The Mentors

When a founder decides to build an impact driven organization, at some point they have to make an important decision on whether to structure it as a for profit entity or a non-profit. While a for-profit can maximize financial upside to the founding team and shareholders, a non-profit by definition can focus more of its effort on the impact it wants to have in the world. 

In this week's episode bring back Darrell Silver, the founder and former CEO of Thinkful, a for-profit education venture, to talk about why the model of the non-profit freeCodeCamp is so innovative in its funding and impact model, and why he is now a major donor and supporter of the organization that was founded with a similar mission to his. 

In this rare interview, we got to dive into some of the nuances of how nonprofits are managed and how freeCodeCamp has been able to deliver 1.1 billion minutes of instruction with just a 12 person team by making their education model open source. We also discussed how people who want to improve their career prospects and pick up a technical skill can best decide whether to learn online for free or pay tuition for an instructor guided education experience if they can afford it. 

Tune in to hear our interview with Darrell Silver about the story and future of freeCodeCamp.

If you want to support their work, you can donate as little as $5 here which will directly contribute to 250 hours of free education!

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Kevin Urrutia decided to teach himself to code while in college so that he could turn all the different business ideas he had into reality. Little did he know that after years of building apps and websites and trying idea after idea, he would need to completely change his mindset about how to get ideas off the ground to have his first entrepreneurial success.

Kevin left his home in New York to go to Silicon Valley and work as a software engineer for Mint.com and later a little known startup called Zaarly where he would learn the power of SEO and marketing. 

After reading every marketing and sales book he could find, he moved back to start an online maid service called Maid Sailors. In this episode he talks about how his new found love for marketing helped him scale Maid Sailors to millions of dollars in revenue, and truly kicked off his entrepreneurial career helping him launch several more startups, including his digital marketing agency Voy Media.

This show is brought to you by School16, a tech career accelerator for professionals interested in roles in Product, Marketing, Sales and Operations at top tech firms and startups.

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This week we got the chance to interview a former SpaceX Engineer and founder of biohacking startup Levels as part of a special podcast recording hosted by School16 in front of a live audience.

In this episode, Josh Clemente told us about how he pushed his way into getting an opportunity to work at Tesla and then SpaceX, where he ended up leading the Life Support Systems team. He credits his time at SpaceX for teaching him how to think big and go after nearly impossible goals, and his time running his own general contracting business in college for giving him the confidence to start building a business that was going after a massive opportunity.

Listen to find out how Josh came up with the idea for a continuous glucose monitoring technology that is being made available to anyone to help people avoid some of the most common and dangerous diseases. We also discuss how he built the right team to help him get his first customers, find investors, and start bringing it to the masses all in less than 2 years since he conceived it.

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This is one of the most common questions we get from aspiring entrepreneurs. The answer, however, is less about what you should learn and more about how you should do it. 

Entrepreneurs come from almost every background imaginable, but one of the biggest contributors to founder success is previous experience with working on highly talented teams. 

Let's take the most famous example - the "PayPal Mafia." Companies like SpaceX, Yelp, Yammer, LinkedIn, and Square all came from individuals that were employees at PayPal. Some of them came from engineering, while others lead operations or sales teams, but the factor that separated them from other people starting companies at the same time was their experience working with and learning from other incredibly talented individuals.

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This is a follow up to our recent episode titled The Story of A Homeless Neuroscientist and how one small act eventually resulted in a job offer. We often come up with reasons not to do something or to delay acting on an idea because of fear of failure or simply because we feel like we have other more important things to do. 

Entrepreneur Naval Ravikant once wisely said "inspiration is perishable - act on it immediately." Famous motivational speaker Tony Robbins uses the same technique to stay on top of the various business interests that he has. Whenever he's in a meeting he makes sure to act on at least one thing that's discussed immediately to insure that it gets done. This is because he knows from experience that if something is put off there's a big chance it'll never become a priority. 

In this episode we discuss how you can apply the same ideas to seemingly small actions this week that can have very impactful outcomes.

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This rebroadcast episode was inspired by the growing opportunity to connect with sought after individuals that are more accessible than ever before as more people are working remotely in 2020.

Finding a good mentor is hard but the real work is in keeping them. In today’s episode we talk about how you can impress important people in your life, be they a mentor, advisor, investor, or simply someone that’s further along than you.

We give two specific examples of how our mentees have accomplished this by following up, following through, being solution oriented, and finding opportunities to add value instead of always asking for help.

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Our sense of self worth is constantly in flux, but it's important to learn how to control it to stay productive. This is in part because failure is a big part of the process and if you tie your worth to success or failure it's bound to become debilitating. Instead of worrying about outcomes that are outside of our control we should focus on actions that we can control. 

In this episode we discuss the following four techniques, tying each of them to a personal story:

1) Getting outside encouragement

2) Setting achievable goals

3) Shifting your focus

4) Finding ways to be helpful to others

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When faced with a challenge remember that you don't have to endure it alone. In this week's 5 Minute Pick Me Up we wanted to share a story of Brianna Austin, a homeless neuroscientist that we learned about on LinkedIn and why we were compelled to reach out to our network in an effort to help. 

In this episode you will learn: 

1. Why sometimes it's valuable to trust your instincts and do the opposite of what conventional wisdom tells you to do
2. How to ask for help while showing credibility
3. Why it's critical to invest in building and developing relationships especially in challenging times like these

As a resource we encourage you to join our free weekly seminars to learn from people that have overcome similar challenges to land incredible opportunities at firms like Twitter, Uber, Google, and more. You will have the chance network with other attendees and connect with our expert instructors to develop your network.

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This is a rebroadcast episode that was inspired by a recent class in our Sales Module at School16.

We decided to give you an inside look into a recent phone call we recorded where we ask a high school principal for a speaking budget. 

For many people, asking someone what they might be willing to pay is the most uncomfortable part of any sales or business development conversation - aka, going for the close. But with practice, you can learn how to do this quickly and effectively, creating new opportunities that may have been left on the table before. 

You'll hear how to use active listening to rephrase your line of questioning when asking for something like budget or a commitment to finally get the answer that you want.

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