Many people who work at larger companies think about starting companies of their own, especially those who work at larger technology companies like Microsoft, Amazon.com, Real Networks, and more. I was one of those individuals, having worked at Amazon.com for more than six years, and then at a smaller internet company, JibJab. I had many personal opinions about how people should run their organizations, and I had a lot of exposure to small companies and their problems, but I admit that there were many unanswered questions, and many things that I thought I knew a lot more about than I actually did.
Before starting TeachStreet, I threw around terms and concepts such as pre- and post-money valuations, best practices in naming of companies and products, how to conduct product development sessions, and more. But, most of my ideas weren’t fully thought through, nor had I carried them out from start-to-finish on my own. I learn now that I wasn’t alone — most startup founders just leap in at some point, and we shared many of the same questions.
It’s because of this that Marcelo Calbucci (host of the popular Seattle20.com blog) has planned the first ever conference focused on pre-entrepreneurs, those who have yet to join or found a startup. And, what I like about it is that all of the speakers are current and past founders of companies who once harbored these same questions and concerns. You’ll hear from successful, and not-yet-extremely-successful founders, on topics ranging from How to Pick an Idea, How to Identify Co-Founders, Raising Money, What to Do When You Fail, What It’s Like to be Acquired, and more.
I’m personally excited, and humbled, to be talking about ‘Building the Product‘ — it’s a topic that I have a lot of experience with, but feel like I’m still learning a massive amount about every month (and day) — I look forward to hearing what the audience thinks about our process.
So, if you’ve ever thought about starting your own company, I highly encourage that you attend StartupDay 2009 — it’s an affordable and highly-concentrated introduction to startup life, from those who are living it!
2009 is racing by — I can’t believe it’s been ~5 months since I was fortunate to attend the Hacking Education gathering in New York City, assembled and hosted by the amazing team at Union Square Ventures. I really don’t have much to add to the summary that the USV team has posted, but if you are interested in helping create the future of education, I couldn’t more strongly recommend that you take 20-30 minutes to read it complely from the first words to the end of the comment thread (it may be the best comment thread I’ve eve read!). While present in the room, I was clearly aware that I’m incredibly ‘new’ to the world of education transformation, but that doesn’t diminish my excitement about the contributions that TeachStreet will make in opening up the world of lifelong learning to the Web and beyond — taking the time to re-read the summary only gets me more excited about the potential impact of our work, and the fellowship of innovators that we’re proud to be among.
What’s all the fuss about Twitter? Since our call out for Twitter teachers on TeachStreet, we’ve been getting some great feedback and interest in learning more. That’s what we’re all about here at TeachStreet — connecting folks who want to learn something new with local experts.
We’ve partnered with some great local partners, Allen Klosowski (Organizer of the Denver Tweetup) and KUSA Channel 9 News, to help put together a FREE “Introduction to Twitter” class for the community to learn more about Twitter and get started on this new phenomenon.
If you would like to attend, please see the information below and be sure to RSVP for the event since space is limited.
INTRODUCTION TO TWITTER
Presenting:
Joseph Sunga, TeachStreet.com
Allen Klosowski, Denver Tweetup Organizer and Professional Photographer
4:30-6:00pm
Learn more about Twitter and what the fuss is all about
Learn from local Twitter experts who will provide real-world examples of using Twitter
Discuss any questions you may have about Twitter
Special Thanks to:
Allen Klosowski, Denver Tweetup Organizeer and Professional Photographer
With over 24,000+ followers, Allen is definitely a local Twitter expert in the Denver area. He also organizes the monthly Denver Tweetups where hundreds of “Tweeps” come together over some tasty brew at a local brewery. The last Denver Tweetup, which was on April 24, 2009, had over 150+ attendees filling up the Great Divide Brewing Co. Tap Room. Along with being prolific on Twitter, he also runs a professional photography company, K2 Photo Studio.
KUSA Headquarters – Channel 9 News 9NEWS offers breaking news, local headlines, weather and sports, along with national and world news. KUSA-TV is the number one local news source in Colorado. Backed by the strongest news gathering team in the business, an affiliation with NBC, a partnership with the Denver Post and Entercom, and a close relationship with USAToday, 9news.com is where news comes first.
After visiting some great local instructors in the Bay Area, we didn’t want to waste anytime visiting our next city. With that said, here we come Denver and Boulder!
We’re planning to head down to Denver and Boulder in May to meet up with our current active members on TeachStreet and folks who just want to learn more about us. We want to help teachers, coaches and experts like you learn more about using online tools like Craigslist, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and (of course) TeachStreet to market their business. So please come to the events with questions!
Meet with Sam Niccolls and Joseph Sunga in Denver/Boulder between May 7-9
What to expect at a TeachStreet Orientation:
Networking with fellow teachers in the area
Learn some tips on how to utilize TeachStreet better
Open discussion and Q & A about marketing online
In order to attend each of the events, you must RSVP below. If you have friends or colleagues who may be interested, please forward them this blog post.
If you have any further questions, please e-mail me at joseph@teachstreet.com.
The TeachStreet community team recently visited the Bay Area to host several meetups for our members and their guests. It was exhilarating to meet and have conversations with over 60 great teachers and instructors on TeachStreet.
If you missed the events, here are the tips we shared with attendees to help them use TeachStreet to get new students.
Completing these steps will definitely get you ahead of the game for finding new students. And, if you have any friends or colleagues who might like to learn more about TeachStreet, please let them know or suggest them as a teacher on TeachStreet.
In addition to sharing our favorite “how to’s” for how to use TeachStreet, we also had the opportunity to connect instructors and teachers with one another for support and networking.
If you live in Seattle or the Bay Area, TeachStreet members are meeting up regularly. So, if you’re interested in connecting with a local group, email me (with “group member” in the subject line) and I’ll try my hardest to get you linked-up with groups forming in your area.
Here’s a great slide show of the events that my colleague Joseph put together:
As always, if you have any questions or suggestions for me — I’m more than happy to help.
They’re our current interns (Amanda, Annie and Gracie), and they just LOVE working for us.
If you’d like to join our team this spring and/or summer, check out our job posting for full details about what we’re looking for and how to apply.
To whet your appetite, here’s the basic overview:
Job Type: Internship. 10 hour/week (minimum), 15-20+ hours desired with 3-6 months commitment (with a two-week “trial” period for us to make sure we love each other). College credit available if school approves. Internships are paid; amount based on experience. All candidates should have their own laptop computer.
Intern Descriptions: Basically we’re looking for super smart, outgoing, Jacks-and-Jills-of-all-trades. All candidates should be optimistic, incredibly flexible and have a just-do-it attitude! (We have a strong “no sniveling” policy here at TeachStreet and we want proven “self-starters”.) Oh, you should also love learning new things.
We’re looking for undergrads of senior standing (outstanding juniors may also apply) as well as graduate school candidates (MBA’s etc.). Focus areas for internship will depend on intern’s background, expertise and the needs of the company. Four main focus areas for internships are: (1) Data & Quantitative analysis, (2) Customer Services/Community/Sales, (3) Engineering and (4) Product marketing, research and business development.
From salsa dancing to hip hop, we try our best to provide fun workshops for our community to learn new things. We were able to put together a Hip Hop Workshop last Saturday, where students were able to get an introduction to both break dancing and hip hop dancing from some great teachers.
A big thank you goes out to both Daniel Etcheto (Breakdancing Ninja) and Shinji Kasahara for taking the time to teach our community about what they do while providing a bit of a taste of their world of dancing. Along with the teachers, I’d also love to thank Marlo Martin for lending her space at eXit Space School of Dance. Without the help of the community of teachers and schools on TeachStreet, events like these wouldn’t happen, so please give you thanks today with a review or testimonial:
For more photos/videos from the event, please check out our slide show below:
There were a lot of happy, and exhausted, faces when leaving the workshop, which was great. Some fo the students wanted to know when the next workshop or event is going to be in Seattle, so please if you’re interested too — send me an e-mail of what you want to learn. If you happened to have any questions or feedback, please e-mail at joseph@teachstreet.com.
The TeachStreet Community showed up and definitely boogied the night away last Saturday to the latin beats at Century Ballroom. I’d like to thank Alison Cockrill of Century Ballroom for partnering with us to put the event together for the TeachStreet Community. If you had fun on Saturday and loved the salsa lesson, please thank Century Ballroom by leaving them a review/testimonial on TeachStreet.com.
For more photos/videos from the event, please check out our slide show below:
Thanks to everyone who came to the event, I hope you were able to learn something new and was able to showcase your salsa skills on the dance floor later that night. We weren’t able to get the raffle done that night for the “5-Week Salsa Series”, so I’ve done it today. Drumroll please…
…and the winner is: Vernon Sackie!
Congratulations Vernon, hopefully these lessons will help in doing those spins that I’ve always had trouble with.
Hopefully it was a fun event for everyone and I would love to know more about what you, as in the community, would want to learn next! Please send your feedback to me at joseph@teachstreet.com.
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If you’re a parent of young ‘uns, you’re in luck because Penny’s Puppets are back in town!
Penny is one of the best puppeteers in the West and is coming to Seattle for shows at the Seattle Children’s Museum Feb 19th and 20th. Her shows are evoke the kids’ imagination, and are a fun mix of children’s music, theater and art! Even more fun is that the Friday show is going to be in congunction with the museum’s Baby Sign Language class that day.
