I want you to think of the amount of work you do each day.  Now, imagine that you were asked to double it - what would you say?  But that’s not all, I now want you to give all that extra work away for free.   

If you think this sounds unrealistic, you’re not alone.  That was also my first reaction.

But this isn’t a hypothetical. In fact, it’s the core principle behind today’s guest, Matthew Manos, company “verynice”.  His company is a collaborative design strategy practice that specializes in creative problem solving based on his give half methodology, where he gives half of his company’s services away for free to nonprofits and other community organizations — so they can spend money directly on the problems they are trying to solve.

Matthew started out as a semi-professional skateboarder where he first learned to embrace failure and now applies those lessons to running his business and teaching innovation at USC.  

One of those lessons is Matthew’s advice to not accept the status quo, and instead define success on your own terms, when he says:

“Success is up to you to define. Constantly trying to become someone else is the single biggest distraction.”

You can follow the podcast and host Chuck Swoboda on Twitter for further exploration and discussion on innovation.

The episode is also available wherever else you listen to podcasts. Enjoy!