Recorded on Sunday, April 19, 2020 (Ukrainian Easter – Христос Воскрес! Воістину Воскрес!)
Listen online or download the mp3 file below:
Spring is here, for another week at least. Then it’ll be summer.
Out and about in Beijing, to Starbucks at Qianmen, Page One (book store), needed to scan QR codes to get in to the different stores. This is your telecom tracking your location through your phone’s location data. Starbucks wasn’t very busy, but had a few families playing outside.
Looking around Houhai district in Beijing, lots of things still blocked off to non-residents of that area. Walking around Drum Tower, still quite a few places were closed, some shuts had been completely shut down.
Off to Jing-A Taproom, which was pretty full by the time we got there.
Developing your work “put”
The idea comes from trading stock market options, in which there are calls and puts that you can use to hedge your risk in your portfolio.
What did you want to do as a child? Can you re-visit those ideas and modify them for the current times?
Visit university job and career skills websites.
Consider your soft skills or “transferrable” skills.
Can you move? Or, instead of moving, can you do this job online? Eg, teaching ESL.
What would you like to invent? What problem would you like to see solved? Why can’t you do this right now?
Pay attention to the skills you have, where can you improve?
List of open source software: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_free_and_open-source_software_packages
Duolingo – Language Learning APP
Regardless of what you decide to do, use a spreadsheet to track your progress. – Don’t use an APP! Don’t use your cell phone!
Look at the trends in the workplace: robotics, AI, programming, using computers and data. You don’t need to learn a major computer language such as C++ or even Python (though it would be helpful), but even figuring out how to keep your computer up and running is a good thing.
Not just with computers, do you work well with people? What are the trends in your field?
Look through the ebook selection in your local library, the book previews on Amazon, Chapters, Barnes and Noble, Book Depository. Or Google the book and there should be some images or previews available.
Other sites to consider:
- futurelearn.com
- udemy.com
- coursera.com
- codeacademy.com
- Udacity
- Khan Academy
- Open University
- OpenCourseWare
- ALISON
- MIT Open Courseware
- Academic Earth
- iTunes U
- Masterclass (you can also find a lot of the instructors already have videos on YouTube or elsewhere)
- TED
- 99U
- Wikiversity
Some books to consider:
- $100 Start Up by Chris Guillebeau
- Ready, Fire, Aim by Michael Masterson
- Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman
- Time Ferriss’ books are also a good starting point for idea generation
- Seth Godin’s as well, but he likes to talk a lot about marketing rather than making an idea come to fruition
- What Color is your Parachute? By Richard N. Bolles
YouTube “How to …” fill in the blank. What do you want to learn. Your first choice may not be the one you stick with.
Web browsers listed:
- Chrome (Incognito)
- Brave browser
- EPIC browser
Get in touch!
On Twitter @stevensirski