome way to have people waiting to see me wake up, even if they are just random people checking in.  I've also had a few weeks go by when someone I knew liked the idea and wanted me to text them to wake up.

    I'm on a journey to make it a habit. It will take me 66 days to form this habit. I look forward to sharing more about the process as I learn it.

    Are you really offering "constructive" feedback?

    Fri Sep 11 2015

    [caption id="attachment_455" align="alignleft" width="300"]28efabf02ea881d89514f659c29d27c0](http://nicbovee.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/28efabf02ea881d89514f659c29d27c0.jpg) The Engineered Workspace.[/caption]

    As a kid, my mother used to constantly remind me to "clean up my room".

    I had two main methods for doing this:

    Method 1(My method): Push everything in the closet and make my room look clean due to an absence of  toys and clutter that  had until that point covered the floor.

    Method 2(My mother's method): Take everything out of it's place, and spend time considering why I had placed it where i placed it and whether or not I could move it to somewhere better, or lose it all together.

    Method 1 allows me to show that I cared enough to give my room a pat on the shoulder, and get it to a point where it looked clean.

    Method 2 allows me to challenge the systems at play in my room. It gives me the opportunity to see if there is a better way to sort everything. Method 2 changes everything. It allows the room to stay clean even when I'm not occupying it. The well thought out systems can hold the room together as long as the next person stays true to them.

    As Seth Godin says: "The first rule of great feedback is this: No one cares about your opinion."

    If someone asks you for feedback, they are opening the door to their room and inviting you to clean it up. You can say something like "Good Job" or "This is great!" The problem with that kind of feedback is that it doesn't change anything. It doesn't improve anything. The same goes for the people who say: "this sucks" or "I don't get it". It serves no purpose. Start by asking why a certain decision was made.

    If someone asks you for feedback, challenge the ideas that they present and start a conversation with them about those ideas. If you challenge a component of the essay, building, web site, etc., one of two things will happen. The person receiving feedback will either have a great explanation for choices they made on that component and will defend it. The alternative is they will realize that whatever it is must be changed, and will change it.

    If the point of the constructive feedback is to build something better, do everyone (yourself included) a favor and start by challenging everything. Too many projects have failed because they left the gate saturated with the words of those who simply agree with the idea and move forward.

    Stop wasting time.

    Start challenging the smaller details.

    Ship something through challenges made by real people.

    Why I love Google's new logo (and why I didn't at first)

    Fri Sep 04 2015

    ** Do you love the new logo? Do you hate it?**

    On Tuesday morning of this week everyone in the world had a funny looking play button on the google icon when they used it. 

    I myself was one of these people. Even though I only click on about 5% of all of the doodles that Google has to offer, I was intrigued by the big blue Play button and had to find out what it all meant. After clicking it and learning that it was their way of announcing a new logo, I thought: "Hmm, I don't like it". To me it just ruined the classic flair that Google. Their old logo was timeless, and even though it went through changes over the year, it was not nearly as grand as this one. Switching to a completely different style of font just seemed wrong and I didn't think it looked like Google. 

    As I was thinking about it, it dawned on me. 

    Google is a change company.

    Sure they are a search engine company too, but the reason people work at Google has way more to do with the idea that a person can be "Googly". The dramatic change in the logo is a reminder of the dramatic changes they make in the world every day.

    It also reminds me that like most species in the planet, I'm averse to changes in my environment. The fact that my first response is to figure out what is wrong with it is an incredible reminder that change is happening around us all of the time. While it isn't helpful to jump on board with every change that's happening, I believe that it is important to spend time considering the possibility that the changes you've been writing off are the same changes that could change your life.

    The verdict on my latest gear - The Hydro Flask

    Tue Sep 01 2015

    I love Hydro Flask.

     

    Thing #1

    The Hydro Flask helps me drink more water.

    It seems like I can't go anywhere online or in real life, without this idea that "humans need water" shoved in my face. The funny thing is that when I drink more water, I don't feel terrible. Huh? Weird.

    Having a water bottle around helps me consistently remember to stay hydrated. It has really helped with my efforts to stay active on a daily basis. Drinking water throughout the day just feels right, and I think that the cold water is really what draws me to it. I really like knowing how many ounces of fluids I'm consuming every day.

    Thing #2

    It's sexy.

    In a way the bottle is a fashion statement. I've decked it out with stickers from places that I care about, and it's yet another way to express myself. The stainless steel, and powder coating make it an elegant addition to your daily carry gear. The metal is extremely shiny, which is awesome because I like shiny things. The rubber seal fits on perfectly and lets out a reassuring "Squeeeek" to let me know that it is on tight enough. The plastic that makes up the lid and lid holder feel sturdy and are made from high-quality BPA-free plastic. It has a small rubber grip around the circumference of the lid which ensures I can open it even after the Incredible Hulk gets his hands on it. 

    Thing #3

    Do you want cold water? Because this is how you get cold water.

    I didn't always like cold water. In fact, there is a vast amount of research that suggests that human beings are better off drinking room temp or even warm water. Now I love cold water, and there isn't anything more satisfying in the summer heat, as taking a delicious swig from a nice cold water bottle. This bottle is insane. I've left it in the car where it has gotten so hot I can hardly touch it, and the water inside is still cool. For hot drinks I kept tea in it, and was able to have hot tea throughout the day. I'm also looking forward to snowboard season when I don't have to worry about my water bottle freezing like it has in the past. 

    1 month verdict: I love it

    So far so good. I have yet to find anything I don't like about it, and I should find something before too long. If you are someone who is in the market for a water bottle, this is for you. If you are someone who wishes their Nalgene kept things cool, shell out 34 bucks and give it a go.

    You can get them at your local REI store or head over to their site, and see all of their swag.

    You're invited to take a risk and ship

    Thu Jul 30 2015

    [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYTbMzxGRHk[/embed]

    Shipper Shop Complex-01

    Would you take a risk if it was the only way to change your life?

    We are all scared of failing. We are scared of making mistakes. We are held back from standing up and changing something because we're worried that it will hurt our image, or alienate us from our community.

    At the end of the altMBA we were told that the final project is to put together a small event. I decided to make my event about change. ShipperShop is for people who are ready to take action, and change something in order to move closer to a lifestyle of passion. It is also about creating an environment where we can challenge one another to dig deeper.

    If you or someone you know is looking for a place to test ideas, take action, and help others do the same, share this with them. We would love to see them there!

    Join us on the Thursday August 13th! Be one of the 30 people making a change and shipping.

    To sign up go to www.shippershop.com

    Brainstorming

    Thu Jul 23 2015

    A brief update

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6N0ks8-acgs&feature=youtu.be

    Brainstorming

    Brainstorming is a simple concept. Pick the topic, set the number of ideas you want to create, and come up with all of them. The hardest ones will be at the end. They will create a place for only thoughts that seem off the wall. 

    My team came up with a list of 500 or so ideas, and then we narrowed it down to our 99 favorite.

    Blurt the answer and move on without worrying about what people will think about it.

    99 Micro Biz Plans (Yolk D, Project 3)

    June 21, 2015

    Here are 99 micro business plans. We probably came up with a few hundred at least and whittled it down to these. Looking forward to your honest thoughts.

    Yolk 1-D Week 1 group members: (these link to each other’s altmba)

    Seth Perler, Boulder, CONic Bovee, Colorado Springs, COYves Farges, Vancouver, BC CanadaMarcus Turner, Denver, CO

    99 Micro Biz Plans

    “IndieEd Network” - A new idea in education. A network connecting homeschoolers, unschoolers, people who are not enrolled in traditional schooling so they can help each other. There is a great need for these folks to get guidance to fill in the gaps with educating their kids. Many do not have education backgrounds and become overwhelmed.Micro schooling - An idea for a new type of school that is community run. A structure for how to implement it, completely nontraditional, creative, free, open. Let the design of these schools be driven by this question: What would be the coolest way in the world to create a school that best empowers learners to make their dent in the universe?Strength school - What if there was a school that was designed to build upon the strengths of the students? What if the teachers were skilled at helping students create and execute projects that were personally meaningful? What if students learned to execute projects, including all steps, from ideas to creation? This is not about perfection, it is about trying to build things that have purpose to the student. These things would require multiple disciplines and the teachers would serve as guides and mentors to walk students through the disciplines as well as managing the projects. There are no grades because it is not about compliance. There are self evaluations and evaluation meetings with mentors.Teacher coworking- Creating a coworking space for teachers who are NOT employed by schools but still want to teach, they teach homeschool classes, unschool, etc their way, for their pay. New paradigm based on the idea that teachers are artists and should be empowered to develop their craft rather than depend on following curriculum designed by big business. Teachers are seen and treated as professionals. What if there was a place where teachers could work together, inspire each other, support each other. What if teacher could develop their craft, set their own goals, build their own microbusinesses? What if there was a place where people could bring their kids, choose their classes, choose their teachers, do projects that are meaningful to the kids? What if teachers were trained to, rather than follow the curriculum prescription, they were trained to develop their strengths as teachers? What if teachers choose what classes to teach based on their passions and expertise? What if teachers made their own schedules? What if parents and teachers were empowered to collaborate in building the most engaging courses possible, as partners? What is these teachers were “freelance” teachers? It’s a new way to approach education. What if there were various classroom configurations and sizes that teachers could use to plan their expeditions with all materials you could possibly need?Education coach training - Teach people to become education coaches. Educational coaching is a brand new field that helps struggling students who don’t fit into the proverbial box, navigate the outdated system effectively. It holistically helps with advocacy, executive function issues, social issues, emotional issues, academics, study skills, etc..Gap life - A business that guides kids through how to have life-changing gap years. Many kids are not ready for college but go straight after high school. An increasing number of kids are following Europe’s lead and taking gap years, years where they can have other experiences working, traveling, serving, etc.. This business would help families map out and execute safe and enriching experiences tailored to an individual’s strengths, interests, talents, values and passions.Festival - So many people want to reform education. I’m not speaking about the corporate reformers! Noooooo, I mean other people who are itching to see change. What if there was an Educatio disrupt festival with bands, celebrities with learning disabilities, celebrating strengths, talents, and other things that aren't measured on tests??? What if it was constructed so that changemakers were speakers, if it was fun, if it empowered people to collaborate on small and large projects they could take back to their communities or on a bigger level? What if smaller changemakers came together to make NOISE so we can get education moving in a better direction much sooner!Student advocacy business - A problem I see all the time is that parents and their kids often do not have the tools or knowhow to advocate effectively. This business would consist of a few advocates who help families advocate in any and all ways necessary. They would help students learn to self-advocate. They would help parents know how to advocate by phone, email and in-person. They would advocate by supporting parents in the 4 main types of meetings; 504, IEP, RTI and conferences. They would help parents understand their rights and help them know when legal intervention is needed.A different type of service project - What if every school in developed countries had sibling schools or sibling projects. WHat if these were service based relationships? WHat if both sibling schools asked the other what they need and each year these communities tried to create something the other needed? What would these experiences do to help kids feel a part of a global community? How would these experiences of service influence how students think about the world? It’s not about the project, it’s about the process.Build your own curriculum app for homeschoolers- that starts with what you want to learn and helps you implement it. Many homeschoolers don’t have the experience to develop curriculum creatively or to know if they are covering all the bases. This would have questions the user would answer in relation to topics of study and it would build for them a framework they can adapt to their situation with suggestions.kid.safe.social.com - A premium, highly regulated social networking site that is 100% safe for kids. Extensive application process, fee based, geared towards dif ages, etc.. So parents KNOW their kids are safe online. This idea can be applied to a Kidsafe browser - premium browser managed by the company to guarantee kidsafe browsing. Eliminates the need for blockers and such. Could also be a Kidsafe laptop or phone.Executive function app: Executive function is the single most important concept for parents and teachers to understand if they are to help outside-the-box learners who are not meeting “potential”. Unfortunately, the literature on EF is not in layman's terms and people who think they understand it do not. What if there was an app with an assessment that then explained your EF style and things you could do to develop it? Game changer.Yoga coworking - A coworking space for yoga teachers (and the like) to mastermind, help each other grow as entrepreneurs, etc.. They could rent various sizes of spaces so they can create programming that they profit from. This empowers the little guy. It helps them learn the biz of yoga - Teaching yoga teachers how to be entrepreneurs so they aren’t slaves to the imbalanced system that keeps them poor.Build a guitar kit - Many guitarists come to a point where they want to take a stab at building a guitar. There are many ways to do this, there are companies that sell the individual parts, there are luthiers you can learn from, but after 25 years of playing, I have never seen a kit that walks a person through the entire process of building their own guitars.Flat rate airline - What if there was an airline that had flat rates? What if you went to their website and knew exactly how much it costs for various aspects of the service? No manipulating prices, no games, just honest and clarity regarding pricing.Bike microchip - Bike theft is a huge issue in many areas. A bike microchip could help locate stolen or lost bikes. The microchip could go down the frame and could be adhered permSmart camera - Many people want to become “real” photographers. In other words, they want to learn to use the manual settings on a camera. You can take classes and such, but what if there was a real dslr camera that taught you how to use the manual settings, that walked you through it step by step, shot by shot. You could use the guidance or just shoot, but the camera is designed to give you the knowledge necessary to master these powerful tools.A new take on healthcare - Huge problems with the healthcare system, what’s the solution? Perhaps a biz that vets indie health and wellness providers to insurance companies.Cancer advocates - A small company who seeks to to deal with the red tape that cancer patients deal with. They would do the research on the difficult questions, talk to the doctors, provide the client with an UNBIASED person on the side of the patient to help navigate a scary and confusing medical and insurance world.Homeless camp - Many of the homeless choose the lifestyle. The police are constantly looking for their “camps” and forcing them to “move on.” They don’t have anywhere to move on to. What if there was a “camp” that was designated as a safe place, a community area that supported the homeless?Fun.eral.com - We put the FUN in Funeral. For people who want to design their own funeral, particularly as a celebration of their lives. This would be a company who empowers the dying to design their ideal funeral in a celebratory manner, based on their wishes and values. Of course there would be support for people to go through their own grief process in a healthy manner. This does not in any way seek to make fun of or make light of the real need for healthy processing of grief.  But the point is that it breaks the status quo and allows people to choose a ceremony that is personally meaningful.Marijuana dependency help - I live in Colorado, and as the marijuana legalization is changing the business landscape, more and more people are experiencing difficulties with Marijuana dependency. More people are wanting help with these issues, and as the marijuana industry grows, it’s likely that the need for help with these issues will grow as well.Prison inmate support - What if there was a company who empowered inmates to contribute to a book that goes to prisons and gives inmates an option to send their thoughts to other parts in the world. What if Ex-cons who turned it around were paid to go back into the prisons and teach inmates how to make it back in the world?Custom in-ear headphones - Headphones often come with a few sizes of the rubber pieces that are inserted in the ear, and none of them ever seem to fit right. What if you could take a cast of your ear safely, ship it to the company and they made custom noise cancelling headphones for your ear!Lyme Disease Network - Lyme disease is a quickly growing problem, particularly in the Northeast. No longer can you get a tick without worrying if it carried Lyme. This disease has profound effects on the people who have it, from aches and pains to a debilitating lack of energy. Unfortunately, the word is spreading slowly for various reasons. This business would be a social networking site that educated and connected. THere would be a section with major articles, links to specialists, and other needed resources in one place.Sober nightclub - What if there was a clean and sober nightclub with music, comedy, entertainment for people who do not want to be around all the alcohol and drugs?Rugged Camp- A choose your own adventure experience

    Resources-Big Company Resources.

    This is a camp for doing burly, rugged things. You’ll need to grab an ax and run out to the forest and chop down a tree that you haul back to the cabin. You’ll learn how to hunt, and shoot better than ever with our professional training program. You’ll also get to be apart of several high adrenaline gravity sports such as; Rock climbing, mountain climbing, ropes courses, and cliff jumps. This is a company that provides a unique custom tailored value that caters to only the bravest, and adventurous customer segments. It will involve partnerships with companies that have access to this land as well as partnerships with outdoor gear and training companies. Unlike most baby’s first adult “Adventure” camps, this camp is only for people who take calculated risks and aren’t afraid of working hard for a thrill. The choo

    Anti-Topple Children’s Restaurant Seat-Business Resources - Venture CapitalistsThis is a high chair design based on the weebles toy you have as a kid. It features a patented design that keeps the kid up right no matter how much they rock around. The chair could be pushed down to the floor with a kid in it, and if you let go it will rock back to an upright position. It would be a nice change of scenery and appeal to restaurants looking for a quirkier way of offering a seat for kids. It could also appeal to parents looking for a booster around their table.High Quality Steady Cam setup for independent films-Business Resources- Venture CapitalistsThis is a camera that allows anyone to make a steady beautiful movie with an extremely good resolution, and all for a starting price of $199. Our value offerings would also include really high quality microphones and different filters, and editing suites and effects. The goal of this product is to make it even easier to produce high quality videos for YouTubeTrippy Visuals and EDM music all rolled into one site-Business Resources- Venture CapitalistsAn easy to access website to go to during parties that displays trippy visuals, sound bytes, image collections, etc. It would be monetized by letting artists sponsor the current song that is being played, and also displaying a easy to pull up playlist that lets you save the songs for later. No login required as long as they access it with a browser that caches the info. This would likely be used at parties with drunk people and needs to be simple to succeed.Hooters Gym - People that never went to a gym in their life, now have a reason to go, or maybe two reasons. Sexy motivational trainers that dress “appropriately” for the environment will motivate people to push themselves harder than ever before. It’s going to get sweaty. This is a subscription based revenue model with additional possibilities for a built in juicebar and weekly class options. The target demographic might be people that are just interested in the sex appeal of the gym, or they might just like it because of it’s awesome, well laid out, clean environment.Fire Code Preparation- This company would inspect new developments prior to any fire code inspection. They would ensure that all bases are covered and addressed so that they will not have to worry about missing any deadlines after inspection.Charitable Arcade with sponsorships for each machine. - An old fashioned arcade with renovated machines that allow for newer forms of payment. Each machine would be sponsored by a charity and would receive a percentage of all funds that come through its slots. There would also be a social media plugin that would allow you to tell people on your various social networks that you donated. You can also get special matching options that will double or triple the money that goes to the charity. This involves a minimum investment based on how well the charities receive the idea. In an urban area, this has the potential to generate plenty of revenue for the charities as well as the non-profit itselfComputer consultant that builds the course around your needs- Computer classes teach you things that are often irrelevant to how you personally use the computer. Our consultants review the average things that you do on your computer, and teach you how to do them better. These tips then get sent to you, and you are quizzed a month later by showing that you can adequately use the techniques.A box of discussion cards to ask a small group of people at a dinner party- It just takes one person in a community to spark a new revolution of people who are honest with themselves, and push themselves as a community to become better people. This product is a small box of cards that you would present during a dinner party among friends that present valuable philosophical ice breakers that delve into the hearts of the people around the table. People could answer the questions, then get involved in the online community who are also asking the questions. We would build the questions by presenting some of today’s philosophers with a list of items the question must satisfy. Ex- “What is it for” - Seth Godin. This would involve a partnership with a card manufacturing company, and a few pseudo-well-known thinkers. The resulting revenue stream would be the money made from the deck sales minus the delivery method and  product wholesale costs.Community driven Green house Grocery store. Grocery store?-Grocery store that lets you pull your produce right out of the ground. The innovative growing planters would be out in greenhouses with enough space to supply the demand, and would be loaded into special Semi-trucks that can move the produce into the city and into the growcery store. This would have to be in an urban environment near farmland in order to be able to restock.Biodegradeble office supply company- For the company that wants to go truly green, this company would be the Sprouts or Whole Foods market of office supply stores. High quality staplers, pens, pencils, ink toner, paper, and more. Everything that we sell could be composted in only a few months. On top of all of that, customers would have a portion of their purchase donated to projects that are helping develop sustainable living solutions for people on earth.Bouncy Chair Office store - Office supply store that sells ergonomic office solutions. Standing desks, Stay balls, and other stay fit solutions that will help people get more than work done on projects at their company.Monthly Online Meal Subscription- Parents that want to ensure that most of the meals they serve their kids in a week are healthy would pay a monthly fee for a number of meals. They pay the monthly subscription and get a new box of ingredients shipped to their house. They open up their email and see a link to the recipes, videos, and any information that pertains to their specific geographic location. They could also get the grocery list and go buy the food at the store so that they are only getting the recipes. The grocery lists would show detailed layouts for each grocery store and where they can find things.Organizational Firm: Organize your life- This consultant agency declutters your life. From the way you organize your scheduling to the way you organize your desk, they are all over making sure your life is simpler and happier. This could be for a consumer or business market.Online Media Digitization Platform- Ship us your old dvd’s and VHS’s and we will convert them into media that can be viewed on our monthly subscription platform, or downloaded onto your hard drive. The VHS’s could be responsibly taken out of commision or recycled into something else. This would also be handy for home videos that customer’s want to hold onto forever.Goat Lawn Mowing Service- We scope out the property and laydown invisible fence wire. We then deliver goats to you with neck invisible fence collars that keep them from eating your neighbor's lawn. These are goats that are trained to eat in a line and eat mostly long grass. It would leave the grass with a unique “Textured” feel that they couldn’t get from a mower. Plus the company would have automatic exposure from being a “Purple cow” (or in this case “Purple goat”) idea.A Tommy Wausau “Tear me apart Lisa” Notebook with different quotes from the movie-  This is a notebook for members of the cult following revolving around “the Room”. Each notepage would look like the main character who exclaims the famous line “ You are tearing me apart lisa”.Toothbrush with a floss dispenser at the bottom- One product two services. Refillable floss containers could also be for sale. Some people may forget to floss but this built in floss dispenser will help them remember. Each toothbrush would have a unique fact about tooth decay to encourage brushing and flossing.Online Command Prompt Usage Course- Online course that presents different IT situations that you must respond to using commands from the Windows and Linux command line interface terminals. You will learn all of the main ones, but the most important thing is becoming familiar with the vast variety of options that become available when not utilizing a graphical user interface.TV Box that allows you to link a domain to a video feed of anything you want to stream- This is a small box that plugs into different display types, and allows you to stream anything that is cached from the input over the internet and into whatever you would like to display it through. It would allow you to plug in a DirectTV box and let you access it from anywhere in the world.Sand Sculpture beach festival- A festival on the beach featuring live music, artwork, and giant sand sculptures burned into glass. People could walk through the glass palaces and mazes and see how the different artists. Attendees would get to see artists work on a large scale level.Dirt destroyer. Find things you don’t want your employer to find and cover them up. This company looks over all of the infor your new employer can find, and cleans it up so your social media accounts are super clean.Party Taxi- Don’t take a lame taxi to the hotel from the airport. Choose one of the doors in the back seat and go on an adventure to a special place in the city you are visiting. You would be served alcohol and given an experience you won’t soon forget.Workflow Consultant - We analyze your workflow and let build a new strategy designed to force efficiency. Your company can’t afford to stay behind forever. Pick up the pace and hire a team of people who have gotten things done for years to help you.Camera designed to follow the instructor so that kids can watch the uploaded video when they try to do the work themselves - Kids sometimes struggle receiving all of the value from a teacher’s lecture. These cameras would be positioned in the back of the room and used to collect lectures before uploading them to a portion of the site available to each kid via the site.YVES Ideas: Trivia Site that oriented towards a company’s specific insider knowledge (products, history, procedures). Unlike broad-based trivia sites this targets a lot of customers with a niche need: sales training (a large market) with a specific internal community-oriented multiple choice answer set of questions on the customer’s products, people, policies, history, in a “it’s all about us” format in essence training as a game. Revenue is package sold, with add-on revenue for question load, duplication elimination service, and even content providing. KP = quote, trivia, encyclopedia sites, KA = CRM of company customers + question generation + data management , KR = Sales department + computing services , VP = Improve the quality of the intellectual corporate resources , CR = one-to-one , CH = online + trade show contact , CSeg = community and automated services to drive queries to personalized assistance , CStr = subscription possibly per user , RS = There are enough product features to charge for such as question development and also expansion of a sub-section of non-proprietary data to customers as part of a Community Creation plan for the customer..Skinglow: Website that accesses the high resolution of the camera to determine skin health for makeup choices and maintenance. Specific camera image processing to take a health snapshot of skin from different parts of the body in a content comparison. Revenue one time sale with an expert consultation add-on service. VP is health. KP = Skincare products , KA = Health & Beauty , KR = Medical imaging technology, gross histology, skin specialists, optical diagnosis. VP = Everyone wants to look better, CR = automated with one-on-one for additional $ , CH = Online + KP referrals , CSeg = endorsed customer growth & repeat use , CStr = subscription fee or three usage fees equal to a month on trail , RS = The KP should pay as will the individual users.Possessions site that allows people to list all their possessions and quantify the cost for everything for sale with plug-ins to eBay, Craigslist, etc. KP = None, KA = Passive data upload , KR = Computer data management , VP = Allows people that want to live minimally or who are moving and want to sell everything to do so , CR = automated , CH = online + PR , CSeg = Huge renewing market of people moving and selling things , CStr = computing services + some staff , RS = fee,  subscription, & small % of items sold.Winepool.com Puts your cellar up for sale allowing you to build it yet tap into the value equity over time. KP = Wineries and wine distribution companies + some government bodies + online wine partners + wine magazine + delivery partner , KA = identifying wines, wine market prices, executing sales online , KR = online resources , VP = Allows people the freedom of valuing and tapping into the equity of their wine cellar, CR = Community build for sure because wine is emotional , CH = online but physical transport means that transport partners needed. , CSeg = Wine cellar owners, collectors, wine stores, CStr = computing and wine specialist staff , RS = Subscription + small % sales and possibly storage of wine.i-made-it.com: Pantry items, home-made jams offered for sale of a casual or prebusiness basis including recipes for the highest demand. Shops could, for example, buy locally made jams in small batches in essence tapping into the local long tail. Crowdsource the stores asking for a particular product that would steer producers to products in demand. KP = Independant incubator kitchens, cooking schools, caterers , KA = providing a market for small batches of homemade products. , KR = computing , VP = local production , CR = Community-based , CH = retail , CSeg = home food preparers  , CStr = insurance + computing =  , RS = fees _ small % of sale price.wherediigo.com App that scans previous or old boarding passes to document your trip history and map out with also a (pay) cost module hooking into the calandar. KP = Airlines and travel companies , KA = reading passive data , KR = online + phone camera , VP = organizes personal data and provides travel data, CR = Community , CH = online , CSeg = travelers, retirees , CStr = computing structure , RS = information to KP.myfuturelook.com You load in your pictures from childhood up till today and the App creates photos of how you would look in the future (up to 100) health enhanced of course with an option of hair colour (pay for clothing style changes and tatoo additions) Bring them back when they put in a return date in the future to compare. KP = Health and Beauty industries , KA = reading passive photos and executing age regression software, KR = Camera photo , VP = People can see themselves , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 30 - 40 crowd & kids, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue from the ad revenue.University degree calculator: Tracks pay grades for an assortment of degrees dynamically in the region and other regions without the chatter of job ads. Strictly a dynamic salary reality tool. time periods and statistical pay levels for different degrees by geography. KA = data entered and executing spreadsheet response, KR = Camera photo , VP = People can see themselves , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 17 - 27 crowd & kids, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.Meditation buddy which measures your heart rate to maximize meditation health results. KP = Health, New Age organizations, Yoga organizations, KA = reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses, KR = Camera photo , VP = Health benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 30 - 40 crowd & yoga new age hipsters, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.Packing buddy: generates lists of things to pack depending on where you go and trip types including packing optimization and airline baggage rules. KP = Airlines and travel organizations, KA = reading passive photos and executing list generation, KR = Camera photo , VP = People can organize themselves , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = travellers of all ages, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue, affiliate income.Grow-Op buddy: Provides plans from assorted you in apartment herb growing schedule including light, water, and ideal nutrient mix. Updatable geographic feature would indicate if you have to hide the grow-op or do it in the open. Has larger scale support for hobbyists that want to expand production. Delivery of finished plants from local nurseries. Counter competition by setting health standards for the plants. KP = Herb enthusiasts, Health, New Age organizations, KA = reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses, KR = Camera photo , VP = recreational & drug benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 20 + crowd, hipsters, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.Landscaping landmine game: blow up gophers, homeowners, dogs, gardeners, burglars, postmen, local kids, pool boys, etc in this phone app game. KP = Gardening organizations and pest control, KA = Game structures, KR = Camera photo , VP = recreation, CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = all ages, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.WriteBuddy: A supported writer’s buddy: A program the writer subscribes to or is subscribed to by the publisher. Provides quotes and motivation while keeping track of production as well as a series of lectures about writing for long tail markets, digital printing or to-demand printing. KP = writers publishers, KA = reading passive data with data entry and email regular information, KR = Camera photo , VP = writer’s block banishment , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = bloggers, writers, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.PestIDGone: Pest identification pre-elimination: Geographic load to identify pests and recommend solutions cockroaches, spiders, etc including warnings and biological alternatives. KP = Pest Control companies, health departments government, KA = reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses, KR = Camera photo , VP = Health benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 30 - 40 crowd, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue from pest control companies.Decision tree App module for the frustrated project manager or “guy with a big project” designed to break down your goal into a thousand steps along with timelines. KP = News organizations, KA = GUI to generate decision trees, spreadsheet responses, KR = App front end, VP = business benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 30 - 40 crowd, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.recipe ingredient generator: allows you to pick what you are going to make and generates an ingredient list to shop for with the ability to exclude items you know you have home. KP = Food Stores chains or food distribution company like Qualifirst.com even the Food Network, KA = record-keeping of recipes uploading recipes, KR = App with recipes base uploadable ingredient list with Camera photo , VP = Health benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = over 20, CStr = software costs, RS = KP fees + subscription and ad revenue.birdwatching: don’t know anything about birds but a weird bird landed on the park bench? snap a picture and the app tells you the species, dates the sighting, and puts it in your birdwatcher’s log. KP = Audubon, Parks services, nature clubs, KA = App with photo and photo identification for all birds, KR = Expert on ornithology + Camera identification, VP = Recreation, CR = automated with value added one on one , CH = online direct, CSeg = birdwatchers and curious nature walkers, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.Genetic trait app: enter in information about your parents and grandparents to create likely traits in offspring.using knowledge about recessives and dominant genes. KP = Health medical genetic company's, KA = reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses, KR = Camera photo + App data entry , VP = Health benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 30 - 40 crowd, CStr = software costs + xpert genetics consult, RS = subscription and ad revenue.I-exploreparks.com  This maps local parks and allows you to better plan and explore local parks. KP = Parks and recreation organizations, KA = Google maps plus special downloads of thousands of hiking trails, KR = MAPS + Camera photo , VP = Health benefit and recreation, CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 15 and older, CStr = software costs + data entry costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.makeyourowncomic allows you to storyboard your idea. Pay for tools and online courses in comic drawing. KP = Artists league & comic makers, KA = sophisticated comic drawing tool, KR = Specialty software & Camera photo , VP = income producing from artistic talent., CR = drawing communities by type (anime, classic, and yes, less socially acceptable drawing art) and one-to-one though there could be some automation , CH = online direct, CSeg = artistic element, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.pastamaker: takes the mystique out of pasta with video and instructions oriented to the age of the person. Kids for kids, hipsters for hipsters, and ancient fossils for older people :) KP = Food channel and cooking schools, KA = build library of specific pasta making, plating, the sauces, etc is what is done, KR = Camera for video photo , VP = Health benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 10 and up, CStr = software costs, RS = fee, endorsement, subscription and ad revenue.iamnotdepressed: excessively cheerful quotations and phone calls to lift your spirits. KP = Health, New Age organizations, Yoga organizations, motivational organizations, KA = email info, videos, information and executing some spreadsheet responses, KR = Camera and video, VP = Health benefit also entertainment, CR = automated , CH = online direct PR news, CSeg = 25 and up, CStr = software costs, content costs, psychologists on consult, RS = subscription and ad revenue.thriftvalue.com: App that catelogs thrift store finds ato discover value in stores (clothing brands, pottery w photos, metal, with youtube input like from thriftfinder. KP = Specialty tv segments on thrift stores, Salvation Army, KA = reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses, KR = Camera photo but also video feeds, VP = home business support , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 30 - 40 crowd & yoga new age hipsters, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.thenecklace.com: A complete app selling beads including auction plug in for necklaces and individual preferences + videos history of neclaces, news about neclaces, famous necklaces. KP = Jewelry manufactures, collectors, women, KA = reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses also some community posting of videos, KR = Camera photos and video , VP = home business , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = women 20+ and collectors, CStr = software costs, RS = subscription and ad revenue.hikester.com maps hikes (one day, two day, three day) geographically in the area using google maps. Open source with Tripadvisor status and maybe Yelp. Packing guide, scenic points. KP = Health, New Age organizations, hiking organizations, Sierra Club, KA = Google MAPS along with reading passive data with data entry and executing spreadsheet responses, KR = MAPS data and data entered on hiking trails, VP = Health benefit , CR = automated , CH = online direct, CSeg = 17 +, CStr = software costs + data entry costs + research for hiking trails, RS = subscription and ad revenue.your-humour.com Builds personal content about comedy by your taste along with abilty to load content. Humorous video per day option and pay for small content from amateur comedians around the world allowing you to rank them. KP = Comedy Clubs, Comedy Channel, KA = Videos set up from multiple areas with lighting issues and content copyright to settle. KR = Videos and relationships with comedians around the world to build. VP = business entertainment, CR = personalized, CH = online direct also on a separate video feed channel, CSeg = 25+, CStr = software costs revenue feeds to comedians supplying material, RS = subscription, group subscriptions, and ad revenue

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    Idea # 81Author: MarcusBusiness Idea: A Fan Focused Mobile Marketing Agency providing app development, direct-to-fan consulting and execution, project management, and design for record labels, film studios and festivals.Available Resources:We have a software Developer, Data Scientists, and a graphic designer on the teamWe’re in the early stages of development for a pilotThis will be a Bootstrapped projectMicro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?Labels are struggling to increase revenues amid a shift towards streaming.  This app would be focused on musical history and the culture it helped shape. For each story, users get opportunities to comment, post their own related photos through social networks, and post video commentary.And for whom?The fans of the artist’ on the label.Historic significanceHow?Interactive Mobile AppHow do we make money?App Development feesBilled monthlyCreating new advertising opportunities on the site which added value for both users and brandsIdea # 3Author: MarcusBusiness Idea

    The Monster Cruise Halloween Sweepstakes is an agency contracted project that

    will align the Monster Energy brand with a $7billion dollar a year industry.

    Available ResourcesA partnership with cruise organizers Sixthman Cruises, 81 full ship chartersAn exclusive partnership with America Haunts, 2,000,000 visitors a yearAccess to haunt ticketing data for marketing purposesAlignment with established band partnerships through MonsterMicro Business PlanWhat problem are we solving? These events attract over 2,000,000 visitors within a 45 day period, but fail to   attract major corporate sponsorships.Long lines and inefficient crowd controlMissed opportunities for additional revenue streamsThe Cost per acquisition is very high compared to other industries.Lack of engaging and compelling storytelling as part of the Haunts overall marketing strategy.And for whom?Fans of the bands, Halloween, Horror Films, and Extreme SportsHow?I have a direct personal relationship with a musician who is sponsored by MonsterI had a friend custom flake-paint a skateboard with the Monster logoHow do we make money?App development and serviceConsulting FeesData analytics and metricsBooking and tour managementAdvertising / media spendDigital marketingIdea # 81Author: MarcusFilmdini - A platform that uses big data, crm, and predictive analytics to creates a report with a detailed marketing strategy, distribution channels, and estimated value of an independent filmAvailable Resources:Proprietary consumer transaction and viewing history data from Redbox and NetflixCode : A fully developed framework has already been createdThe datasets are available for the APIThe data scientist on our team have already been testing a series of algorithmsMicro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?Video streaming services and distributors are apparently having difficulties bidding on content with confidence. The data is available, but determing value has been a very big challenge.Independent filmmakers don’t have reliable distribution channels and this platform would open those channels through partnershipsAnd for whom?StudiosStreaming servicesIndependent filmmakersfilm festivalsdistributorsHow?VC fundingHow do we make money?Software Development feesEquity stakeMonthly billing and service chargesCross selling opportunitiesIdea # 81Author: MarcusAcrossTheUniverse.TV - The Netflix of travel sites. According to a recent study Google conducted with Ipsos MediaCT, two out of three U.S. consumers watch online travel videos when they'€™re thinking about taking a trip.Available Resources:A network of freelance FilmmakersPotential Partnership opportunity with several tour operators, Luxury, and adventure travel agenciesVideo content exist, but isn’t the focus of their marketing effortsWe own the domainMicro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?A lack of a central location where high end travel consumers can view quality videoAnd for whom?Luxury TravelersAdventure TravelHoneymoonersHuntinng tripsCorporate Golf outingsHow?VC fundingHow do we make money?Software Development feesVideo ProductionCost per transactionIdea # 81Author: MarcusPatronLink - big data platform turns patron data into actionable insight to build audience capacity by precisely targeting patrons with the most relevant message, at the right timeAvailable Resources:Proprietary 250 million-line database captures over 400 different behavioral attributes and contains 101 predictive modeldata scientists with many years of experience predicting patron-purchasing behaviorsMicro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?There is a need in the industry for a cost effective way to determine the demographics and behavior patterns of arts patronsIt’s expensive and time consuming to manually cleanse, blend, and model patron dataMost Performing Arts Center lack the financial resources to purchase lists and send mailers for the purpose of patron aquisition. This platform cuts the costs of buying lists significantlyAnd for whom?Broadway ProducersPerforming Arts CentersMuseumsTicketing software solutionsHow?VC fundingHow do we make money?Software Development feesEquity stakeMonthly billing and service chargesCross selling opportunitiesList fulfillmentWhite label opportunities  Business Idea : Secret Stages - A music discovery festival that is occurring in Downtown Birmingham this Summer.Available Resources:Clearance to book bands and sell tickets to 6 small music venuesPartnerships with the filmmaking community to capture contentcorporate sponsorshipsupport from the cityA very well respected talent buyerA dedicated and loyal street teamMicro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?The model is similar to SXSW but with DIY mentalityMany of the attendees of last years SXSW complaining it’s losing the spirit the festival was created withThis opens an opportunity for Birmingham to attract the customer segment that misses the old SXSWAnd for whom?Music Lovers looking to discover the next music.Bands interested in in meeting industry professionals such as publicists, lawyers, A&R, and producers.Mostly Young professionals and hipstersHow?Corporate SponsorshipTicket SalesEquity InvestorHow do we make money?The impact of SXSW 2014 on the city of Austin's economy was revealed this week, following a study commissioned by the festival by Greyhill Advisors, to be a staggering $315 million, nearly $100 million more than the previous year.  Business Idea :The Prison Book Project : The goal of this project is to help expose inmates to their inherent connection with the rest of humanity--to bring hope, inspiration, and wisdom to a population who so badly need it. For those living outside of prison walls, this project is an opportunity to get a glimpse into the minds and hearts of those cast aside by our society, those deemed unworthy of giving and receiving love--that which every single human being so intensely yearns for and the only thing that liberates us from both literal and figurative bondage.The first phase of the project is a  collection of interviews with people who have seen themselves at their worst, who have been able to turn their darkness into light, who have overcome inner or outer adversity. To create a global cultural and historic context for these confessions, the interviews will be woven between some of the world’s most poignant wisdom on the subject of the human condition and the purpose of a human life. The book will be filled with illustrations by tattoo and graffiti artists, genres of art often dismissed by our culture as vulgar, rather than the modern masterpieces they often are. For every copy sold, another copy will be donated to a prisoner.Available Resources:Grant opportunitiesWe approached a prison in Arizona and South Carolina who have creative writing programs for their prisoners.We were able to connect with psychotherapist Jenny Phillips begins intensive meditation retreats for inmates at a maximum-security prison in rural Alabama.Micro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?The time criminals spend behind bars could be used to train them the skills and positive living habits necessary for them to make a positive contribution to society, yet unfortunately they are   have  is a severly under-acknowledgingOur hope is that the first book will aide in creating an environment in prison culture where inmates have the freedom for contemplation, and artistic expression. The book will include an invitation for prisoners to respond--to and write about what they have learned about themselves during their period of incarceration, about challenges of life on the inside, about their journey of personal growth and self-discovery, about their hopes for the future. The second phase of the project is another book--a compilation of these responses, similarly placed in a cultural and historical context and illustrated by tattoo and graffiti artists. pression, and supportive dialogue with one another about their process of personal growth and discovery.And for whom?Readers who want to be inspiredFor those living outside of prison walls, this project is an opportunity to get a glimpse into the minds and hearts of those cast aside by our society,How?We found a local artisan who creates handmade books and replaces the pages with blank sheets. We can ask him to create a series of 5-10 blank paged books that we can send to the contributors with instructions for sending them to the next author or artists. The books contents will be transferred into a single book, and we can use the handmade books for a crowd-fundng project.How do we make money?When the prisoners are released we have a online course created in the same fashion  as this course. We will create an online community of mentors and access to resources.  The prisoners will be given the tools necessary to find a job and find stability. A success story will allow us to create programs like this at every prison that will authorize it.  Business Idea : Figure2 Artist Management was created in order to bring attention to the thriving Birmingham music community. Available Resources:10 artist under contractA recording studioindependent distributionGraphic designersAccess to lists of industry contactsMicro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?The Birmingham community lacks proper representation and opportunitiesThere is a need for genuine music produced from the heartAnd for whom? fans of

    Hip hop

    Indie Rock

    Soul

    Blues

    How?I am relocating to LA next month and have connections that can get me introduced to the proper resourcesHow do we make money? I have a 20% management contract with the artistsTouring RevenuePublishingStreaming AudioSponsorshipEndorsementsMerchandising  Business Idea :

     Micro Business Plan:What problem are we solving?How?We found a local artisan who creates handmade books and replaces the pages with blank sheets. We can ask him to create a series of 5-10 blank paged books that we can send to the contributors with instructions for sending them to the next author or artists. The books contents will be transferred into a single book, and we can use the handmade books for a crowd-fundng project.How do we make money?When the prisoners are released we have a online course created in the same fashion  as this course. We will create an online community of mentors and access to resources.  The prisoners will be given the tools necessary to find a job and find stability. A success story will allow us to create programs like this at every prison that will authorize it.Workplay - A music venue / recording studio / Radio station / Creative Agency / Online Digital magazine. The acts that perform at the venue are the source of the content for the online magazine.Sweet Science Radio - Streaming radio curated specifically for music festivals that will engage past attendees throughout the year. Featuring performances, interviews, and hosted programming collected over the festival's history. The program could also be used for a platform to engage the listeners to become more involved in the curation process.Made In The Magic City- A short documentary series highlighting interesting people, inspiring stories, independent businesses, and events happening in the Birmingham community that can show the growth and evolution of our city.  A visual alternative paper bringing attention to vibrancy of the city. Shown at the local hotels, online, and on public access stations.Mobile Record Label - A new model for the music industry. The app….will be updated on regularly with new content from current artists, and classic content from the labels archives.Custom Phones/Tablet for Incoming College Students - A mobile phone and tablet are outfitted with a suite of exclusive apps built specifically for universities and college students. It will have their textbooks already uploaded, a social network solely for students and teachers to interact, they could schedule zoom meetings with their teachers, watch lectures, find their classmates, collaborate and share their experiences.16. Artify.it - A subscription-based business model developed so local artists can “rent” their artwork to subscribers creating a consistent revenue stream for the artist and mitigating the fear people tend to associate with purchasing artwork in a public setting.Where ? We start an artist co-op started in an underserved community where property values are low, but the potential is high for revitalization.The create their art wherever they like. In a communal area that is adjoining a gallery, at home, . The work can be displayed for the public in the gallery... a local restaurant, anywhere art can be displayed and easily removed. Patron’s can pay a subscription costs of $25 per piece, per month, with a recurring monthly subscription. The gallery could also present an option for a year long contract commitment at a discounted price. Anytime a buyer wants to exchange his current piece for a new one, they simply visit the gallery and exchange it. If they keep it past a certain time, (based on appraised value) it then becomes their painting. Think Redbox.The customer segments include local restaurants and businesses that need to decorate their businesses, real estate agents needing to stage a home, interior designers,  individual collectors / buyers, and corporate donors. The pieces can also be purchased online through a website and mobile app. Patron’s can be encouraged to gift subscriptions and commission pieces.What problem does this model solve ? Generally, everyone enjoys art. For the most part...everyone loves to have it around, they go to where it is being displayed, but they rarely , in a public setting, commit to the purchasing it. This model would help mitigate the perceived risks of the purchase, and it would keep artist in the area producing new work, and most importantly...sustaining their careers.A portion of the space can be transformed into artists lofts, and then rented by by the artist for a very a small monthly or weekly fee. .A portion of the money collected can be allotted for the wholesale purchase of materials, and then re-sold to the artist in the gallery at just above costs. It shouldn’t be any problem enticing 1000 people out of a city of 1,000,000, to subscribe to this cause. This would generate $25,000 in guaranteed revenue per month. Communities need artist, and artist need money to survive. This model could be replicated in cities all over the country.Broadway Rendition of Where the Wild Things AreTourdini - A big data platform for touring musicians that would use anonymous data gathered from streaming music services, box office ticket numbers from venues, and merchandise sales numbers to predict tour revenue and merchandise sales. The platform could also become a hub for reviewing their experiences on the road. Then bands would know which media marketing outlets etc...to target.Industry / Organization Specific Apps / Custom SmartphoneAR Museum and Site-Seeing Tour GuideOne Plus - Rush PartyAR Travel AgentHey JudeConnected Tour Buses / Mobile Recording StudioRecord Store // Dispensary

    Yves Ideas:

    KP = , KA = , KR = , VP = , CR = , CH = , CSeg = , CStr = , RS = . is the short form of the Business Model Canvas I will use. KP = Key Partners, KA = Key Activities, KR = Key Resources, VP = Value Proposition, CR = Customer Relationships, CH = Channels, CSeg = Customer Segments, CStr = Cost Structure, & RS = Revenue Streams. The idea is to get used to thinking in a structured manner AFTER putting quantity forward as the objective for ideas.

    Un-boxing A book apart

    Wed Jul 22 2015

    A book apart knows who they are for.

    There are a million books for people who want to learn how to build websites. A book apart is for the people who want to design websites.

    A book apart knows what they are for.

    It is very easy to get tangled up in all of the standards that exist in the realm of the web. A book apart is for making a brief and powerful statement that will help designers everywhere make better decisions with their sites.

    It is easy to approach any project with the mentality of : "Why are people going to want this?". The harder question to answer is: "Where does it fit?"

    If you can identify why the problem you are solving is important, you can start to answer that question.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwJrT8YNeoA&feature=youtu.be

    Shipping it

    Tue Jul 21 2015

    http://youtu.be/0bZCjIVlx4g

    Today I finished my Ship It Journal. 

    I am committed to putting on my live event, and I will stop at nothing to make it happen. I've applied dates to all of the different items that need my attention and got them out on the wall with deadlines.

    To-do stickies

    Tasks that remain to be finished in a week.

     The premise of the event is this.

    Talk about my experience in the altMBA, cover a few of the topics, and then let everyone take action that night. A big part of shipping is accountability. If you don't have someone waiting on the end of your deadline, chances are whatever it is won't make it. It's going to be about taking action that night. Refusing to wait for a "better moment" is the only way to finish anything.  We will all start with planning, then line people up to wait for us at the finish line.

    Starting

    Mon Jul 20 2015

    http://youtu.be/C3SVDJRBSyM

    This project scared me at first. I didn't think I would be able to do it. I didn't think anyone would read it.

    Over and over I continued to come up with a reason for why I can wait and don't have to ship.

    No one would have hit a home run, painted the Mona Lisa, or written Purple Cow if they didn't start.

    I’m sorry Clark, but I can’t let you work any longer.

    Your work is good, and good sucks. You don’t seem to really like it at all. Your friends see it. People you work with see it. The people you save when you are living in your calling see it too. Why can’t you embrace it? What worldly threat is holding you back from living as superman all of the time?

    To be Clark Kent and brush your calling to the side, is to deny yourself time spent operating as the creature you were intended to be.

    It is time to sell the bullshit you bought, and start to work with what you were given. You’ve got no time to lose! Imagine a life where you wake up excited for the day and you have trouble going to sleep because your day was filled to the brim with people and experiences worth having again, and again. What does your day look like?

    Hurrah! If you can search inside yourself and identify the answer, congratulations! You’ve now fertilized the catalyst of a very long journey ahead. It is going to be a very challenging several months, and there will be plenty of complications. However, it will pay off. Your body now roams the planet conscious of its one purpose: Deliver this beautiful, previously unknown part of myself into the world, and walk with it through its incredible life ahead.

    Set your goals.

    Conceive the dream. Carry it through its development. Release it into the world kicking, screaming, and smashing through the barriers that were put in place before its conception.

    What do those barriers look like?

    What must you learn along the way?

    Who needs to be apart of your support circle?

    Finally, set its due date! You are an excited new parent and can’t wait to meet your child.

    Rejoice when it comes to fruition, breathes the air of the earth and can be remarked on by others fortunate enough to meet it.

    My name is Nic Bovee. I dream of a life spent helping entities bigger than myself with a team of people who always challenge the status quo. My goal is to rely less on my position as Clark Kent, and dare to fly into the unknown as the super hero I was placed on earth to be. I love being asked questions I don’t know the answer to. I love to collaborate with a team of people who enjoy the same. It would be so refreshing to operate with a team of “A+” players who don’t allow me to stay tucked away in the safe bowels of my comfort zone. The path to living my dream comes with many adversaries. The biggest challenge being the mentality I have created for myself.

    “ You cannot survive on your own!”

    “You’re not smart enough! “

    “You depend on other people to live! “

    Pushing against those barriers until my newly achieved goal can break through them is going to be almost impossible. It’s going to take a lifestyle that permits learning, and developing new things while still functioning safely in the company. It will take me stepping out and assembling a team of people who are the best in the world at what they do. It will take my vulnerability to step out and actively look for the bigger entities that have problems that our elite team can solve for them.

    My plan of action is this.

    Start now. Reach out to the people in my existing circle and find out if they want to be apart of something like this. Start acting like a company, and set deadlines for the projects I’m already involved in. Learn how to pay taxes like a company. Tune in to what it is I actually do on the team, and pitch it to the people who I want to work with.

    My Deadline

    June 15th 2016-It is the one-year anniversary of the day I started the most important transformation of my life. I will be spending an equal portion of my time during the week meeting with my team and talking through the current challenges our firm faces. My price structure will be fully developed as a piece of art. I will have at minimum 5 projects at a time, and will be actively networking to gain at least 5 more for the next month. We will ship on time. We will ship great work. I will have learned new things from the 50+ books I add to my library. Most importantly, I will be shedding new light on my current job and hopefully applying some of the concepts from my company into the weaknesses of the one I work for. It’s not going to be easy, and I’ll need to constantly monitor the course and change as need be.

    Creating all of this will be worth it. When I reach the top I will have brought along stories that either tell of the bounty of success or the lessons from a successful failure.

    P.S.

    At the beginning of my article, I was really leaving an opening or invitation for readers to join in and set some goals of their own. I left the door open, but never told anyone to go in. As Seth Perler pointed out, I should make a point of letting the reader know that there is an opportunity and to get the most out of my article they should take it.

    Updated Plan of action- Upon Michelle’s request

    Restate my goal (With meat):

    I want to live a life where I work with companies that want to push themselves to a new level of greatness by helping them make decisions on the creative front. This includes:

    Branding- Designing the story behind the image, then updating the image to reflect the story. I want to design a workflow that will ask the questions that need to be asked in order to discover what the company’s story is.

    Logo Design- Whether it’s a redesign for branding or a start to finish creation, my goal is to be a company that takes the culture of a company, and creates a logo for them. I’ve done this for a few different people, and I’ve really enjoyed it.

    Web Site Design- This is definitely an element of my structure that will require looking for a great developer who can work with me on developing a strategic method of laying out a site in order to provide an easy experience that doesn’t feel “broken”.

    Customer Relationship Design- Most small companies I talk to don’t care about the actual relationship that they have with their customers. It sucks because they miss out on such an awesome opportunity to make the customer want to keep coming back for more than just the product that they sell.

    Customer Experience Design- From start to finish, I want to build the street that a customer walks down when they use that company. This has a lot to do with Seth’s Purple Cow concept, as well as tribes. It think that most companies leave the community out of it. What needs to happen is a new focus on doing things that wow the customer. Zappos had free 2 day shipping as something they did to upgrade the customer’s order from free standard shipping. Sweetwater sends smarties with musical widget they send. I want to evaluate the customer experience by having people go through the entire interaction with the company, and come up with a list of things the loved and things they disliked.

    Value Development- Work on actual projects the customer is working on to offer insight on how they can add even more value to what they are offering by means of adding a few features, or simply revising the way they pitch the product. This process will rely heavily on the information we have from the strong customer relationships and using it to offer something that speaks to them.

    Company Structure Design- This first came from an experience I had as general manager of a computer shop. This involves looking at the internal workflow. I want to look at what the business does internally and help them find a better way to accomplish more things, faster! I think that it’s difficult to see the inefficiency if you are used to looking at it every day. We come in and identify the top things that could change in one week that would help a company be more efficient in the way that it runs and handles itself.

    Pushing against the obstacles

    Who will I reach out to?

    Two groups of people

    Internal- People I know personally who would be a lot of help and want to be a part of this company or know people who might. The smaller goal here is to build a team of people that expand the diversity of the promises we can make to our customers. By knowing the people apart of this, we can make promises and exceed them to provide our customers with an exceptional experience

    People from internal are filling certain roles of the kind of experience our group wants to create:

    Web      Marketing           Internal Structure            Education            Developers         Graphics             Branding              Value Development

    Jon Dale- Close personal friend and the reason I’m aware of Seth Godin and in the altMBA

    Todd A. - Web

    Justin L. - Social Marketing

    Andy T. – Develop the network

    Josh K. – Learning materials

    Kevin M. – Becoming an entrepreneur vs. a free lancer

    Stephen D. – Developer connections

    Jason R. – Developer connections

    Brooke B. – Marketing

    External- Companies that have people in them who want to make the company more than just a Car dealership. More than just a coffee shop. More than an okay place to go buy jewelry. Places that are used to dealing with pricy corporate establishments that use the same methods they have used for the last 20 years to offer a solution of one facet of the customers problem. I want to start small with people I have already worked with and know, offering new value that their company can begin to implement, until I have a method I can start to practice on a bigger company.

    The PC Shop

    G1 Equip

    MakeExerciseEasy

    Recycles

    DTG

    CreativeIvoryMusic

    Moutain Scoops

    Team TeleCycle

    Jives

    Why will they want to be a part of what I’m doing?

    Internal- Not all of them will be a part of it directly, but they may point me in the direction of people who will want to be part of it directly. I think that if I am connected with the right people, the idea of scheduling time to collaborate and sharing contracts with people who are the best at what they do will be an attractive offer for people who may be wasting their time at a job they get nothing from.

    External-I believe that when presented with an opportunity to invigorate the working environment and increase their exposure to people who care, as well as overall productivity and financial performance. I see it as them making the decision to hire a life coach that helps the company find what it wants just as much as it helps the employees.

    What will I ask specifically?

    Internal- Why do you do what you do? If their passionate I want to connect them with the companies that are passionate.

    What is the project they are actually joining?

    That varies based on the client. Some of my clients have wanted minimal changes to be made on one page of their site. Others have had me re design their logo and analyze their business structure.

    How will I specifically act like a company?

    Stephen Pressfield brought up the idea of meeting with yourself weekly. Thanks Stephen! I want to meet on a week by week basis and set goals for my “Company” as if I already had the accountability of people who were waiting for me to give them a project to do.  I also want to spend time developing my whole business model, to understand what kind of company it is that I’m really describing.

    List the projects that need deadlines.

    Current projects that need deadlines are all web based projects. I am rotten liar to myself. I tell myself that I don’t have time to spend on the project. Wrong. I will start by setting a dead line to have a fully written Web Design questionnaire by next Wednesday.

    How will I learn to pay taxes like a company?

    This is one that I’m hoping I can find info on from my cohort or the altMBA family. I think it will be quite a while before I can hire a book keeper or CPA. What book can I read that will teach me how to manage an LLC in terms of taxes, and not get screwed over.

    What is that you want to do? How will you pitch it?

    I’m passionate about many things, but there are two things that out-weigh the rest. Design, and people.

    I love to see and understand why things were created the way they were. When I can afford to do it without debt, I will go to college for design both industrial, and graphic. The thing that I really love looking at is details, and in this job I get to explore details in almost every aspect of my favorite hobby: business. I also love people. I want to create something that is as much a community as it is a company. A place for creatives. These creatives might be paying the community, or they might be getting paid. We all are passionate about building plan Z first and shipping a day early than we were expected.

    Sunk Costs

    Sat Jul 18 2015

    **They're all around us. **

    The gym wants its money every month, and you will pay it even if you haven't gone for 3 months.

    The car needs another repair after you've already dumped more than it's worth.

    The movie you paid to see is terrible.

     

     

    http://youtu.be/H2eOkOxKHdE

    The magic of the sunk cost is that when you can identify it, you will be able to make a decision more rationally.

    Whenever we cough up the money for a recurring sunk cost, we are telling ourselves a story. It may come in many different forms but the gist of it is this: 

    "This is an investment, and if I stick with it a little longer it's going to pay off"

    It's an emotional thing. We don't want to feel stupid and so we keep on finding reasons to keep using our resources.

    Time to say goodbye to your "investments".

     

    This guy can sing! altMBA - Framing

    Fri Jul 17 2015

    **I had the immense pleasure of attending a barbecue thrown by someone I met at Trader Joes. **

     

    I was shopping in Trader Joes when out of the blue I hear someone say "Hey that's a really cool jacket". I turned around and saw a tall smiling man walking toward me. It was awesome!

    We talked for a while, and I got the sense that he was a genuinely kind and awesome dude. I spoke with him almost every time I went in after that. I found out he was a singer who had auditioned and made it on the show the Voice. Later on he invited me to a BBQ I wasn't even sure I was going to make it to. I'm glad I did because I got to experience his incredible voice. Check out the video, he starts singing about 5 minutes in.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpfoRludBmU&feature=youtu.be

    Project 1 from the altMBA

    Project 1 gave us a chance to work together as a team to explain a good decision making process by understanding:

    Frames

    Decision Trees

    Priorities

    Sunk Costs

    All of these are very important when it comes to making a decision. 

    This is how I chose to explain framing:

    Destroy-your-frame

    “Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realize the truth. Then you'll see, that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.”

    As you read these words, your mind is busily processing each word into something that has meaning to you. If I didn’t bring it up, you most likely wouldn’t be considering the miracle that the electrical pulses in my head were converted into words, sent to my fingertips, converted into electrical signals sent to the computer through an infinitely complex set of protocols and mediums, then re-converted again to text and mapped out onto the millions of tiny lights on your monitor. You may also feel compelled to read this post for one reason or another, and right now I’d like to ask you to consider moving on to the next post, or thing you have as an option in front of you. By choosing something other than what you see as your “current activity”, especially if it is something really ludicrous you have effectively destroyed your frame.

    The frame is a helpful tool for recognizing the subconscious assumptions you make about every single aspect of your life. By recognizing the frame, you are shedding light on line that all opportunity stands behind, gazing longingly in at the fluff lucky enough to make it into the limelight. That fluff is inside of your frame for one simple reason. You want it there. It is the thing or things that resonated with your emotions causing you to quickly form the assumption that it deserves your attention. It is the fluff that makes a decision difficult. It is time to wake up to the reality. Outside of the small canvas of options you have painted within the frame of your decision, lies a gallery rife with even better options that weren’t even allowed onto your paint brush. Destroy your frame. Tear it off of the wall and embrace the world of possibilities that lie in front of you. Unplug from the Matrix you’ve created for yourself and see what’s really available for you. Time is of the essence, so now that you’ve emerged on the other side, take a deep breath. Let’s make a decision.

    It starts with the change agent. A problem that needs solving.

    A person came into a computer shop I worked at and asked the question: “Should I buy a Mac? I hear they are a lot easier to use and my PC has been running so slow.” What is this person’s problem? What change agent caused them to start a decision process in the first place?

    That is when the Apple elitist in me screams: “Duh, they’re on a freaking PC, of course it’s slow and frustrating!”. Ladies and Gentleman I present in all of its narrow minded glory, a frame. You may not see the danger, but imagine me giving that person information based on what my frame of their problem says the obvious choice is. It’s just plain foolish to set one option on a scale without a counter option to balance it out and come to a reasonable, educated decision. It’s time to destroy the frame and rebuild it around options that matter. Here is how we do it:

    Ask off the wall questions-

    How educated is she when it comes to PC? How long has she had her PC? Could she do more of the things that she finds frustrating on the PC in a more familiar environment? Does she have any friends that she can borrow a Mac from to ensure that she isn’t switching to something that will have a learning curve? How do they like living in Colorado? What is their favorite television show?What is the price difference between a low end Mac and a high end PC? You get the picture. Make cases for both sides of the argument. Pose as many questions as possible and don’t be afraid of the questions that don’t seem to have any relation to the problem.

    Trash the options your frame dealt you-

    In most cases while confronting a decision, our frame usually submits a few ideas for consideration. Throw them out of the equation all together. This leaves you with one problem and zero solutions. Innovate. If that option wasn’t available how then could we solve the problem. Switching to Mac isn’t an option, and this person desperately needs to feel less frustrated when using a PC. What about switching to Linux? Or not using a computer at all? It seems that innovation is usually brought into existence because it is demanded. Demand innovation. Paint the frame, then the gallery, then demolish the gallery, and force yourself to migrate your art onto the hull of a spaceship.

    Consider the opportunity cost-

    If one of their options is to spend a minimum of $700 on a Mac, could that money be used to solve the problem using a different option?  What is the opportunity cost of all of your options. What opportunity are you giving up to make the current option you are considering?

    Now assess the options. Borrow Mac from a friend and evaluate it for 10 day’s. Become more familiar with working in a PC environment(unfortunately this does mean learning a thing or two about basic maintenance). Start working through options to ease into the decision. Try the cheapest options first and consider setting a timeline that tells you when you will take the plunge.

    Now build a new frame, the proper frame your new set of options deserve.Start to strategically migrate the options that seem least likely to solve the original problem to the outside, and sit back and appreciate the different features of each option you now have in front of you.

    Left with a handful of reasonable options, including ones that you may have never considered, it is time to decide.

    OVERVIEW

    Framing is usually done without unconsciously, which means it relies on our deeper self, and does not provide a platform for our better options to breathe. We must destroy that frame and rebuild it around a set of options that includes the options that fell into the crowd of ideas that got instantly shoved aside when the problem presented itself.

    Ask any question that pops into your head to try and get some off the wall ideas and solutions for handling the problem.

    Take the obvious solution out of the picture all together and ask a new question such as: “ If solution x can’t happen, what can I do instead to solve problem y?”

    Consider the opportunity cost: “What value would one decision give that another one wouldn’t?”

    BONUS: How does this apply to the educational system?

    Frame: Students must be tested and graded in order to ensure that they are learning, and that our teachers are doing their jobs.

    What problem is this solving? We don’t know if kids are learning, and if the teacher is doing their job.

    Off the wall questions-

    Who is the educational system for, the kids or the administrative board?

    Why are schools all inside?

    Why does every kid need to go to school?

    What are they really getting from it?

    What does the grading system measure?

    Who benefits most from the grading system?

    Remove the current solution all together-

    In a school with no grading system how would teachers know that their students understand the material?

    Give smaller tests on each subject and find out where kids are struggling and frame their concepts differently so they might have a better chance to understand the material.

    Allow kids to work at their own pace and put more emphasis on challenging them to try new things.

    Opportunity Cost-

    What could the money that goes into testing and grading be used for?

    It is estimated that 1.7 billion dollars is spent on testing every year which could easily be used to implement better programs that support learning.

    By not grading, the teachers have more time to spend working with kids ensuring that they don’t need help understanding the various concepts.

    To read more about this issue be sure to check out my friend Seth’s post.

    About this project: This is post 2/5 on Project 1 of altMBA. It was created by the Yolk Cohort, section 1D. There were 5 people in this section who each created one of the following posts:

    Ignore sunk costs – Marcus TurnerFrame decisions properly – Nic BoveeDecision trees – Pete Burge**Ranking priorities -Yves Farges**Holistic wrap up – Seth Perler

    **POSTSCRIPT**

    Wow! It's been awesome to hear all of the great feedback! I think that one of the most common critiques was on the weakness of the article towards the end. I think that there are three ways to approach an issue of lack luster content.

    1. When you start to feel like the content you are producing is weak and not enjoyable to write, scrap it and move on to something that is.

    2.Read each sentence carefully to find out which sentence is the most boring, then ditch those select sentences.

    3.Re-read the paper as Ryon mentioned and come up with an idea of how it sounds.

    I've also concluded that the bonus section could either be done away with, setup as an additional example, or moved into a separate post.

    If I were to re-write this post, I would condense it by chopping out my own fluff that I felt like I needed to satisfy the project. What I have to say is only important if people are awake long enough to read it.

    In order to practice what I preach starting now:

    That's it. I'm not saying anything more.

    Book Review: The Virgin Way, Everything I know about leadership

    Thu Jul 16 2015

     

    The Virgin Way- Book Review

    The Virgin Way

    Before I read this book for the review, I honestly didn't know anything about Richard Branson or the Virgin companies. I had heard about a few of their products but never been a customer myself. I think this is mainly due to the fact that they are mostly located in Europe, but I may just be completely out of their target demographic.

    Books that talk about the brand tend to feel like a sales pitch, and I think this one definitely had a bit of that going on. That said, I think the book is great for inspiration and offers a myriad of concepts both familiar and new worth taking into consideration.

     

     

     

     

    Action Items

    (3 action items you can take from the main sections in his book)

    ListeningUse notepads while you are listening to people talk about anythingAsk for feedback on ideas from your friends and families before you leapActively seek customer feedback instead of waiting for it to come in via other vehiclesLearningBumble bees fly in practice but not in theory- Try something people say should be impossibleLuck is preparation meeting opportunity - Add "Will be prepared for exciting opportunities" to your pros list on learning new things.Try being a Yes Man.LaughAsk the person in your next meeting to tell you a joke- especially if you don't know them wellImplement five new things that will brighten the days of people in your team.Spend 10 extra hours each week, just with your family. The first blockades that pop into your mind when you consider spending more time with your family are either things that no one else can do, or things that can be delegated. Spend 30 minutes and figure out who on your team could take on some of the things keeping you from your family.LeadMeet with someone who is outside of your division, or works on different things than you.Make a decision. Stop estimating and start doingFinish something

    A recap of the altMBA, and a letter to the future.

    Wed Jul 15 2015

    I will be starting a daily trend of posting some of my work from the altMBA.

    This is to give subscribers a chance to read some things they may have missed, and an opportunity for me to recall the incredible growth that occurred over the last month.

    An open letter to the next people who make the decision to join:

    Dear agents of change in the altMBA,

    What you are about to participate in can and will be life changing for you as long as you fight the resistance and ship religiously.

    You were all drawn here for different reasons, but you are all present now because you have placed a value on taking a leap into the unknown. This will be some of your hardest work, and will propel you beyond the limitations you have hit in the past. Here are a few things too help you as you begin this journey.

    Be empathetic. Look at the world through the eyes of the people you are meeting. You may not always agree with them, but you can always make an effort to understand their side of the story.

    Be vulnerable. It’s difficult to do because we are all accustomed to a world stuffed with trolls who have nothing better to do than  put you down. That’s not what this environment is for. This is an ecosystem of love and creativity. It is a place for the misfits who dared to dream of something greater. Do your best to help everyone else’s dreams come true.

    Jump. Take the plunge. Dare to speak up. Offer help when people need it. Be bold in your writing. Don’t be afraid to create beyond the program. Be the first. Push everything out of the way in order to ship

    Be like Amazon. Ship on time. Exceed expectations. Love your people. Kindle new relationships. Fire old tendencies.END LAME PUNS

    **The world is waiting to watch you plunge into the murky water and make a splash. **

    Dive,

    -Nic Bovee

    Day 5 of the altMBA

    Tue Jul 07 2015

    I finished my list of dreams 48 hours ago, and it's time for time for me to evaluate whether or not the goals can answer these questions posed by Zig Ziglar:

    Can I answer yes to all of these questions about my dream:

    Is it my goal or someone else's?

    Is it morally right and fair to everyone concerned?

    Is it consistent with my other goals?

    Can I emotionally commit myself to finish this goal?

    Can I see "myself" finishing this goal?

    If I can't answer yes to all of those I will put an X next to the Idea.

    After processing that info  I will ask the next series of questions and have to answer "yes" to at least one of them.

    Will this goal:

    Make me happier?

    Make me healthier?

    Make me more prosperous?

    Win more friends?

    Give me peace of mind?

    Make me more secure?

    Improve my relationships with others?

    I will put another an "*" next to any of the goals that need to be removed using this questioning.

    Here is the list of dreams I am working (Some personal goals have been left out):

    Personal

    • Get my motorcycle license
    • get a motorcycle
    • Start rock climbing regularly
    • Live in Alaska
    • Get a diving certification
    • Go cliff jumping
    • Go Sky Diving
    • Write a book
    • Post weekly to my blog
    • Start a YouTube channel about something that I am passionate about
    • Take a professional driving course
    • Learn to site read piano
    • Get my small planes pilot's license
    • Get my Network + certification
    • Get my Real Estate Brokerage license
    • Play music in a band
    • Rebuild an engine
    • run a small group for people
    • Own and operate small farm
    • Spend a brief season as a flight attendant
    • Travel to 3 new countries every year
    • Meet with people and help them make positive changes in their life
    • Purchase a real estate property and manage it while paying it off
    • Hike the Pacific Crest Trail

    Family

    • Spend one meal per week with my family
    • Say one word of encouragement to each family member every week
    • Take one family member out for coffee once every month
    • Host an annual goal setting workshop for my family, and then have planned bi-annually check-ins
    • Go on at least one family camping trip per year
    • Go on a family hike every month
    • Find out when my family member is having a concert or event and show up
    • Write an our of the blue letter for no reason and send give it to them
    • Plan one snowboarding trip for the winter
    • Start a family game night: Possibly on the same night as dinner?
    • Schedule time for one home improvement project
    • Be intentional about being thankful for them at least once a day
    • Go to a concert as a family
    • Find a conference that we could all go to that would empower us to live better lives.

    Career

    • Help make improvements for the company I work at
    • Start expanding my side business to other states
    • Develop a valuable process that acts as a way for businesses to take themselves to the next level, and the use the process with the coaches that are apart of the organization
    • Build a team of people who like to work on challenging problems
    • Sell something passively on Amazon
    • Invent a product that I would use regularly
    • Invest in a small company
    • Run a moderately successful website with more than 1000 hits per day
    • Develop a downtown office space and bring in great companies to work together under the same roof
    • Create a business model that people want to steal
    • Buy  a car wash
    • Own real estate that I rent out
    • Develop an App that solves a problem I have regularly
    • Always ship a day early.
    • Pay my employees health insurance and for life building exercises that will help them become stronger people
    • Donate to young entrepreneurs that work for the good of impoverished people
    • Help develop companies into platforms that people would have a difficult time replacing
    • Have a weekly corporate meeting with myself.

    Physical

    • Go to the gym early in the morning everyday
    • double my weight lifting in a month
    • Run a marathon
    • Take swimming lessons(Yeah I really can't swim very well)
    • Go through Tim Ferris's The Four Hour Body
    • Run 1 mile every morning
    • Do the incline once a week
    • Do more than 100 pushups at a time
    • Get weights and lift every day
    • Take tennis lessons
    • Join Parks and Rec soccer
    • Climb Mount Everest
    • Climb al CO. 14ers
    • Build and keep a 6 pack
    • Consume 2 home cooked healthy meals every day.
    • Expand the flexing diameter of my biceps and forearms by 50%
    • Do a quick morning workout every day I can't make it to the gym
    • Take boxing lessons
    • Race downhill mountain bikes and win a small competition
    • Land a steezy kickflip 95% of the time a try
    • Learn how to do hand stand pushups
    • Land backflips on a trampoline
    • Land a 360 method
    • Lear how to do wheelies on a dirt bike
    • Run the Pike's Peak Hill Climb

    Mental

    • Smile most of the day
    • Wake up excited for what I'm about to do
    • Read 100 books everyday
    • Improve my typing by 30 WPM bringing my average to 97 WPM
    • Improve my handwriting by learning and implementing a new style
    • Become proficient in CSS/HTML
    • Take drawing classes and draw a self portrait
    • Finish my sketch of Dani
    • Write a song w/ lyrics for the guitar and perform
    • Study american history and become familiar
    • Learn to speak french sufficiently
    • Take an english class in college
    • Read newtons physics and understand basics
    • Learn all scales on guitar
    • learn how to use electric instrument software
    • Remix a Harry Nilson song
    • Multiply two 6 digit numbers in my head in under 2 minutes
    • Take a concealed Carry class and get my permit
    • Finish my network and A + certifications
    • Read Yves recommendation for real estate knowledge
    • Learn C+ and build a basic program
    • Take an Archery Course
    • Get my WFR Cert
    • Take a culinary Course

    Spiritual

    • Actively attend and stay involved in a church
    • Tithe every week
    • Go on a mission trip to another country
    • Pray every day
    • Take a prayer hike every month
    • Join an online bible study
    • Take time out of each day to be emotionally thankful for all that I have
    • Give away one belonging every week
    • Write a letter and leave it in the mail room with words of encouragement that people could pick up and be inspired by
    • Give $1000 every year to a new charity
    • Lead a youth group
    • Lead worship 1 or 2 Sundays every month
    • Read the Bible cover to cover

    Financial

    • Own a car 2006 or newer with 4 wheel drive
    • Increase my monthly income 3 times by December 2015
    • Build a my mutual fund portfolio to $10,000
    • Pay a finance consultant to help me build a financial plan
    • Own a duplex and rent out one half of it
    • Invest in a startup
    • Build an investment portfolio that will allow me to be free to do live giving things throughout the year
    • Own a vacation home in Tuscany
    • Own a coffee shop that I can work in
    • Generate $2000 passively each month
    • Help give my parents a great retirement
    • Build a five year investment plan

    I am now working through my original questions on all of these goals and I will come back with another post on my findings

    Day 4 of the altMBA

    Sat Jun 20 2015

    After the completion of my 4th day and my second project, I am feeling the strangest mixture of both tiredness and energy. I have gotten no more than 5 hours of sleep every night. I've gone to bed at 1 and woken up at 6. The energy I feel with this program has really made me think about the kind of projects and people I'd like to work for when I'm living the way I was made to live. I feel more energy than I have doing anything and I also feel more tired than I ever had. It's like spending every day tossing and turning, too excited to sleep.

    I've played around with waking up a three hours before I need to do anything in the past and it was always amazing to see the results. I'm taking this next month and using it as an exploration of what wake me up every day.

    You can read my project post about setting goals here.

    Day 3 of the altMBA

    Fri Jun 19 2015

    Goals. Everyone needs them. Everyone thinks about them. Only a handful realize them.

    You've been asleep in the lukewarm bubble bath. The stagnant water is not hot enough to give your bath purpose. The water is not cold enough to convince you to move your wrinkly ass and do something about it.

    It's time to wake up.Stand up. Dry off.

    It starts with a baby step. It starts with a tiny action. It starts with small blog post.

    It starts.

    Day 2 of the altMBA

    Wed Jun 17 2015

    Today has been very stressful as I have been working around the clock to get my portion of the project done. It can be viewed on altMBA.com but I figured I might as well show it off here too. More great projects to come, and be sure to see what some of the other people are posting on the site.

    Destroy-your-frame

    “**Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realize the truth. Then you'll see, that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.”**

    As you read these words, your mind is busily processing each word into something that has meaning to you. If I didn’t bring it up, you most likely wouldn’t be considering the miracle that the electrical pulses in my head were converted into words, sent to my fingertips, converted into electrical signals sent to the computer through an infinitely complex set of protocols and mediums, then re-converted again to text and mapped out onto the millions of tiny lights on your monitor. You may also feel compelled to read this post for one reason or another, and right now I’d like to ask you to consider moving on to the next post, or thing you have as an option in front of you. By choosing something other than what you see as your “current activity”, especially if it is something really ludicrous you have effectively destroyed your frame.

    The frame is a helpful tool for recognizing the subconscious assumptions you make about every single aspect of your life. By recognizing the frame, you are shedding light on line that all opportunity stands behind, gazing longingly in at the fluff lucky enough to make it into the limelight. That fluff is inside of your frame for one simple reason. You want it there. It is the thing or things that resonated with your emotions causing you to quickly form the assumption that it deserves your attention. It is the fluff that makes a decision difficult. It is time to wake up to the reality. Outside of the small canvas of options you have painted within the frame of your decision, lies a gallery rife with even better options that weren’t even allowed onto your paint brush. Destroy your frame. Tear it off of the wall and embrace the world of possibilities that lie in front of you. Unplug from the Matrix you’ve created for yourself and see what’s really available for you. Time is of the essence, so now that you’ve emerged on the other side, take a deep breath. Let’s make a decision.

    It starts with the change agent. A problem that needs solving.

    A person came into a computer shop I worked at and asked the question: “Should I buy a Mac? I hear they are a lot easier to use and my PC has been running so slow.” What is this person’s problem? What change agent caused them to start a decision process in the first place?

    That is when the Apple elitist in me screams: “Duh, they’re on a freaking PC, of course it’s slow and frustrating!”. Ladies and Gentleman I present in all of its narrow minded glory, a frame. You may not see the danger, but imagine me giving that person information based on what my frame of their problem says the obvious choice is. It’s just plain foolish to set one option on a scale without a counter option to balance it out and come to a reasonable, educated decision. It’s time to destroy the frame and rebuild it around options that matter. Here is how we do it:

    Ask off the wall questions-

    How educated is she when it comes to PC? How long has she had her PC? Could she do more of the things that she finds frustrating on the PC in a more familiar environment? Does she have any friends that she can borrow a Mac from to ensure that she isn’t switching to something that will have a learning curve? How do they like living in Colorado? What is their favorite television show?What is the price difference between a low end Mac and a high end PC? You get the picture. Make cases for both sides of the argument. Pose as many questions as possible and don’t be afraid of the questions that don’t seem to have any relation to the problem.

    Trash the options your frame dealt you-

    In most cases while confronting a decision, our frame usually submits a few ideas for consideration. Throw them out of the equation all together. This leaves you with one problem and zero solutions. Innovate. If that option wasn’t available how then could we solve the problem. Switching to Mac isn’t an option, and this person desperately needs to feel less frustrated when using a PC. What about switching to Linux? Or not using a computer at all? It seems that innovation is usually brought into existence because it is demanded. Demand innovation. Paint the frame, then the gallery, then demolish the gallery, and force yourself to migrate your art onto the hull of a spaceship.

    Consider the opportunity cost-

    If one of their options is to spend a minimum of $700 on a Mac, could that money be used to solve the problem using a different option?  What is the opportunity cost of all of your options. What opportunity are you giving up to make the current option you are considering?

    Now assess the options. Borrow Mac from a friend and evaluate it for 10 day’s. Become more familiar with working in a PC environment(unfortunately this does mean learning a thing or two about basic maintenance). Start working through options to ease into the decision. Try the cheapest options first and consider setting a timeline that tells you when you will take the plunge.

    Now build a new frame, the proper frame your new set of options deserve.Start to strategically migrate the options that seem least likely to solve the original problem to the outside, and sit back and appreciate the different features of each option you now have in front of you.

    Left with a handful of reasonable options, including ones that you may have never considered, it is time to decide.

    OVERVIEW

    Framing is usually done without unconsciously, which means it relies on our deeper self, and does not provide a platform for our better options to breathe. We must destroy that frame and rebuild it around a set of options that includes the options that fell into the crowd of ideas that got instantly shoved aside when the problem presented itself.

    Ask any question that pops into your head to try and get some off the wall ideas and solutions for handling the problem.

    Take the obvious solution out of the picture all together and ask a new question such as: “ If solution x can’t happen, what can I do instead to solve problem y?”

    Consider the opportunity cost: “What value would one decision give that another one wouldn’t?”

    BONUS: How does this apply to the educational system?

    Frame: Students must be tested and graded in order to ensure that they are learning, and that our teachers are doing their jobs.

    What problem is this solving? We don’t know if kids are learning, and if the teacher is doing their job.

    Off the wall questions-

    Who is the educational system for, the kids or the administrative board?

    Why are schools all inside?

    Why does every kid need to go to school?

    What are they really getting from it?

    What does the grading system measure?

    Who benefits most from the grading system?

    Remove the current solution all together-

    In a school with no grading system how would teachers know that their students understand the material?

    Give smaller tests on each subject and find out where kids are struggling and frame their concepts differently so they might have a better chance to understand the material.

    Allow kids to work at their own pace and put more emphasis on challenging them to try new things.

    Opportunity Cost-

    What could the money that goes into testing and grading be used for?

    It is estimated that 1.7 billion dollars is spent on testing every year which could easily be used to implement better programs that support learning.

    By not grading, the teachers have more time to spend working with kids ensuring that they don’t need help understanding the various concepts.

    To read more about this issue be sure to check out my friend Seth’s post.

    Day 1 of the altMBA

    Tue Jun 16 2015

    book-decisive-265x440

    It's 6:00 am Monday morning.

    Like a little boy ready to open his presents on Christmas morning, I jump out of bed and onto the computer.

    I scroll down to my first project: "Project 1: Make good decisions", and begin to read through the material. Without going into too much detail here is what I can conclude about a good decision.

    A good decision:

    Is a management event and must be treated as such

    Ignores Sunk Costs - Sunk Cost is the idea that you have invested to much to move on to something else

    Means looking past "How this decision makes me feel now" , and looking forward at how this decision increases the chances that you achieve your goals

    Requires a change agent

    Needs to be framed... CORRECTLY

    Framing is the subconscious list of options that we give ourselves when looking at a decision

    Here is a process you can take into your company, personal life, or anywhere you have a decision that needs to be made.

    1. List your goals and the outcomes the decision is supposed to produce. Answer the question: What is this for?

    2.List every choice that's available to you. Break out of the frame that you created for yourself

    3.For each option that you discover, list the things that need to happen in order to make that option happen

    4. Read Michelle's post on untangling decisions.

    5. Organize your priorities and don't proceed until the constituents agree.

    A video from Seth on Decisions

    How I use Google Drive to bridge the gap from mobile to home base and beyond

    Wed Oct 01 2014

    First off,

    I want to note that this post is not meant to put down the alternatives to Google Drive. I am merely expressing my experience with the service, and a few things I did to get more out of the service.

    GoogleDriveI have been a Google Customer for a while now. I think that the first time I ever took advantage of the "Google Drive" before it was the cloud storage system it is today was in Gmail. All Gmail users had a certain amount of data they could use for storing email attachments and emails long term. The next time I used the service was when they introduced the Google Docs program.

    I upgraded to the pro version of Google Drive, after a family reunion. My aunt was asking about ways we could share family photos with everyone in out family. I immediately thought of Google Drive as a potential solution, and signed up for the 500GB version for $10 a month. I had kept it for a while, just using it as a tool for sharing photos with our family members. It wasn't until recently that I started using it to bridge the gap from the work I was doing at home, to the place that I would be working at the time.I don't want to keep ALL of my files on my computer I travel with. I want to be able to access them, but more importantly I want space on my laptop.

    The Setup

    Step 1- Clean up files

    I needed to clean up my folders a bit. This meant looking over all of the files that could be moved, and moving them to the desired location. I have three main folders, and under that I had several individual folders for clients, and personal design projects. I deleted as much as I could to leave just the things that I am working on at the time. I hate having desktop icons. I feel like it is easier to have a cluttered file system when you just drag things to the open space, and don't take time to put them where they belong.

    Step 2- Create a "Temporary" Folder

    This folder will be synced with both computers and hold anything you only want to store locally until it can be filed away to the appropriate cloud based location. Let's say you have a fairly large file that you need to work on today outside of your home base. You can download the file and save any changes to the temporary folder on your home base computer, or your mobile computer. Then when you are done needing it with you on the go, you can move it from the Google Drive web interface to another folder such as the next folder we will create: The "Cloud" Folder.

    Step 3- Create a "Cloud" folder

    After setting up a Google Drive account, it's time to create your first Google Drive folder. Go to your Google Drive, and click the add new icon. Click folder and label it "Cloud". The purpose of this folder is to keep items that you don't need on either machine, but want to make sure you can access down the road. I personally don't use this too often, because I have plenty of space on my home machine. I do however store all of my Google Docs in it which is especially handy. I also keep a sub folder inside it that I share with family and friends who want to upload an entire photo album for everyone to see.

    Step 4- Create a Latest Work folder

    The purpose of this folder will be to make sure you are synching only the bare necessities when you are on the go. Create it the same way you created the last folder from inside your Google Drive account. Remember: You can still access any of these files because they will be stored on Google Drive, right now we are focusing on just the folders that will be synced with your mobile computer.

    Step 5- Create system specific folders

    I have one Mac Book Air for travel, and one custom built PC for work at home. You will want to have folders that are specific to the device you are working on, so that you can easily keep up with what you will need to have synced. From your Google Drive account, create folders with the name of the system they will be storing files for.

    Step 6- Installing and configuring

    After you have spent time organizing the files and you feel like it is as organized as it can be, it's time to install Drive onto all of your machines. Follow the instructions here that walk you through step-by-step on installing it. Windows users can click here to have it installed automatically using ninite.com. Once you have it installed, and you have signed in using your Google account info, it's time to choose what to synch on both machines. By default all of your folders will be synched to any machine that has Drive installed, so you will want to select only the necessary ones. To do that, pause Drive by finding it's icon in the system tray or menu bar. Then click on "Preferences" to open the window with sync settings. Click the check box that says "Only sync some folders to this computer", then click the check box next to the folder that needs to be synced to the machine you are working on. After these boxes have been checked, you can un-pause your drive. You should now be able to see a Google Drive folder showing up in Windows Explorer, or OSX Finder. You can expand that folder to see the other folders you have created and synched. Drag those folders to your library on the left side of the window so that you can easily access them when you need to. Once you have repeated these steps for all of the systems you need to have on the cloud, it's time to upload everything.

    Step 7- Uploading files

    Now that you have everything nice and neat and synced correctly, you can upload folders and files by dragging them to where they should go. If you already have an organizational system in place for your folders and files, you can move the parent folder into which ever Drive folder they should be in. Your folder hierarchy and organization will stay the same on Drive. After dragging everything to the final location, it will take some time to upload everything that needs to be uploaded.

    That's it! You're ready to keep your folders backed up and secure, and hopefully clear up some space on your mobile machine.

    If you have any cool ideas for using Google Drive, leave a comment!

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