Author: cahouser
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Big Ideas Aren’t Enough
One of the cruel realities of the world is that a good idea won’t go far on its own. A good idea—especially one that is novel, original, and unproven—needs a persuasive, resourceful person pushing it forward.
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The Time We Turned Down NBC’s The Office
I took my first office job in 2001 working the customer service desk of a company called Despair, Inc. (Yes, that is an actual company name). Despair had built a nice little business making products that parodied a specific type of motivational posters.
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The Magic of the First Few Cohorts
In certain communities of practice (participants in startup accelerators, students in courses, attendees of conferences) something special happens before things get too big. This piece is for people wanting to find—and benefit from—these cohorts. In 2009, some grad students and I started a student group because we were confounded. Why, we wondered, were so few […]
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How to make your work feel more valuable
I once landed a consulting gig where an organization asked me to help them put on a virtual conference. I pitched them a grandiose vision: state-of-the-art participant experience, elegant marketing strategies, high-energy facilitation. The price I charged corresponded with the vision; it wasn’t cheap.
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What Would Life Be Like if Rejection Didn’t Hurt?
After a big win, I am basking in a specific emotional state not unlike Mario when he eats a star. It’s a cocktail of joy, optimism, confidence, and forward momentum. This feeling is rare. I don’t want to squander it.
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A Review of Buildspace’s Nights and Weekends Program
TL;DR: If you want to bring an idea into the world, you should do this program…with a few caveats. Thanks to Buildspace, I found myself in the running for $100,000 last week. I was one of 16 people—whittled down from 7,500—who had a shot. I didn’t win it. But it doesn’t matter. My ROI from […]
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Beating Perfectionism Means Striving For Collisions, Not Beauty
Tuning forks produce ethereal, harmonically pure musical tones. Musicians use them to tune their instruments. The crystal clear, frequency-perfect note vibration is a precursor to a violinist or cellist producing a dazzling piece of music. But what comes before that gorgeous, sustained ringing of the tuning fork? A big, dumb collision. A gesture devoid of […]
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Be Careful What You Carry
I was sitting on the trunk of my beat up Honda in a nondescript apartment complex parking spot. Waiting for my bass player Monty to hop in my car so we could drive to practice. My amplifier was in the backseat poking out of the open window. The scene was an accurate depiction of life […]