For all the talk about learning new skills, studying, or getting work experience, often we don’t need more inputs to see huge returns on our career growth. What we need most is a shift in mindset. In fact, we need many mental shifts when it comes to how we're viewing the world. There’s a term we like to use at Praxis called deschooling. Deschooling is a process by which you gradually break free of certain modes of thought that most people adopt in school so that you can succeed in the …
Actionable ideas to kickstart your career
Placement Update: March 2017 Apprenticeships
It's my favorite time of the month! Time for an update where I recap and highlight a few of the most recent placements here at Praxis. This is so exciting because every time someone starts their Praxis apprenticeship it means they're about to experience what education should be. They're getting a taste of the real world and seeing first-hand what businesses look for in an employee. HINT: it's not the credentials. It's the forward tilt. The action-bias. It's the digital paper trail. …
How College Made You Hate Learning
My friend (and Praxis CEO) Isaac Morehouse has a fun little experiment he asks people to do in his book Freedom without Permission. In the book he writes “a Google image search for the word [education] results in desks, chalkboards, letter grades, stressed kids, regimentation, classrooms, and kids sleeping or with pained looks on their faces.” He asks this of people because it’s a good reminder that most of us treat school and education as the same thing. Picture a world where this …
Your Personal Brand | Forward Tilt Podcast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIRrW55z4tg You have a personal brand whether you like it or not. Call it a reputation if you prefer, but it is the feelings and associations that come to mind when people think of you. A lot of people feel resistant to working on their brand. They feel that it is slimy and inauthentic to work on others perceptions of you. But a good personal brand is about authenticity. It is making sure that what you share and create online communicates who you are. That …
A Quick Praxis Team Update
Meet our new CTO, Chuck Grimmett! Chuck has been advising Praxis participants and helping the team with tech problems for a few years now, and taking our curriculum and tech to the next level meant we had to get him on the team full time. Chuck is a polymath, and among his many talents are cooking and cocktail making, which you can read about on his blog about food. Chuck and Education Director TK Coleman spent a few days in Charleston earlier this month for a marathon session on the …
Why Working for Free Won’t Work for You
I’m a big fan of “free work.” No, I don’t mean doing favors or giving handouts. I mean a deliberate process of forgoing immediate earnings to gain experience, knowledge, and credibility. What sounds controversial to some was the dominant path people took to building careers for hundreds of years. An experienced professional, often in a trade or art, would take a mostly inexperienced young person who worked for free or for very cheap and through that process, learned to become successful …
You Got the Job, Now What? A Guide to Accelerating Your Career
Young people today think getting a job is hard. It’s not. As I’ve written elsewhere, I can get you a job next week, guaranteed. What is hard is keeping that job. It's hard taking charge of that job and turning it into something that you find valuable and fulfilling. What’s hard is becoming so valuable they have to pay you more, bend the rules for you, and otherwise grant you what you want because they know you could go elsewhere and have dozens of opportunities lined up. That’s what …
6 Common Questions our Business Partners Ask Us Before Taking an Apprentice
Each month, dozens of businesses from around the US inquire about partnering with Praxis to take Praxis apprentices. They're looking to fill roles ranging from sales and marketing to operations, development, and creative, as well as more generalist positions. For the partners we accept, the results have been pretty amazing. The other day we received this message from a business: "I'm convinced Praxis is the only training ground that puts participants in the right frame of mind to …
Praxis on Fox News
A few weeks ago something big and unexpected happened. We were invited onto Fox News! Although this changes nothing in terms of our goals for the program and the company, it was exciting to watch the huge influx of applications, inquiries, and positive comments. Here's the full interview below: Interested? Shoot us an email at info@discoverpraxis.com or schedule a call with a Praxis representative. …
You Can’t “Brand” Yourself All the Way to Success
We've written here before on the blog how important it is to have a strong personal brand. We're so committed to it that a core part of the program education experience centers around helping participants develop their own and use it to effectively market and sell themselves in the real world. Participants start podcasts, write books, build blogs, and learn to use tools like social media to get opportunities that might otherwise be closed to them. It's a regular occurrence for them to land …
How to Interview Like a Praxian
Meet Taylor. Taylor is 19 years old and dropped out of college after one semester. He’s currently interviewing with 3 companies located in Chicago, San Diego, and New York City. He’s interviewing up against people 3+ years older than him for positions that, on paper, require a 4-year degree. How is he able to compete? His personal brand and work experience definitely help, but when push comes to shove, the way he presents himself in an interview is what makes the difference. He’s able to …
The Power of Silence | Forward Tilt Podcast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBBMz_rAbZg From podcasts to audiobooks, articles, and videos there is a massive amount of great content in the world. So much content that you can fill every empty space with something. You can listen to podcasts while you drive. You can read articles on your phone while you wait at the doctor's office and consume audiobooks during your walk on the beach. With so much great content available, you begin to feel that time spent on doing nothing is time wasted. …
The Praxis Blog’s Greatest Hits: Our Most Popular, Valuable and Controversial Blog Posts of All Time
It's been over three years since we wrote our very first blog post on the Praxis blog. Since then we've written over 500 blog articles and we've got no intentions of stopping. Looking back through the archives, it's fun to see that although parts of the hard product have changed, the vision of the program as it was founded has remained the same. When we started this blog, we wanted to create a place for the Praxis team to explore their ideas about education, career building, life, …
Meet Praxis Advisor Amanda Kingsmith: World Traveler, Yoga Teacher, and Writer
Meet Praxis advisor Amanda Kingsmith. Amanda is a dynamic entrepreneur on a mission creating a life of travel and exploration where she creates value from all corners of the world. I caught up with her between adventures to talk about her fascinating life, unconventional career path, and her experience as a Praxis advisor. Why are you excited about being a Praxis advisor? I am excited and passionate about being an advisor because of the participants I have the opportunity to …
What is Praxis “for?”
We often write here on the Praxis blog about things we say we’re against. Don’t go to college. Don’t rely on your resume in the job process. Don't blindly follow the conventional wisdom. It might be easy to see some of this and ask yourself “what is Praxis for?” I answered this question on the latest episode of Praxis Night Shift, a late night talk show I launched with my friend and Praxis Education Director TK Coleman saying “Praxis is a delivery mechanism for a particular view of …
