2016: Jersey City, NJ

December 29, 2016

Another year is winding down and I wanted to take a moment to reflect on where these past few months took me. There is something satisfying about finishing a year and looking back at how I have changed. 2016 was full of surprises. Opportunities have been come and gone. New families have been started, and some friends have been lost.

We are all different people than we were this time last year – having been shaped by the experiences of the past few months.

Causing a ruckus in education

Education is an incredibly complex and fractured industry. It has many actors (parents, students, teachers, unions, governments (municipal, county, state, and federal), non-profits, and for-profits). And everyone is a stakeholder. Education is one of the few industries that has a tremendous multiplier effect. Improving education makes everything else in the world easier.

This year I left Mentored, the startup I helped build for three years. Making the decision to leave was hard. I was the first employee hired on and felt tremendous ownership over it. In three years we had shipped three software projects, signed up over 65,000 students, partnered with DonorsChoose.org, and ran programs at schools across the South Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, and Newark. The work was meaningful and the mission – to provide every student with a personalized education pathway – is important.

But I’m happy that I made a move.

I’ve joined a great team in the digital group at Barnes & Noble Education. BNED recently became it’s own publicly traded company, it serves over 5 million students through 771 bookstores on 500+ campuses across the US. The digital group is new to the company, and we are building software to help colleges and universities improve student outcomes. At BNED LoudCloud I’m a marketing manager working on our learning analytics and courseware products. My job sits at the intersection of product, sales, and customer acquisition. We’re growing fast and have some big news to announce in 2017. Stay tuned.

I want to learn a ton, ship projects, and drive meaningful impact. And I want to surround myself with smart people who challenge me to improve every day. I feel fortunate that I’ve been able to do this all in 2016.

Learning

This year I read 33 books – mostly in the space of marketing, design, and philosophy. I also have read countless journal articles and have tried to finish the The Economist every week. There is something about getting lost in a book that makes me happy. Reading is a great opportunity to explore a new way of thinking and challenge the ideas you previously held. For the start of next year I have a stack of books on communication and storytelling sitting next to my bed. I’m stoked.

I got half way through a python course, and then started a new job and haven’t touched it. I know enough html, css, and SQL to be dangerous… I can also pseudo code and help think through systems from a UI / UX perspective. But I can’t yet do anything other than put up static webpages or wordpress blogs. Web automation tools, like zapier, are making it easier than ever to hack your way through systems but I still find think this is a hole in my overall skill set. I think the biggest reason I haven’t learned to code is I don’t have a “why” in mind. I’m learning for the sake of learning and not with the objective of building something. When I think about how I learned html/css/sql it was to accomplish something at work. Not having a why is a mistake that I need to correct in 2017 if I want to acutally learn how to code.

I also was fortunate to attend several seminars and workshops this past year. A few highlights: Patterns, Seth’s Tribal Gathering, Value Creation Class and Leadership Workshop, a Typography Course, and StoicCon. I also got a lot out of the Artist Exchange slack room organized by Death to Stock.

Teaching

For someone who spent a good chunk of 2016 running programs in schools, I didn’t actually get a lot of opportunities to teach. A few opportunities over the past few months reminded me how much I missed that challenge. In November I had a few deliberate teaching opportunities – running a sales workshop for the NY EdTech MeetUp and and doing a guest lecture at Parsons. I need to find some more teaching opportunities in 2017.

Writing

I wanted to write more in 2016 – to force me to focus my thinking and refine my thought process. I published two books, authored a piece on TechCrunch about the EdTech market, and wrote 95 articles between my blog and medium. My top posts – as measured by page views and resulting conversation – were:

This year I made a deliberate effort to make my writing simpler. I try to keep everything I write below an 8th grade reading level. This forces me to refine my thoughts and makes my writing clearer. The Hemingway app has become one of my favorite tools. In case you were wondering, this post is written at a 5th grade level.

Traveling

I was all over in 2016. The year began in New Orleans with my brother and buddy Evan. I then made it to the Dominican Republic with my parents, aunt & uncle, and cousins. Atlanta for Barrett & Nicole’s wedding, San Diego for the ASU-GSV conference (EdTech), Los Angeles to set up school programs, San Francisco for work, NJ to officiate Nick & Dana’s wedding, Dallas for the CloseIt Summit, hiking all across New York state, Anaheim for EDUCAUSE, and dozens of colleges up and down the East Coast. Plus exploring more of New York City.

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New York City – A Love / Hate Relationship

New York is ~~one of the greatest cities~~ the greatest city in the world. Being here makes so much possible. It seems like every month I have old friends dropping into the city, which makes it easy to keep in touch. Every week there are dozens of opportunities to meet new people at interesting events. There is never a shortage of things to do.

But the city can be a bit overwhelming. It is full of type A people who can make you feel as if you’re not working hard enough. There were days this past year where I felt like I was falling behind my peer group because I haven’t made it into Y-Combinator, gotten on the 30 under 30 list, or sold a company to Google. I also realized how comparing myself to others is a waste of time. It will just drive me crazy.

New York City attracts some amazing people to it. And I’ve been really fortunate to make some great friends (a lot of them through altMBA – which was not something I had expected). But NYC is fairly transient, and I’ve seen some good friends leave this city. It sucks. I’ve also been frustrated with the way this city forces friends to schedule time to hang out months in advance, waiting for the stars to align – or something like that. With so many busy people it can be hard to keep up friendships.

Net-net, I love this city. I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.

The Best Laid Plans…

With the new year comes an opportunity to set new goals (professional, physical, financial, learning, etc.) and work on a plan to turn them into a reality. This week I’ve been thinking a lot about where I want to be this time next year, knowing full well that life often has it’s own plans for us. I’m excited for the new year and to see what surprises life has in store.

2016 was a blast – and I can’t wait to hang with you in the new year.

What a year… I have a lot to be thankful for – family, friends, and the chance to work on meaningful projects. Thank you for being a part of my life and for helping to make the past few months great.

I’m looking forward to a year full of adventure, growth, and shenanigans.

✌🏽, Sean

p.s. how’s your year been? shoot me an email or give me a call, it would be great to catch up.

h/t to Sarah for the inspiration to write this post