Pursue The Passion
902 posts
Lisa Bauch doesn’t like being told “no.” The owner of Uppercut Boxing Gym, in Minneapolis, MN, found other boxing gyms to be unwelcoming to a woman entering the sport; Lisa rectified this problem by starting her own gym. Now in its eleventh year of operation, Uppercut welcomes all boxing enthusiasts, from fighters in training, to…
Gamal Aziz, CEO of MGM Mirage and COO of the MGM Grand, has spent his entire life in the tourism industry. Born in Egypt, Gamal was fortunate enough to naturally acquire various languages as a child, possibly foreshadowing a life of demanding communication. At 16, Gamal spent his entire savings on a roundtrip ticket to…
At 47, Sandi Serling decided to start riding motorcycles. She is not an action junky, nor is she crazy, but her love of the motorcycle is palpable. On her 46th birthday, the self-employed P.R. agent jumped out of an airplane; halfway down, she thought, “I want to ride a motorcycle.” “To be successful in your…
, founder of the Alliance for Sustainable Colorado, recognizes the extent to which Earth is in danger. Fear of overwhelming odds, however, does not imbue, in John, the apathy, towards natures, so prevalent in American society. In an age where Green Building has become a talking point in American politics, John is doing, and…
When we were in Seattle a month ago, our group met a couple of motivated guys that were raising awareness for their younger brother, who was in need of a bone marrow transplant. The guys around me, Jay and Zach, encouraged me to use this blog to help these guys out. This morning I opened…
What got you interested in studying the workforce and the changing demographics? What got you going on that? Well, I think I’ve always been curious. Frankly. I’ve spent my whole career in consulting. I’ve always been in a situation of working with different companies on different issues at different points in time. The workforce issue…
How To Become a Mechanic Our RV broke down in Hastings, New York in pursuit of the American Dream. Little did we know that we would find the American Dream in Mark Martino, owner of Mark’s Service Center. When did you open Mark’s Service Center? November of ’89. November of ’89 and you’re 47. So…
, CEO of Up With People, almost went to trade school, because dyslexia left him at the bottom of his class, barely graduating high school. Two months after seeing Up With People, at his high school during his senior year, Tommy was traveling the globe with the group, destined to, 20 years later, take…
Brad Feld, managing director at Foundry Group and Mobius Venture Capitol, has been in the technology business for a long time. He started his first company out of his fraternity at MIT, and hasn’t looked back. Since selling his initial company, after 8 years of growth and management, in 1993, Brad now serves to support…
Joanne Gordon is an author, journalist, wife and mother, and not necessarily in that particular order. As a child, she wrote what she calls “Judy Bloom-esque” narratives, about the trials and tribulations of a pre-teen. A natural interest in “the human part of business” led Joanne to a fact-checking position at Forbes magazine. Four years…
is an extrovert inventor that has been taking things apart and finding innovative ways to put them back together since kindergarten. One look at Dave’s kitchen table will tell a life story shaped by gadgets, tinkering, and an innate curiosity to find out how things work. With the Golden Gate bridge in the…
Mark Starr, owner of David’s Pizza in Spokane, Washington, goes to work everyday to make a difference; success has been a pleasant byproduct. David’s Pizza sits adjacent to the campus of Gonzaga University, on the outskirts of a neighborhood of 3rd and 4th generation Spokane residents. The placement is fitting; Mark spends nearly all…
He is a former Wall Street banker and the first deaf pilot to earn an instrument rating from the Federal Aviation Administration. We are at his kitchen table in a one bedroom apartment in Akron, Ohio. He has a big binder of press appearances, letters from people who heard him speak- an amazing life in…
Scott Hatley, founder of the non-profit Incight, is wheelchair-bound due to muscular dystrophy. That did not stop him, however, from graduating from the University of Portland, in 2001, and immediately starting his company, which offers employment and educational opportunities to people with disabilities. Scott was inspired by his summers spent at the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s…
loves to garden, but it took a life-threatening illness to force her to truly pursue her passion. Anne was working as a television reporter when she was diagnosed with Burkitt’s lymphoma, a rare form of lymphatic cancer. Facing possible death, Anne decided she could not live with regret inside of her and, with…
Laura Dombrowski has a degree in statistics and a career in photography, thanks to the traces liberal arts found, within the general education system, at most American universities. Laura took her first photography class during her junior year of college, and spent an entire Semester at Sea traveling the world, taking pictures. She has not…
Gerard Nebesky makes paella, and makes a pretty good living doing it. Standing outside of Renga Arts in Occidental, California, Gerard seems incredibly intimidating (he is not), for no other reason than he looks like the coolest guy on the planet, which matches well with the life he has lived. At 18, Gerard flew to…
KIVA.org is a company that needs little introduction. A micro-financing operation based out of a humble San Francisco office, KIVA.org has grown in a single year from a four-person company with little investment a year ago, to a company with more money than it knows what to do with today. This is a problem, but…
, the Passion Catalyst, sees passion as a necessity in business and in life. “There is this notion in business,” he says, “that passion is in some way frivolous, and that work is supposed to be miserable. I would argue that passion is not frivolous, but rather is one of the best investments we…
This interview takes place in a loud restaurant on a Monday night. All of us have a few beers we’re attending to. Noah leads the interview, for the most part. Interview: How To Become an Executive Chef Noah: Would you mind giving us an introduction and telling us who you work for? My name is…
Interview: How To Become a Biotech Research Associate (non-PHD) What exactly do you guys do here? What’s the name of the company? It’s called Stratatech Corporation. We make skin. We grow skin. Well, yeah. We basically make skin in a lab and we’re doing a human clinical trial right now on burn victims. Is it…
Kathy Cima works in a plain office, wears plain clothes, talks quietly and plainly. But her job is anything but plain. She is a public defender in Minneapolis. Before this, she worked ten years as a civil lawyer. She enjoys arguing about stuff that actually matters now… not when and where you are allowed to…
Interview: How To Become a Science Consultant My name is Kathy Muirhead. I am one of a two person company called SciGroS. It has nothing to do with fertilizer. The idea is actually around science and growth. Science based growth. What we do is we work with little companies. Anything from the gleam in the…
hasn’t made it; at least, that’s what he’ll say. The owner of Santa Rosa, California’s Ausiello’s 5th Street Grill warns, “once you sit on your laurels and think you’ve made it, you’re done.” Arman, whose vitality makes his age a complete mystery, has owned successful bars for over 25 years; anyone looking into…
