So…how does it work?

This week, I had a kind of reality check.  Here are some details that will provide a bit of context:

• I am a pre-finance major
• I am looking for an internship this summer in finance
• I have an opportunity to meet with a pretty fantastic guy who is a co-founder and managing director at a mid-sized Venture Capital firm in Salt Lake (Signal Peak Ventures, if you're interested)

My purpose in meeting with him is to ask for an internship position with his firm or on the finance teams of one of his portfolio companies.  The reality check that I had was that I am asking for a position that does not exist when I have no "hard" finance skills.  I had this reality check right before we went around asking our classmates questions.  Obviously, I asked how I should go about my conversation with the gentleman I am meeting with.  The answer that I got was surprisingly consistent.  Surprising because I asked several different students from several different majors.  The answer I got?  Show how you can add value.

I guess I knew this, but it never really "clicked" until I had these conversations.  Now I could make some cliche comment saying how much this class will help me to add value in all my endeavors, and it would absolutely be true.  But I want to go beyond that.  I add value by who I am, not only by what I can do.  Another reality is that computers can do a lot of what we hire people to do.  They can make appointments, make trades, analyze, design, and on and on.  But for some reason we hire more expensive and less reliable humans.  Why?  Because we add value in who we are.  Our job then, is to find out what we can do to add value, and develop those gifts.

Rock on.

This song doesn't really have anything to do with anything, but it is a great cover!  Enjoy.

"You wanna kiss the sky? Better learn how to kneel." -Bono

Going into this week, and this class, I was rather cocky. In talking with friends who had taken the course, I had heard that it was tough, but I arrogantly thought that I would be able to breeze through.  I mean, I had a slew of fantastic English teachers in high school, what did I have to worry about?  Well, it turns out, a lot.

Now, I am at a point where I must make a decision.  I can either remain cocky or humble out a bit.  Experience tells me that “kicking against the pricks” yields nothing but frustration and bloody toes.  I believe I will choose to humble out and see what I can’t learn this semester. 

I realize that what I learned this week doesn’t really have a whole lot to do with grammar rules and participles and other semantics, but I feel like it is quite valuable, and I am committed to applying this lesson across all spheres of my life. 

Rock on.

Here is the song quoted in the title.  Enjoy.