Teachers operate in a world where deadlines are required to be met, and goals must be accomplished. Introduce difficult parents and the pressure of overwhelming testing expectations, and it becomes easy to see, how the teaching profession suffers from a massive attrition rate. Successful teachers, learn early on, that recalcitrant students are non-productive students. They are also able to distinguish between ritualistic compliance and a genuine desire to learn. This distinction, is one that is vital in the classroom, and even more so in the business world. Continue reading
Welcome Guest Blogger Alex Sanchez!
Big news guys, we’re really glad to be bringing on our very first guest blogger – Alex Sanchez! Alex runs his own blog at Up From Nothing and as I’ve been reading his stuff, I’m amazed at how parallel he is to GoingUpward. While the GoingUpward blog has been traditionally dedicated to helping small businesses do better online, Alex takes it a step further, giving you the principles and tools you need to not only grow your business, but to grow you. Before we introduce his first post (coming later this week), I wanted to answer some of the questions I’m sure you all have.
The Disney Difference: Lessons learned from Wreck-It Ralph
Earlier this month, I finally watched Wreck-It Ralph, Disney’s story about the bad guy in the video game that doesn’t want to be a bad guy anymore. He’s tired of constantly getting knocked to the mud in every game and left to live in the dump, while everyone else gets to have cake and live in the penthouse. When he discovers a way to become better than what he’s always been, he sets out to prove to everyone that the bad guy doesn’t doesn’t always have to be bad! What a great movie. But it was more. Watching the special features, I was reminded about just how Disney is different than all the rest, and how they’ve continued to be so different and popular for so long. The Disney Difference is in the details. Continue reading
5 things snowboarding taught me about business.
Over the weekend, I went on one of coolest adventures of my life: a trip to Red River, New Mexico for three days of snowboarding. Being that I’m from Oklahoma, you can imagine how pumped I was about all of this. We have no real mountains to speak of, and even snow is scarce in some parts of the state. My friend who invited me was originally from Baltimore, and though he’d gone snowboarding plenty of times before, this would be his first time in the Rockies. We saddled up at about noon and made the 10-hour drive to this grand adventure that not only gave me some great memories, but served a few lessons in business sense as well. Here are 5 things I learned about business while snowboarding in New Mexico. Continue reading
3 things every freelance designer needs to do to be successful
I’ve been having a great series of conversations the last few days with another freelancer who’s been struggling to get more work. I’m not even fully where I want to be yet, but I must be doing something right, because I have other folks coming to me on a fairly regular basis for freelancing advice about how to get started or how to “go upward” in their freelancing (hence the name of this site). After nearly 10 years as a freelancer and an untold amount of experiences, I have a few key things that I’ve found that separate the professionals from the losers. The interesting thing is, a professional designer needs to do these things, even though they are not design-related.
The role of the client vs. the role of the designer
Is the designer nothing more than a glorified employee? After all, they’re just there to do the job, collect the paycheck and move on to the next thing, right? Surely, a relationship that doesn’t last long shouldn’t have much value applied to it by either party. And you seriously wouldn’t believe how dirty it makes feel to write all that. Guh.