Jamin

In Keith Ferrazzi’s book, Never Eat Alone, he mentions 10 ways to be an expert in your field. In what will be come a ten part series, his first tip is:

Get out in front and analyze the trends and opportunities on the cutting edge

First off, there are two main reasons that you would want to do this. The main one being the credibility this will gain for you. not just in school maybe you’ll be able to make a better grade on a test, but once you get in the workforce, knowing trends are huge to being able to predict what will happen next. This doesn’t just apply to business, because nearly everything goes to through different trends, whether they are cyclical or or just up and down. If you can become good at predicting trends you are now an indespensible asset to any company.

But how can this be accomplished in the academic setting?

Find professors that are on top of current events. They often know more than just what they are teaching in the class. Also, keep up with the news. There is an immeasurable amount of ways to know whats going on in the business and world news. If you don’t watch cable tv, turn to the interent. The Channel King allows for top business channels like Bloomberg US and CNBC.  And you never know what might come up on the business section of digg.

I finished my first book of the summer yesterday. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen. This book is basically a process David Allen uses and coaches to help people get organized and be put in the position to be as efficient and effective as they possibly can. The key is to always keep track of what is on your mind and coming into your life by writing it down. There are three requirements to that, he says.

1. Every thought and item in your head must be put into your collection system
2. As few collection buckets as possible
3. You must empty these collection buckets regularly

The most important thing to take from this book is to always come up with a “next action”. For all your projects, assignments, and needs. If you can determine the next action, you’ll already be ahead of the game. Too often projects are left open to just get done. But until you take a second and realize what must be done next the project could stagnate.

I have hardly done the book and the processes inside it justice, but it is a must read to see if this GTD mentality is right for you.

The best way to sum up the reason for the book is something Allen says in the last section:

“The bottom line is it makes you more conscious, more focused, and more capable of implementing the changes and results you want, whatever they are”

And this book will put you on the way to just that.

One thing you hear while attending college is how important networking is. Students go to great lengths to put themselves in situations that will allow them to network with fellow students and alumnus.  Networking sites are becoming even more important each day (Facebook, LinkedIn).

Recently, Matt Svoboda posted on his blog a video of a pastor who tried to convince his listeners to witness to everyone they meet because “everyone is interesting”. Why not transfer this principle to meeting new contacts where you are now?  Not only is every person be interesting, but also a valuable link in your network.  Sometimes a little motivation like being able to talk to an interesting person is great for helping to network.  A book which talks more about networking and developing relationships and is on my to read list is “Never Eat Alone” by Keith Ferrazzi.

So the summer has started but I will be attending classes for the first summer session. This blog will be a practice for a Undergrad Business/Productivity blog I would like to write. In order to prepare for that, I’ll publish a few posts on here.

I am taking Survey of Calculus and Intro to Information Systems, which is my possible major.

This summer I would like to read (in no particular order):

Getting Things Done - David Allen

Don’t Start The Revolution Without Me - Jesse Ventura

The Revolution: A Manifesto - Ron Paul

A Whole New Mind - Dan Pink

Any other business books I happen to stumble upon

The purpose of this blog is to become more knowledgeable in creating a successful blog and also work on my writing.

Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!