Mark and Jesse consider the wave of AI technology that is rapidly being deployed in a number of industries. Whether it's the dreamlike collage-art of Midjourney or ChatGPT's pedantic essays based on conversational prompts, AI seems to be on everyone's lips these days. What remains to be seen is how quickly -- and broadly -- it will impact businesses. Mark and Jesse both agree, though, that now is the time to consider how it might impact your business and how you could make use of it.   Jesse offers a simple exercise to get started -- write down (without Googling!) every way you can think of that AI could replace or perform some aspect of your business. Write each idea down on a sticky note, and as you amass a lot of sticky notes start to organize them, arrange them into categories, and see what patterns appear. At the very least, this exercise can help you start to understand better what your business is, where and how AI can help or hurt your processes.   Mark Butler, Virtual CFO The Money School: https://moneyschool.works https://markbutler.com https://letsdothebooks.com   YNAB https://www.youneedabudget.com

Welcome AI Overlords | How Will It Affect Your Business?

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In today's episode, Jesse discusses his net worth tracker, a basic spreadsheet in which he records the balances of his investments and other assets quarterly. For Jesse, net worth is the scorecard of personal finance -- it's a way of keeping track of what direction you are going with your money. However, scorecard is an impersonal way to describe net worth, perhaps even suggests that one's value is tied to net worth. This could not be further from the truth! There's a lot more to a person than their net worth, but net worth does tell an important story about a person's money, and money is a vital part of a person, even if it's not their whole self.   As Mark has observed during his time coaching people to manage their money, people that routinely spend beyond their means -- that is, accrue negative net worth -- have allowed their desire for consumption to exceed their ability to consume. Their net worth represents a person who is out of touch with their tradeoffs. As Mark has mentioend in previous episodes, YNAB is all about making your tradeoffs crystal clear, and learning to love the choices you make to bring your money in alignment with your priorities. In short, learning to love your spending.   Mark Butler, Virtual CFO The Money School: https://moneyschool.works https://markbutler.com https://letsdothebooks.com   YNAB https://www.youneedabudget.com

Why You Should Be Tracking Your Net Worth

In today's episode, Mark and Jesse discuss money as a concept, why it exists, and how trade (using money) has created tremendous value for humans throughout history. On the YNAB Podcast, Jesse has spoken about money being far more than a tool, however, and really an extension of one's self -- one's energies and desires. Mark and Jesse then attempt to connect the dots to our modern monetary system, where debt and inflation loom large. What exactly is it about money is essential to human flourishing?   Mark Butler, Virtual CFO The Money School: https://moneyschool.works https://markbutler.com https://letsdothebooks.com   YNAB https://www.youneedabudget.com

You Are Money, Money Is You

Mark kicks off today's episode with a handful of words, hoping to weave them into a broader discussion: vision, goal, strategy, plan, and tactics. Mark and Jesse discuss how many small business owners look for tactics first, various tasks focused on operations: posting on social media, starting a YouTube channel, building an email list. These may or may not be worthwhile activities -- you really need a strategy to understand the big picture of where the business is going (or needs to go), and then select the activities that will get you there. But even then, strategy is hollow, Mark argues, unless there's a why behind what you do. Unless the company has a clearly defined core identity, it will struggle to adopt a good strategy.   Mark Butler, Virtual CFO The Money School: https://moneyschool.works https://markbutler.com https://letsdothebooks.com   YNAB https://www.youneedabudget.com

You Need Core Values, Not Strategy

In today's episdoe, Mark and Jesse discuss the importance of developing good systems, not just in business but in life! Mark shares a recent experience in which his wife left for a few days on a retreat, leaving Mark to handle her usual duties. Mark was faced with a lack of systems in day to day tasks, and enough friction to sit her down after the retreat and have a talk about family systems. Kate agreed, and, within a few weeks, became a systems expert, looking for every avenue she could find to create better processes.   Good systems aren't just for increasing business profit, they're for improving quality of life, relationships, and family harmony too!   The Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt and Jeff Cox  https://www.amazon.com/Goal-Process-Ongoing-Improvement-dp-0884271951/dp/0884271951/ref=dp_ob_title_bk     Mark Butler, Virtual CFO The Money School: https://moneyschool.works https://markbutler.com https://letsdothebooks.com   YNAB https://www.youneedabudget.com

Systems: Not as Boring as They Sound!

Mark and Jesse ponder the question -- what do you do when growth slows and the business plateaus? Mark recalls a story about a successful businessperson who failed at several ventures before striking gold, and notes that the "gold" business was never hard. It grew a lot early on, and continued to grow steadily from there. He juxtaposes this result with some of his clients who spend hundreds or even thousands of hours working on a business, yet never really take off. There were signs of sucess early on in the good business, and likewise there were not signs of success in the failed ventures. Looking for signs of success is a good indicator of whether a business has legs or not. If you don't see any, it's a good indicator that your time is spent elsewhere!   Antifragile by Nassim Taleb  https://www.amazon.com/Antifragile-Things-That-Disorder-Incerto-ebook/dp/B0083DJWGO/ref=sr_1_1?crid=JMRX5RI5RNZ8&dib;=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.C3e4IagEiQHRzgC0W8S0KkU1s2tYPbhDWivIreUIOtwe2xEXBRSw7sYgY8vGAZxpOF13z-5F3MCQJ00OZnI2iuM5RFHBnnqqX5yeUs348hp-T297HGOx2e0-cQ-XPjqTBF2D8WYJx5Kt0LCnHhsFfmbdwGDgxb3pwniTQYHi71ahb0q4CkhWvUHmByV0dJqUkoIHy2PEFt18GVXgLjePclPH4zK4uOKDXX14x9cdoAc.MlGqTaeOx35qrIkulkswcuGJuF4GOAXfSoFOGSpA4z8&dib;_tag=se&keywords;=antifragile+by+nassim+taleb&qid;=1710465424&sprefix;=antifragile%2Caps%2C102&sr;=8-1     Mark Butler, Virtual CFO The Money School: https://moneyschool.works https://markbutler.com https://letsdothebooks.com   YNAB https://www.youneedabudget.com

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