Bryan Law on Starting a New University in Angola

In Chapter 20 of 23 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, business strategist Bryan Law answers "How Are You Going About Starting a New University in Africa?" After meeting Guerra Frietas while studying at Northwestern University, Law joins Freitas' volunteer team to help build a new university in Angola. Law shares steps he and the team have taken to build credibility get a top-tier team of volunteer professionals to help build the school.

Bryan Law is a Principal in the Global Business Strategy Group at Google and a board member at Angola University. Previously, he was a manager at Monitor, management consulting firm. He has worked in consulting roles at Watson Wyatt and Mercer. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Business and a BA from Georgetown University. 

Getting Advice for Making Big Decisions in Your 30s

In Chapter 23 of 23 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, business strategist Bryan Law answers "At This Point in Your Life, Where Are You Seeking Advice and Coaching?" Now in his thirties, Law shares how he gets advice from a network of people to make more informed decisions. From teacher mentors from Georgetown to an inspiring Angolan friend to his parents to his spouse, Law finds willing people to support him as he faces key life decisions. He shares how the process of getting advice and coaching is less about being asked provocative questions that help him come to terms with decisions he makes.

Bryan Law is a Principal in the Global Business Strategy Group at Google and a board member at Angola University. Previously, he was a manager at Monitor, management consulting firm. He has worked in consulting roles at Watson Wyatt and Mercer. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Business and a BA from Georgetown University. 

How Relationship Connections Build Leader Capacity

In Chapter 14 of 16 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, product management executive Ramsey Pryor answers "What Leadership Skills are Becoming More Relevant as Your Career Progresses?" Pryor shares how the question of leadership he is trying to answer changes over time. Early in his career, leadership is more about individual performance at a higher level than peers or competitors. Over time, leadership becomes less about tactics and more about people and resources you can bring in to solve a problem.

Ramsey Pryor is a product management executive at IBM focused on cloud-based collaboration and security software products. Previously he was VP Product Marketing at Outblaze, acquired by IBM. Pryor earned an MBA from IESE Business School in Barcelona, Spain and a BA in Economics and Spanish from Northwestern University.  

Building Software for a Socially Connected Workforce

In Chapter 15 of 16 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, product management executive Ramsey Pryor answers "What Has Your Software Product Manager Work Taught You About Team Collaboration?" Working as a product management executive building cloud-based collaboration platforms at IBM, Pryor learns how cloud software is helping users better manage life in a socially connected workforce. As office life becomes less 9 to 5 and personal life, via social media and mobile, becomes more present during office hours, Pryor finds collaboration software can bring a user's life together in and out of business to be more manageable.

Ramsey Pryor is a product management executive at IBM focused on cloud-based collaboration and security software products. Previously he was VP Product Marketing at Outblaze, acquired by IBM. Pryor earned an MBA from IESE Business School in Barcelona, Spain and a BA in Economics and Spanish from Northwestern University.  

Staying Inspired by Keeping in Touch With Teachers

In Chapter 19 of 22 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, education technology entrepreneur Adam Geller answers "How Are Your Personal Experiences Shaping Your Professional Aspirations?" Geller stays connected to fellow teachers and school administrators from his previous work experience. These connections and the updates they share on Facebook provide Geller a constant reminder of why he does what he does working to improve education by improving teacher training.

Adam Geller is founder and CEO of Edthena, a video platform enabling online teacher coaching, peer review, and group learning. He is a recent Education Ventures fellow at the Kauffman Foundation and the founder of Teach For Us, a network connecting Teach for America corps members and alumni. He earned a BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a MA from the University of Missouri-Saint Louis.

How Diversity Enhances Career Advisor Network Value

In Chapter 22 of 22 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, education technology entrepreneur Adam Geller answers "At This Point in Your Life, Where Are You Seeking Advice and Coaching?" Geller gets career advice and career coaching from a broad, diverse professional network of people working across different fields. The diversity of experiences - from PhD scientists to management consultants to venture capitalists to startup CEOs to his hairstylist, help Geller develop and grow.

Adam Geller is founder and CEO of Edthena, a video platform enabling online teacher coaching, peer review, and group learning. He is a recent Education Ventures fellow at the Kauffman Foundation and the founder of Teach For Us, a network connecting Teach for America corps members and alumni. He earned a BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a MA from the University of Missouri-Saint Louis.

Geoff Hamm on Building Business Relationship Trust

In Chapter 4 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, mobile business executive Geoff Hamm answers "How Do You Establish Trust When Building Relationships?" For Hamm, it starts with finding mutual connections to establish credibility and transparency. To build trusted business relationships over time, Hamm relies on consistency, accountability, and honesty, especially when a situation does not go as planned.

Geoff Hamm is a business development executive and VP Strategic Alliances at mobile marketing platform start-up Applovin in San Francisco, CA. Previous to Applovin, Hamm held senior sales management positions at Tapjoy, Scribd, Electronic Arts, Yahoo!, Orbitz, IAC and Excite where he built deep relationships with advertisers and brands. Hamm graduated from the University of Illinois.

Geoff Hamm on Why to Do Business With People You Consider Friends

In Chapter 5 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, mobile business executive Geoff Hamm answers "How Are Your Personal Experiences Shaping Your Professional Aspirations?" Hamm believes that work life and personal life are not mutually exclusive. With experience, he learns to prioritize and embrace doing business with friends who also work in the Internet industry.

Geoff Hamm is a business development executive and VP Strategic Alliances at mobile marketing platform start-up Applovin in San Francisco, CA. Previous to Applovin, Hamm held senior sales management positions at Tapjoy, Scribd, Electronic Arts, Yahoo!, Orbitz, IAC and Excite where he built deep relationships with advertisers and brands. Hamm graduated from the University of Illinois.

Geoff Hamm on Organizing Your Social Network for Success

In Chapter 9 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, mobile business executive Geoff Hamm answers "How Do You Use Your Network to Get Help in Making Career and Life Decisions?" Hamm shares how he structures his personal and professional network as a series of rings, with immediate family and best friends at the core. In the ring nearest the core, Hamm includes mentors, bosses, and peers who have been engaged, reliable, supportive when he has asked for help in the past.

Geoff Hamm is a business development executive and VP Strategic Alliances at mobile marketing platform start-up Applovin in San Francisco, CA. Previous to Applovin, Hamm held senior sales management positions at Tapjoy, Scribd, Electronic Arts, Yahoo!, Orbitz, IAC and Excite where he built deep relationships with advertisers and brands. Hamm graduated from the University of Illinois.

Aspen Fellow Preston Smith on Developing Leadership Capacity

In Chapter 14 of 22 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, elementary charter school network CEO Preston Smith answers "How Did Your Aspen Institute Fellowship Contribute to Your Professional Development?" Selected into the Pahara Fellowship leader development program at the Aspen Institute, Smith joins a cohort of entrepreneurial education leaders. There, he learns via peer self-refections that help him identify ways to improve how he leads his life and his organization.

Preston Smith is co-founder and CEO of Rocketship Education, the highest performing low-income school system in California. After graduating the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Smith joined Teach for America. After three years teaching 1st Grade, he founded a district school in San Jose and became its principal. Smith was selected as a member of the 2010 class of Aspen Institute New Schools Fellows. 

Preston Smith on Staying Humble When You Think You Are Successful

In Chapter 18 of 22 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, elementary charter school network CEO Preston Smith answers "At This Moment in Your Life, Where Are You Seeking Advice and Coaching?" Smith shares a big life lesson he learned from crashing a car while in high school. The lesson reminds him to stay humble even when you think you have everything figured out. As a professional, this helps Smith embrace support from an executive coach, his Aspen Institute Pahara Fellowship cohort and a group of advisors he terms his "kitchen cabinet."

Preston Smith is co-founder and CEO of Rocketship Education, the highest performing low-income school system in California. After graduating the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Smith joined Teach for America. After three years teaching 1st Grade, he founded a district school in San Jose and became its principal. Smith was selected as a member of the 2010 class of Aspen Institute New Schools Fellows. 

Louise Langheier on the Lifetime Value of an Ashoka Fellowship

In Chapter 8 of 21 in her 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, social entrepreneur Louise Langheier answers "What Did Your Ashoka Fellowship Teach You About Social Entrepreneurship Best Practices?" Langheier shares how being recommended and becoming an Ashoka Fellow has opened new doors to help her lead as a social entrepreneur. She finds the unstructured network supports her needs as a leader seeking to affect social change in her nonprofit CEO job.

Louise Davis Langheier is founder and CEO of Peer Health Exchange, a non-profit that trains college students to teach health education in public high schools. Louise was selected as a member of the 2011 class of Aspen Entrepreneurial Education Fellows, and was named an Ashoka Fellow in 2012. She graduated from Yale University. 

Mark Graham on Essential Advice Every Intern Needs to Know

In Chapter 14 of 15 in his 2013 Capture Your Flag interview, media executive Mark Graham answers "How Have You Learned to Give Better Advice When People Ask You For Help?" Graham shares what he does to counsel interns on how to build career skills in an internship and get a full-time job working in media and entertainment. He shares the importance of making connections and keeping in touch with your professional network. Additionally, he shares the importance of saying yes and taking initiative to go above and beyond your job description. Lastly, he pushes interns to socialize their successes to others in the organization can better understand the contribution they make in their time working the internship.

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at MTV Networks. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media. He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.

Idan Cohen on Finding Inspiration and Support Living in New York City

In Chapter 4 of 13 in his 2013 Capture Your Flag interview, technology entrepreneur Idan Cohen responds to "Living in New York, it's an aspirational city and people have big dreams - how has being around that community of people affected you?" Cohen shares how much more optimistic and supportive people are in New York City than where he lived before in Tel Aviv. As an entrepreneur, he finds the diverse, positive support system helps him dream big dreams and work toward those dreams.

Idan Cohen is a technology entrepreneur and product management leader at Samsung Electronics. He co-founded Boxee, which was acquired by Samsung in early 2013. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: Living in New York, it's an aspirational city. People here have big dreams. How has being around that community of people affected you?

Idan Cohen: So I think the main thing for me, moving here and being here, was the positive and optimistic approach that everyone has. You know, coming from Tel Aviv, which is a very entrepreneurial place or Israel in general, and a lot of people have a lot of aspirations, and they do something about it, and they are not afraid to shake things up, definitely more than anywhere else. They're always ready to cut corners and go around walls, and they have their own unique and successful way of doing that.

But the main difference of being here is, first of all, I feel that at the end of the day, it's just that people have more appreciation to what other people are doing. And I remember when I first moved here, when you would meet people and you'd tell them what you were doing or they would tell you what they were doing, and everyone is just, you know, “Wow, that's great. That's so awesome that you are doing that.” And in Israel, that was not like that. Everyone would start punching holes. It's kind of like the nature, that nature of, you know, “Yeah, it's great that you're doing that, but this is not going to work, this is going to work.” And it's not a bad thing. I mean, it's okay, but at some point, it starts grinding on you.

And here, even though sometimes it might be a little superficial, but that-- the fact that, like, everyone is a big support system, and in a place like New York, which is actually so big, and in a place like the US, then it's wonderful, and it helps a lot. And then combine that with being in a city that's extremely diverse and funnels the most talented people in the world, you know, in every domain, I think that's what makes it so interesting because where I came from, yeah, I was in a community that was doing-- you know, that was around technology, but even there, it's very segmented to very specific things just because you can achieve very specific things when you're, like, from there. Like, not every startup is the right startup. I mean yeah, I can give tons of examples, but things that you couldn't build in Israel. Or, I mean, you could move here and do them. Obviously I did that, but still, yeah, maybe even Boxee is not something that you can do from Israel. You have to be here. And that's the thing. Just in New York, you can find all these people, and they're all a big support system, and that's wonderful.

Lauren Serota on Surprising Teaching Career Benefits

In Chapter 17 of 21 in her 2013 Capture Your Flag interview, creative director and educator Lauren Serota answers "How Has Teaching Opened New Opportunities in Your Career?" Each graduating student becomes an ambassador not only for the school but also for each faculty member. This creates a feedback loop Serota uses to learn from alumni and build her reputation as a teacher willing to learn and share to new audiences. This opens new opportunities for her such as giving a design talk in Monterrey, Mexico.

Lauren Serota works as an associate creative director at frog design. She is also a teacher at the Austin Center for Design (AC4D). Serota earned a bachelor's degree in industrial design from the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD).

Nina Godiwalla on How Job Success Can Isolate and Overwhelm

In Chapter 8 of 18 in her 2013 Capture Your Flag interview, author and entrepreneur Nina Godiwalla answers "How Have Awards and Accolades Validated Your Work and Your Mission?" Godiwalla finds receiving awards, such as being inducted into the Texas Women's Hall of Fame, validate her work and her mission. As a public speaker traveling extensively, she finds it progressively difficult to get to know people well during short trips. Travel-related time constraints limit her ability to connect with the amazing people she meets which leads her to feel frustrated and isolated. Nina Godiwalla is an expert on diversity, leadership and women in the business world. She is CEO of Mindworks, which provides leadership, stress management, and diversity training to companies all over the world. She is also a bestselling author and public speaker. Godiwalla earned an MBA from Wharton, a MA from Dartmouth and a BBA from the University of Texas.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: How have awards and accolades validated your work and your mission?

Nina Godiwalla: At this point, I feel like it just helps me realize I’m going in the right direction but it doesn’t necessarily change anything major for me. Now that I’m so clear in what I’m doing, the awards and the accolades are like an extra bonus, like it’s nice, but before I felt like I was almost choosing what I would do based off of awards and accolades to some extent because that would be a great thing to do to get this award or get that, and now I feel I’m more along the lines of I’m so clear on my mission, I’m so clear on the purpose, and what I need to accomplish, fantastic, they’re just not nearly as important to me, I think, now that I’m so clear on my path.

Erik Michielsen: And you’re meeting some other people that are part of those communities, do you feel like you share similar views and there’s more work to do?

Nina Godiwalla: We come from completely different areas, one of that, I mean when I got inducted in the Texas Women’s Hall of Fame, Sandra Day O’Connor, as you know, she was one of the recipients, there are people that are colonels in the military. We all came out of so many different disciplines. Again, it’s like an amazing opportunity to meet fantastic, accomplished people, but definitely coming from very different backgrounds, and I feel like also, at this point, I’m so overwhelmed with—I feel like I’m constantly meeting such amazing people that I don’t even have time to get to know anybody anymore, and so the journey almost feels lonely at times because I’m overwhelmed with amazing people that I can’t follow up with. It’s absurd, it is absurd as it sounds, and I know that’s a choice, I mean don’t get me wrong, you create how busy you are, but there is always the next thing that I’m going to, the next thing I’m leaving for. And I mean I go to events all the time, I’m speaking. People give me their business cards, and I’d say I’ll follow up, and I have such good intentions, I really want to, I write it down, but by the time I get back, I’m already—there’s the next one where I meet 15 other people, and then I go back, the next one, so in a lot of ways, yes, I mean it’s fascinating, it’s amazing, but it’s also just completely overwhelming to be around, just meet all these amazing people all the time. (chuckles)

Erik Michielsen: Yeah, yeah, you wish for all that, sometimes, to come, and you get it, and you’re like I’m feeling more isolated and more lonely than ever.

Nina Godiwalla: Yeah, and I’ve heard that from several people, which I thought was interesting. I wouldn’t have—someone said it to me today, actually, she said— I was saying how, “Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to connect a little bit more with people geographically because several of us travel a lot?” And she said, “Yes. Sometimes it gets lonely,” and I hadn’t thought of it that way, and I was thinking, “That’s exactly what I mean.” I mean it feels lonely somewhere along the lines even though you’re constantly with such amazing people.

Fabian Pfortmüller on Rethinking Career Ambition As You Grow Older

In Chapter 5 of 18 in his 2013 Capture Your Flag interview, entrepreneur and community builder Fabian Pfortmüller answers "How Are Your Aspirations Changing As Your Experience Grows?" Pfortmüller finds life in his 30s teaches him life is more a marathon than a sprint. As a self-described ambitious person, he finds ambition can be dangerous if you do not maintain some work-life balance. He creates more with doing less and, surrounded by ambitious peers, finds what is right for others is not always right for him. Rethinking career ambition helps Pfortmüller better balance professional and personal goals, including family and relationships. Fabian Pfortmüller is co-founder of Holstee, a socially conscious online marketplace, and Sandbox Network, a global community for young entrepreneurial people. Pfortmüller graduated from Columbia University.

Yoav Gonen on Identifying New Ways to Improve News Writing Skills

In Chapter 8 of 19 in his 2013 Capture Your Flag interview, New York City reporter Yoav Gonen answers "What Skills Are You Working on Right Now to Become Better at Your Job?" As Gonen gains confidence, he sees what other reporters are writing as a learning opportunity and not a threat. Following reporters he admires on social media helps him look for new ways to report the news. Additionally, Gonen invests time taking Hebrew classes and benefits from the process of learning a language. Yoav Gonen is a reporter and City Hall Bureau Chief for the New York Post daily newspaper. Previously he spent nearly six years covering the education beat for the New York Post. Gonen earned a B.A. in English from the University of Michigan and a Masters in Journalism from New York University.