Daily Endeavor Blog

If you’re thinking about what to do next, one good rule of thumb is to explore areas where there is tremendous disruption and change ahead, and as a result, a surplus of opportunity.

How education occurs — how it’s designed, how it’s delivered (or isn’t) — is undergoing change on a tectonic scale. If you’re looking for work, it’s understatement to say there is opportunity there for you. **

Sir Ken Robinson speaks a lot on the state of education. I’m glad he does — his big picture thinking simplifies what’s complex, making conversation (and your job search) easier to start. It also happens that this talk in particular is one of the best examples of why I do what I do. It fires me up. Redesigning education at this scale is my life’s work.

RSA, as they always do, does a phenomenal job illustrating the talk.

** Note: At Daily Endeavor there are over 4,000 species of education jobs, and more being invented everyday out there.

In the fun chat with Lindsey Pollak last week I mentioned the freedom that comes with asking different questions — in particular, making the first step in the job search more manageable by asking two specific, time-bound questions: Over the next two years, what do you want to be better known for? Over the next two years, what do you want to go see for yourself?

If you’re interested in some of the why behind these questions, and why taking a prototyping point of view is helpful, here’s a short talk (13 min) I gave on the topic at AshokaU’s TEDx event at Google DC earlier this year. This talk is a partial introduction to the larger prototyping framework at Endeavor Prep.

If you haven’t met Ashoka yet, founder Bill Drayton gave rise to the term “social entrepreneur” a few decades ago, and since then Ashoka has been at the center of catalyzing change in nearly every corner of the world. AshokaU is their initiative bringing change-making to university campuses.

Video doesn’t always tell the full story of the participants in the room, but as a guest I can tell you they were great. AshokaU and their partners organized a very impressive two-day event. They’re doing some great stuff over there.

Daily Endeavor is a free online guide to jobs to help people figure out what they want to do next professionally. It’s the first step in the job search.

The website is a continually improving collection of job reviews that are collectively and publicly written by people who have had them. Of the three major stages job seekers pass through – What do I want to do next? Who do I know in that area? Who’s hiring now? – All the job boards, like CareerBuilder, The Ladders, and Monster, solve the third; LinkedIn and Facebook solve the second (though LinkedIn is growing to do a good job on more than that); and Daily Endeavor solves the first.

When most people are asked “What do you want to do next?” they respond with “What are my options?” They don’t want to know who’s hiring tomorrow, at least not as their first step. They want to understand the types of jobs that exist and which ones might be right for them.

This need, which was continually the headline in hundreds of client conversations at Endeavor Prep, is critical and unmet for nearly every student in business school, law school, graduate school, college, and increasingly high school. We originally thought this pain was primarily felt by students, but as the economy tanked and our average client age increased, we learned it’s also the central need for people switching types of work in their 30s and 40s, and even those starting their encore careers.

Because there’s no easy way to learn about 99% of the types of jobs that exist (e.g. Research in Strategy Management Consulting, or Co-Founder in Microinsurance), people do the best they can and fill the void with informational interviews. They try to get meetings with people they know who can explain a little bit about what they do.

Informational interviews are great, but of course have some real limitations if you want to learn about a lot of areas, especially if those areas are varied. Organizing one-on-one meetings is really time consuming for both people involved. And most of all, your potential to learn is limited by who you know.

We’re building the world’s largest set of do-it-yourself “informational interviews” online so everyone can quickly explore, vet and “follow” jobs and professional categories during their job search.

If you’re looking for a job, Daily Endeavor enables you to explore the universe of options even if you don’t know a lot of people. Our goal is to democratize access to careers — we want you to be able to learn about professions regardless of who you know.

There’s more to say and more to come. For now, go ahead and check out Daily Endeavor. It’s the first step to get you started in your next job.