Entrepreneur and father of 7. I write about applying entrepreneurial frameworks at work and at home. 15,000+ people read my free newsletter. Press "Get Newsletter" to join.
A couple things on my mind... google workspace, failure of nerve, and evenings on lock
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Hey folks! Happy New Year! A couple things on my mind... 1. Google Workspace vs. The World: II am seriously considering switching every piece of software I pay for at Allsmith.org over to Google Workspace. For example: Otter.ai, Slack, Calendly, ChatGPT, and Typeform would all be replaced by Google-native tools. I am curious if anyone out there has made this jump and how it went. I feel like Google is getting close enough that it may be worth going all in, especially as their agentic tools seem to be picking up steam. Reply with any experience you have please! 2. A Failure Of Nerve: I'm almost done with A Failure of Nerve by Edwin Friedman wow. Excellent book. He does a great job describing the leadership shift over the past 15 years in both parenting and corporate America, where data, empathy, and group cohesiveness have often displaced a differentiated leader who takes a bold position and sets and holds a standard. This book has helped me both with my 3-year-old and with clients, which is a pretty impressive feat. 10/10 would recommend. 3. Evening Rhythm: We had a family member pass over Christmas, and combined with the dark days of winter, Chandler and I realized we needed to launch an hour-by-hour evening rhythm for being at home. With a bunch of young kids, this has noticeably reduced stress and fatigue, and everyone gets into the groove more easily. Here is the rhythm:
It will not be like this forever, but it is a good reminder that when energy is low or grief is present, defining what a good night looks like and repeating it for a season is an incredibly powerful tool for a family. AMA. Thats it for this week! Best, Blake P.S. Shameless nepotism plug, but I really mean this: my 14-year-old son Everett wrote a 450-page fantasy novel this summer. On a typewriter. The website he built is genuinely dope and I still cannot believe he finished it. If you like Brandon Sanderson or Tolkien-style fantasy, I think you will actually enjoy the book. You can read the first chapter, try a free AI tool he built for naming books, and subscribe to his newsletter here. It would absolutely blow his mind to hit 50 subscribers. He did all of this completely on his own. I would be grateful if you checked it out. |
A couple things on my mind...
Entrepreneur and father of 7. I write about applying entrepreneurial frameworks at work and at home. 15,000+ people read my free newsletter. Press "Get Newsletter" to join.
Hey folks! Happy Friday before Christmas! Godspeed to all of us trying to fit a week's worth of work in Monday and Tuesday next week - we're doing the Lord's work. A couple things on my mind... 1. Human Mode Email (I made a thing!): I get maybe 20 AI-generated cold emails a day that say things like “I saw you went to Hillsdale College...” or “I love seeing your journey from Cladwell to Jumpdocs and Allsmith.org...” followed by a pitch. As AI gets smarter, I’m finding it harder to distinguish...
Hey folks! Happy snowy Friday. Sending late - back to back meetings all day. A couple things on my mind... 1. Top 8 Leads: I used this a lot when I was raising venture capital and somehow forgot about it until this week. When your funnel gets big - 100+ leads - it helps to ask a simple question: who are my top 8 favorite leads right now? Not the biggest list. The highest odds. The most exciting. The ones you most want to win. Keep those 8 at the very top of your CRM and give them extra care...
Hey folks! Happy Friday! A couple things on my mind... 1. Social Strategy: I watched this video on Nathan Barry Podcast this week sharing a super clear framework for thinking about types of social content that drives traffic into your funnel. I’ve shared the GAP framework before (Generally Appealing, Authority, Personal), and this is in the same vein but adds a measurement layer I really liked. Her breakdown: - Entertain: 65% of content, measure success by shares - Educate: 20% of content,...