One of Y-Combinator founder Paul Graham’s most popular essays for startup founders is “Maker’s Schedule, Manager’s Schedule.” The basic premise is that tech startup founders, who have typically come from programming backgrounds, have to make a mental shift from a maker’s schedule to a manager’s schedule where more time is spent in meetings. At some…
For the Love of the Game
We watched a lot of football this weekend. Even when we weren’t watching football, we were watching football when We Are Marshall came on TV on Sunday morning after church. One consistent theme seemed to continue to pop up in the stories we heard and the successful teams we watched. It was articulated best by…
My 2018 Business Plan
A few years ago I created a Word document with a business plan for my website, The Religion Teacher. I spent hours on it. It had a long list of statistics and strategies that I was going to work on for the year. I quickly forgot about it, of course, and just got back to…
Planning vs. Playing
When someone introduces you to a new board game for the first time, it can sometimes take ten or twenty excruciating minutes of explanation before actually start playing the game. Finally, after what seems like forever, someone says, “Let’s just start playing. You’ll get the hang of it.” I suppose planning for a new year…
A Brief Blog Review for 2017
I have seen a bunch of articles with tips on reviewing your blog and website’s performance for the year. They all seem very complicated to me. I’m going to do something much more simple this year. I want to answer these questions: What worked? (What will I do more?) What didn’t work? (What will I…
