Josiah Mackenzie

Wow…so much has happened since I posted here last. I took a big trip to the US east coast to meet with a bunch of young entrepreneurs individually. That trip was incredibly rewarding, and made me fall in love with the Boston area. Hopefully I’ll get the chance to relocate there in the future.

The past few days have been spent settling in here at college. I had mixed feelings coming back, but I look forward to taking advantage of the situation.

I sat down with Jesse Lear this evening to exchange ideas and set up an accountability achievement system. I created a list of goals I need to accomplish this next month, and gave the list to Jesse. If I fail to meet my objectives, Jesse will cash the check I’m giving him made out to charity. The fact that I could lose a large amount of money will serve as an extra motivation for me this next month. Plus, we’ll be meeting weekly to go over how we can help each other reach our goals. Should be a valuable experiment.

Check out the Walamu pre-launch site run by my buddy Rohail — it’s going to be cool…

I spent much of today working with the financial aid people at Cedarville. While I’m tempted to spend these days finishing up business ventures, I’m realizing that scholarships can be a very effective way to reach my goal of debt-free graduation.

The rest of the day was devoted to wrapping up a million other little things before I leave on my east coast trip. Should be a blast…can’t wait!

This fall semester I was scheduled to take the freshman-level Humanities class I missed it last year…but going to class 3 times a week wasn’t very appealing. So after a week of hard study, I took the CLEP test this morning and passed! It’s like earning over $2,000 (not counting time saved) for a week of studying subjects I love: art, architecture, music, and philosophy. Yes, I dedicated an entire week of precious pre-college time to it, but now I’ll have time in school to focus on more important activities, such as Toastmasters.

Remember, it’s all about leverage!

I don’t usually follow celebrity news…it’s not “news” in my opinion. But Mel Gibson’s incident over the past few days may be more than celebrity news. I think it can teach us as entrepreneurs some important lessons.

Marketing Lesson: Break news
To be honest, I’m reluctant to include a marketing lesson in a moral issue like this. But the truth is that websites that break news get visitors…lots of them (LA Times). TMZ.com got access to the key sheriff’s report, and in the days after the case, was mentioned in nearly every news story related to the incident. So if you can break news, preferably important news, do it. Not only is it great free publicity, you help uncover important information.

PR Lesson: Accept responsibility
When you or your company does wrong, admit it fully and take personal responsibility for the actions taken. Fortunately, Mel did this, and appears to be making moves toward reconciliation with those he wronged.

Personal Lesson: Guard your reputation
I know far too many stories of people in their 40s, 50s, and 60s who ruin entire successful careers with one stupid action. From politics to sports to religion to entertainment, I’m sure you can think of some examples yourself. It doesn’t take much — one seemingly small word or deed can waste the decades of work you spent building your reputation. And it’s more of an issue the more visible you are. As Mel Gibson said himself:

“I am a public person, and when I say something, either articulated and thought out, or blurted out in a moment of insanity, my words carry weight in the public arena.”

Reduce the chance of this happening by taking precautionary measures.  It’s not worth risking your entire brand by doing something stupid while you’re incoherent. Keep your head clear at all times.