The School of Greatness - 461 Adam Braun: Invest in Yourself to Create Your Future

Episode Date: March 22, 2017

"Asking for permission is asking for denial." - Adam Braun If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes, video, and more at http://lewishowes.com/461

This is episode number 461 with New York Times best-selling author Adam Braun. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro-athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur, and each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Welcome, everyone. You're in a treat today because we've got my good friend Adam Braun back on the show. Now, he was here a couple of years ago, but we brought him back because he's got a big

announcement today, and I wanted to make sure that we were the ones to help announce it and bring it to the world. Now, for those that don't know who Adam is, he is a New York Times bestselling author of The Promise of a Pencil, and he is the founder and CEO of Mission U. He was previously founder and CEO of Pencils of Promise, the award-winning organization that has built 400 schools around the world. He has been featured as a speaker at the White House, the United Nations, and the Clinton Global Initiative. He has also been named to Business Insider's 40 Under 40, Wired Magazine's 50 People Who Are Changing the World, and was selected as one of the World Economic Forum's original 10 global shapers.

I am pumped about this because we're talking about the new mission that Adam is on, and that's Mission U. Now, he has helped build schools for kids all over the world who don't have proper education. He's helped that mission. And now he realized that higher education is actually broken in a lot of ways. And what we talk about are why a traditional four-year college education isn't a good idea anymore. How very few students actually graduate in four years. What standardized tests actually tell about someone.

What 91% of college freshmen say is their number one reason for going to a university. percent of college freshmen say is their number one reason for going to a university, why Adam shifted his focus from supporting education abroad to education here at home, and so much more. And I have found, in my opinion, one of the most powerful ways to master your inner game, your inner world through meditation and breathing. And that is with our sponsor today, One World Academy. Now, you guys have heard heard me talk about I am excited about this because we really dive into something that's a major problem a major problem for so many people and Adam talks about the different solutions for higher education and for going on a mission and your own journey to educating yourself so I'm very excited

about this episode and if you want to check out the full video interview as well you can check it out at our show notes, along with a lot of other links and resources at lewishouse.com slash 461. And without further ado, let me introduce to you the one and only Adam Braun. Welcome, everyone, back to the School of Greatness podcast. Very excited about our guest, Adam Braun in the house. Good to see you, man. You too. Now, you were back on episode 56, and at that time, you'd built 200 schools.

I don't know if you're aware of that. At that time, you did 200 schools. No, I didn't realize. Today, actually, right? Yeah. This is coming out a couple weeks after we record this, but today, in recording time, you just hit 400 schools with Pencil of Promise, right? That's right.

It's incredible, man. And when did it first start? So the organization was founded in October of 2008. Our first school was completed in September of 2009. Okay, 2009. So what was that, eight years ago? Is that right? Yeah, I mean, last probably seven and a half years.

Seven and a half years ago? Amazing, man. So 400 schools. You wrote this book that it's on the New York Times bestseller list. It's called The Promise of a Pencil. And the cool thing about this, which I think is kind of ironic, is that a lot of universities are buying this book for all their freshmen to read as they come in. Yeah. And we're going to talk about that.

But you're also starting a new school, a non-traditional type of school called Mission U. That's right. That is essentially telling people why they don't need to go to a traditional college and helping them set up for success for the rest of their life. Yes.

So I think it's funny that your book is actually going to talk to freshmen who are already paying a lot for these college loans and this debt they're going to be in, this four-year degree, which I have a four-year degree. And I had a great, I would say, social experience there. Yes, and I. And environment in my school. But in terms of the things I learned in class weren't necessarily helpful for what I'm doing. Right.

And the way that I was taught on how to learn and things like that you know just all through school not just college was a challenge but my my experience at my universities were a lot of fun playing sports and everything else but actually going to class was pretty much pointless for me so congrats on the book congrats on 400 schools thank you and today mission you calm is officially open. Yep. And I want to learn about that in a minute, but why go from starting one of the leading for not nonprofit, but for purpose organizations in the world, that's building schools for kids all over the world from one school to 400 now, and now leaving it to go do what you're doing in higher education? Why go from, you know,

the poorest of the poor to higher education? Yeah. I mean, it's a great question. It's one that certainly I've had to dive deep into some of the internal psyche to ask, why would I give up such a great thing? Right. And I'm, you know, I'm still heavily involved in Pencils of Promise as, you know, founder and board emeritus. But the main driver was really that after the book came out, unfortunately, as you mentioned, it's been read by a lot of colleges, a lot of companies. You know, I found myself speaking in a lot of large rooms. And at the end of those talks, I'd get asked a series of questions. And there was one question that I kept on getting asked that I did not have a good

answer for. And the question was, it's great what you're doing internationally, but what about all the problems here at home? What about our US education system? Is there anything that you could do to impact the challenges we have here? And I've always been a big believer in relentless focus. I know it's something that you and I have talked a lot about. You have to maintain focus. You can't say yes to everything. Every time you say yes, you're essentially saying a deferred no to something else. And I felt like Penn State Problems needed to focus on international education, in particular primary education for children in rural poverty.

But it really bothered me that I wasn't doing anything about our problems here at home. The thing is, I didn't have a personal motivation and pencil problems was so heavily motivated by my personal experiences that I actually had a really good educational experience here. You know, I went to a great public school throughout most of my life. Um, I went to a really good college and was able to graduate debt free. Uh, and that enabled me to build a, the career that I've had. But I met my wife almost five, six years ago, and her experience was very different from mine. You know, she came to this country when she was nine, bought into the belief system that, you know, even though she grew up in this very loving

family, they had, you know, very minimal financial means. And her belief was in pursuit of the American dream that you could, you know, go to college and that would springboard you to a better future. And that's what we've sold, and decades and decades of young people on. And she went to college for about two and a half years. And after those two and a half years, she'd racked up so much debt and the things that she was learning weren't actually preparing her for the jobs that she was interested in, in a meaningful way that she just couldn't justify taking on even more financial hardship to get a piece of paper. And so she left school, she started working. And when I met her, she was several years out. But every time that I suggested

some entrepreneurial shift in her life or, you know, pursue this path or even just go away for a week somewhere, she always brought it back to the fact that she had this crushing student debt on her shoulders. And finally, I said, you know, Tehillah, their name, tell me the reality here. How bad is it? She said, Adam, I went to this college for two and a half years. I currently have $110,000 of student debt and no bachelor's degree. And when I learned about that reality, I said, you know, this is crazy, but I think you should declare bankruptcy. And at least you'll be absolved of, you know of a decision that you made when you're 17, 18 years old based on a system that told you to make that decision. And once we get married,

I have clean credit, we can start fresh. And that was the plan that I planned to move forward with together. And as soon as I suggested it, she said, you don't understand. Student debt is with you for life. And I said, no, that's not true. You can't declare bankruptcy on me. She said, Adam, student debt is the only debt in the United States you cannot declare bankruptcy on. And she was right. And once I learned that fact, that's when the moment kind of hit that it was really hard for me to continue working on Pencil of Promise,

even though we were doing such great work. When I was trying to support these children in remote parts of the world, and yet the person sitting on the couch next to me was actually at such a massive disadvantage because the education system had really failed her. And as I started to read books and speak with kind of the who's who of the industry, what became very clear to me was that Tehillah's situation was actually much closer to the norm and I was the exception rather than vice versa. And I can walk you through some of the data, but when you really break down the American higher education system, it is

fundamentally broken. And I don't think that many people have come out and openly said the belief system that I now have because we weren't at a place as a society and the cost of college wasn't at the place that it's at today. But I fundamentally believe that the majority of young people that are entering a four-year bachelor's degree program are making a bad decision. And that has not been the belief for a long time. But when you look at the numbers, it just doesn't make sense anymore. And we need to be, I think, bold enough and brave enough to acknowledge that reality and start to put forward solutions. And mission U is just that. Yeah. I mean, growing up, it was like the parents, my parents were pretty cool about things, that reality and start to put forward solutions and mission you is is just that yeah i mean you

know growing up it was like the parents my parents were pretty cool about things but i think most kids parents were like you have to go to college or we're disowning you type of thing it was like so there's a psychological fear there's like a fear of loss with your family and not wanting to let people down and you just go and you don't even know what you're taking on yeah and you think like i'll be able to figure it out or i'll get the job that i need that i'll be able to pay this off even if you get a hundred thousand dollar a year job you know three hundred thousand dollars in debt it's going to take your whole life right and if you have a house and get married and you know it's like unless you live like a poor person all day right pay it off yep it's like

and the other thing is a lot of people don't understand how interest rates work on student loans. And so, you know, you might have $35,000 of loans, which is the average graduate nowadays, seven and 10 students, right. Right. Seven, seven and 10 students who graduate will have a loan, a student debt, the average seven out of 10. Wow. The average student debt. Seven out of 10. Seven out of 10. Wow. The average student debt is $35,000, just a little bit higher actually this year. But most loans, the most popular loan is a Stafford loan, which is a 6.9% interest rate loan if it's unsubsidized. That hurts. And the average person takes about 20, 21 years to pay it back. So that means you're actually, when you do the numbers, playing Coastler to $70,000. And that's for a piece of paper that no longer

is going to be a guaranteed pathway to a job in the way that it was in the 80s and the 90s. I mean, the most shocking thing for me that I recently learned was that, I'll ask you this question, what percentage of all students who enter a four-year bachelor's degree program nationally graduate in four years? enter a four-year bachelor's degree program nationally graduate in four years? 65%. So the number is 18%. 18% graduate in four years. Correct.

Wow. Yeah. It took me seven. So that's why I was averaging it out. So it's just over 50% will graduate in six years. Wow. But we think of it as a four-year program. And you look at the cost.

I mean, when I was in college over 10 years ago, an expensive school was like $38,000, 60% will graduate in six years. Wow. But we think of it as a four-year program. And you look at the cost. I mean, when I was in college over 10 years ago, an expensive school was like $38,000, $40,000. A year. Right, a year. And now schools are $70,000 or more. That's crazy. And you're not going to graduate likely in four years. It's four, five, six. You take that summer program and it's like 20 grand here.

Yeah. So the costs are so wildly out of control. So the costs are so wildly out of control. And then at the same time, we have this huge issue that the skills that you're learning in college don't aptly prepare you to enter the workforce. And so we need to recalibrate what the reality of higher education should look like. And that's really what we sought out to build. Why are kids going into college still if it's $80,000 a year and they know there's no guarantee? Like it used to be 20 years ago or something. I think it's 80 grand a year and they know there's no guarantee? Like it used to be 20 years ago or something. I think it's a number of factors. First off is that their parents are still firm

believers in the system because their parents benefit from this system. When their parents went to college, you could work your way through college and pay it down even while you were in college, maybe a little bit after. For many of them that didn't go to college, it's always been this kind of golden ring out there that I didn't go to college. And therefore, you know, my kid's going to go to college one day. It's this system that we've put in place. And now the wheels have kind of continued to turn and they're so powerful that there's not a lot of people that are questioning whether it's the right path or not. And, you know, my belief is that for some people, college is the right move.

If you're able to get into a really good school, of which there are not, frankly, that many, that I think the return on investment is there, then it's probably worth it. And ideally, if your family can pay for it or if you get close to a full ride. But there's millions and millions of students that are entering this system that should not go to college. And I think a large driver of it is just this societal belief that it's what you're supposed to do. And that was okay when it wasn't as expensive as it is today. Yeah. A buddy of mine, you may know him. His name is Alex Shulman. He's a dentist, my dentist in New York, actually. I think he racked up, and I think he'll be okay with me saying this, around $400,000 in student loans for dental school.

Right. But dental school, you're going to make money. He knew exactly what he was getting into. He knew the purpose of it. He was excited about it. He was like, I don't mind this debt because it's going to help me give all the skills that I need to make all this money back. I know when I'm going to make it back.

I've got the job right afterwards lined up. I'm opening my own practice. He knew the route. But 90% of people probably are going to get bachelor degrees in subjects that aren't giving them a clear pathway to how they're going to make that money back. Right. Or the job they're going to get, correct?

Yep. And you were telling me before this, before we got on here, that you have an application process and you were looking through all these different applicants who like tweeted it out and got 250 people to do an internship for mission you and you said there were people from like stanford and all these other big schools but the star was someone that didn't even actually go to college right i went to like a yeah it shows not

to go to college at all but in the application application, she rose to the top as the best person. So it was before, 10, 20 years ago, it used to be like, oh, if you had Stanford on your resume or Harvard, you were going to get a job. Yeah. But now it's more about what? It's more about personality type. It's more about the energy, about the soft skills. What are you looking for?

So the reality is, call it 10 years ago. Maybe we'll go 15. Yeah. 15 years ago, if you are an employer and you're looking to make a hire, the only data that you have on that person is where they went to college, what they majored in, and what their transcript provides. Their GPA, maybe? Yeah. You looked at the courses that they took, and that proved to you that they knew the thing that you wanted them to know, right? Nowadays, as an employer, where they went to college and what they majored in is one of 15 to 20 probably meaningful data points that you have on that person. So I'm a firm believer that whatever shows up when I

Google someone's name is actually going to have a more meaningful impact on me as to whether they get a job than where they went to college. What you Googled them about. Yeah. Yeah. When I Google them, whatever shows up is actually gonna have a bigger impact on whether they get a job eventually than just the name of the college they attended. I've never looked at a single transcript of anybody that I've hired. And the organization I founded

and when I worked at Bain previously, I've hired collectively hundreds of people. I've asked a lot of people if they've ever last looked at a transcript. No one's looked at a transcript. I don't even know if I've ever checked if anyone's actually graduated from the institution. So what really matters is where you went to college now provides one sorting mechanism that I know you're qualified to get into this school. And that means

certain things about you. But what's actually more important to help get a job is first and foremost, how do you present when you're in the room? To even get the interview is often going to be based on the set of kind of resume and public portfolio of work that you have out there, likely on the internet. It's also a combination of soft skills that are not necessarily demonstrated on where you went to college or not. Maybe some references of people that have worked with you before. Do you get a foot in the. Maybe some references of people that have worked with you before. Do you get a foot in the door because some close relationship makes an introduction to the company

that you're trying to land at? But your social media stream is actually going to be really important. I look at people's Instagram pages. I look at their Facebook presence. If I can, I'll try and see how they present themselves on Snapchat. But all of these things are just as valuable

to the modern employer as colleges. And yet those things don't ask you to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars. And they also don't require you to make a multi-year commitment that doesn't actually correlate to the direct skills that you need. So our admissions process at MissionU is set up entirely different from any college system. First and foremost, we don't look at GPA, we don't look at SAT, and you don't have to have graduated from high school. This sounds like the perfect college for me back in the day. But here's the reason for that. I mean, look at how successful you've become in your career.

Yeah. And you are an example of what turns out to be millions of people who don't necessarily thrive in an academic environment that judges them based on standardized test scores and a very regimented system. Right. I had to take the SATs twice because the first time I didn't have a high enough score to get into college and play football. Yeah. I know multiple people that went through it. At the same time, if you look at the graphs of wealth compared to SAT scores, they are perfectly aligned with one another. The SAT score is almost a direct proxy to personal

family wealth. Really? Yeah. I mean, directly, because it's something that you can study and prepare for. It's a very specific type of test. So we throw all that out the window. We're not interested in past test scores. We're interested in the future potential of any individual that's going to come into our program. So there's four simple steps. The first is you tell us a little bit about yourself. Hopefully we get to know you. What are your aspirations, your dream companies? The first is you tell us a little bit about yourself. Hopefully we get to know you. What are your aspirations, your dream companies?

The second is an admissions challenge. It happens online. We ask a series of questions that really get to the root of how do you solve problems? Do you have critical thinking abilities? The third step of the process is a group challenge in which you are put in a Zoom room. So we use live virtual classrooms and you're given a prompt and it's you and three to four other students. You arrive, you have 45 minutes And you're given a prompt. And it's you and three to four other students. You arrive, you have 45 minutes, and you're given a prompt. An example of one that we're currently using is autonomous vehicles.

They're coming to our society. We're going to have self-driving cars. Will that have a net positive, net negative, or net neutral impact on our society and why? And you as a group have 35 minutes to create a presentation. And the last 10 minutes, you're going present to our staff member and you'll self-assess, you'll assess your peers. And then our staff member will watch back the recording of how you did as an individual and as a group, and you'll get a score there. And if you do well, then you advance to a final round individual interview. And we feel like that's such a more meaningful process to understand who are the really high potential performers than just

looking at a set of standardized tests. So, you know, my guess is there's some listeners to this podcast that, you know, kind of recognize that they would have thrived in that environment and they've probably built really successful careers, but maybe they didn't love the classroom environment. And my hope is that their kids and, you know, nieces and nephews are able to thrive and not just be told there's only one way to go through the higher education system. I love that. And in your mind, what are all the things that are broken about higher education system? Such a good question. So the first and the one that I'm most committed to challenging at Mission U is that young people without financial means are expected to allocate hundreds of thousands of dollars to

institutions that already possess millions, if not billions of dollars, tens of billions of dollars, some of them, without any commitment to that person's outcomes, right? To their future. Yeah. There's no accountability. There's no, we're going to get you a job or you have an opportunity afterwards. No, but the institution doesn't suffer if the person ends up not doing well in their life, right? Because they got the money up front. So that's the first big thing that I want to challenge about the higher education system. And so if you get into Mission U, we are committed to turning those tables around. And so we invest in you for a full year. There is no tuition when you get into Mission U. We commit to investing in you for a full year. And then once you finish Mission U, if and only if you secure a job paying you $50,000 or more, once you have

that $50,000 or more job, then you commit 15% of your income for three years back to Mission U. And that's how we're able to sustain ourselves and enable this high quality education to students and grow. But at the same time, we from day one are saying that we're going to tie our outcomes and our wellbeing and our success to the outcomes and wellbeing and success of our students. No other education system is holding themselves to that standard. No. That you're aware of. No. You have to, everyone else to pay up front. You know, in Australia, they have an income-based repayment system where the government covers a lot

of the costs and then it's a percentage of your earnings in the future. A couple of companies, countries have tried this and it's been great for them, but there's certainly no college. I mean, Purdue University has a program called Back a Boiler where they're starting to pilot this. But as far as I know, we are the only true college alternative for the 21st century that upfront is totally debt-free. There's no tuition, a small deposit, a couple hundred bucks, and that would be allocated to your income share on the back. So that's the first big problem, and that's how we go about solving it. The second part is that the curriculum itself is designed by individuals who are so far removed from the industries

in which they're trying to prepare young people to enter. And so it's not a knock on academics. There's so many that make great contributions, but the curriculums of colleges are often created by people that are interested in, you know, publishing and random, you know, journals. Yeah. Yeah. Um, not to say all of them, cause there's some teachers that are working. Yeah. There's some great ones. Yeah. And the other thing that I'll say is most of the people that I've met in talking about Mission U at universities believe in this because they themselves are such good people that have committed their lives to the service of young people and advancing education. And they recognize that the system is broken and that young people are coming out with all these challenges. But the second big problem is the curriculum is not skills focused. It's not career oriented. And the vast majority of young people, when you pull, you know,

entering freshmen as to why they're going to college, the number one answer, 91% say to get a better job. And yet college is not preparing them to get a better job. And so our curriculum at Mission U from day one is built with employers rather than a kind of core group of academics. And so we have academics that kind of create the architecture and the learning science, but the actual curriculum itself, we have a set of what we call employer partners. And these are companies that advise us on what the curriculum should be. And then we give them access to our top graduates. And right now those are companies like Facebook, Warby Parker, Lyft, Casper, Harry's, uh, Birchbox, 2U, uh, Plated, Chegg.

Um, that's our kind of cohort at launch. Wow. Um, but these are all the leading companies that, you know, if, if I was coming out of college right now, I'd give my right arm to get a job at, and they're the ones that are helping us really think thoughtfully about the curriculum. So, so that's the other kind of second big problem in my mind is a total lack of connectedness between what the needs of industry are and a real skills-based curriculum that also provides young people with a social experience and a real set of soft skills.

Amazing. Are there any other big challenges that you face or you find with the education system? Man, I mean, those are the two ones that really stand out to me. I think probably the third one that, you know, we've done some good jobs at making inroads on is that for hundreds of years, we've operated on this large lecture model. And so, you know, I mean, when you and I were in college, you probably remember sitting in the very back of some huge lecture hall and not paying any attention. We didn't have smartphones then. So we had to like just sit around and do nothing or just talk to someone. I remember sitting in the very back of some huge lecture hall and not paying any attention. We didn't have smartphones then. So we had to just sit around and do nothing or just talk to someone. Yeah.

So that large lecture hall obviously is not a particularly effective way to learn. And because of things like Coursera and Udacity and a lot of other online methods, you now have the ability to oftentimes learn from the best professors in the world and get access to great content. So the content is now free. It doesn't just exist in these like ivory towers. That said, it still requires you to learn by yourself. And there's very few people that can effectively go through a learning experience from start to end by themselves behind a computer. And so the delivery model, the experience of how you go through higher education, I also think needs to change and evolve.

And for each person, it's a little bit different. What we're really, you know, I think kind of pioneering at MissionU is something that a few others have done, but, you know, not in the way that we're approaching it. So we believe in the value of online education. About 80 to 90 percent of the MissionU experience happens online. But these are not prerecorded lectures. These are live virtual classrooms with you and a cohort of 25 students. Every mission you cohort is 25, and you are part of this cohort. You are learning from real industry practitioners. You're taking on real world projects and really essentially diving into the actual skills that

you would apply. But we think you have to come together in person at certain points in the year. And so we have a three-day orientation where you all come together, really deep, immersive learnings together, because you want to build those social relationships, you know, those friends that you're going to have for life, much like you would at college. And then every single month we have a meetup. And then we have graduation, but graduation is in person. Yet I think that this is also, sorry, a fourth place where college really fails in that you're expected to go through this formative experience. And then at the very end, right, you have graduation, then you're sent on your way. And yet, if you're going to college to

get a better job, you know, and you think about where career services itself has a meaningful part of your college, you know, days, it's like at the very end, maybe you show up, maybe there's a career fair. That's all there was. Right. It's not particularly well-crafted or executed. And so we think that your graduation moment should actually happen well before the end of the year. So for us, graduation is about six weeks before the end of this one-year program, one-year college alternative. And after you have this graduation moment, we are still committed to working with you. And so we have six weeks as part of the program

that we call Career Launch. And Career Launch is the time in which we support you all the way from job interview and job preparation, all the way through to salary negotiation. Wow, you'll negotiate for them. We'll help them essentially through that negotiation process. Because I think back to when I was 22, 23, I didn't understand how to negotiate.

Fortunately, I had family around me that could somewhat help me. But as you know, all of these things are learned skills. And almost every person I've talked to about this, even those in their 30s and 40s are like, geez, I wish somebody taught me salary negotiation now in my career. And we think that young people should be prepared with those things early on. And that should be a part of your higher education experience. Powerful, man. What's been the biggest challenges for you guys in kind of getting those off the ground and convincing people that this is the right thing and all these other things? Yeah, I think any time that you have a big idea and that big idea exists in a reality that has not yet come to life,

you have to overcome so many internal hurdles because you have to believe in something that no one else has seen before, that no one else has created before, but you have to believe with optimistic intent that the world is going to believe with optimistic intent that the world is going to move into that place that you foresee it going to. And when I look at the challenges of higher education, we need something better. The next generation deserves something

better. And I think one of the biggest challenges of building Mission U has been and will continue to be projecting a future that is not the norm yet and saying, do we have believers that there's a better way to get access to education, that there's a better way to enable a brighter future for a rising generation and overcoming the dissent that you will experience in challenging the norm, I think is one thing that we have to overcome. But, you know, you always find that there's good people in every, you know, pocket of every town and every corner of the world who oftentimes are able to see the same vision that you have. And so I think that's going to be, you know, from the very start all the way to five years

from now or 10 years. I mean, if I look at Pencils of Promise, when I went out and said, I want to try and build a school in the developing world, and I have $25 and hopefully a bunch of young people that are going to rally in a grassroots right around this, nobody believed that we could build a school. And two years ago, when I started telling people that I thought higher education was broken and that we needed a college alternative for the 21st century, people said, yeah, that makes sense, but how is that going to actually happen? And so now that we're at 400 schools at Pencils of Promise, we're going to continue to set really large and ambitious goals. And so I don't think that the doubters will ever go away with something like Pencils of Promise or something like Mission

U. But if they went away, I think that the motivation would maybe dissipate because people like myself, I think people like you were motivated to create something that others don't believe that we can. Yeah. How many kids go to college every year? Do you know? There's 25 million undergraduates in the United States. The global number that I've seen most recently, I believe is about 180 million. Wow. And how many countries do the free model where it's just free, you don't have to pay anything back? So not that many. I mean, Germany recently announced that they're doing this. Britain's got the same issues that we have here. It's really overpriced and it's really challenging. Canada? Yeah. Canada, I believe,

has institutional. Again, there's public and private. Sure, sure. And so I don't know the exact number of those that have it free, but they're in kind of interesting pockets of the world. Got it, yeah. Some places in Europe too, I think, right? Yeah. I think in South America there's a few places. I think Argentina maybe has it. Maybe. I'm not sure.

Yeah, got it. I wonder how those do for students when they have free education that's paid by the government or whatever it is. You know, so in Tennessee, there's something called the Tennessee Promise. And Obama referenced this at his State of the Union two years ago. And he said, we want to roll this out nationally. And, of course, they never did. But, you know, Tennessee Promise was basically a commitment by the state of Tennessee that any student that had above a certain GPA in, I believe, high school would get access to free community college throughout the state. And as long as they retained a certain GPA while they were in college, they would have access to it.

So that was this model that people are interested in exploring. Now, Chattanooga State University, or State College, one of the 14 schools that are part of the system, happened to invite me to come down because they had used my book as a common read. And so I went and I spoke at this school and I spent time with these students and some of the deans. And I asked the dean, what is the completion rate? You guys have this Tennessee promise. And the number I believe that he shared with me was 16%. People are complete. Yeah. Free education. Right. And so the challenge, at least that I foresee, is that when you make something entirely free and people don't have real skin in the game,

it's tough to really hold them accountable to the end result that you're both seeking together. And so, you know, even in running and building this nonprofit over the years, you know, I found that when people offered free services to Pencils of Promise, I'd say, let us just pay you a small amount. You know, that, that kind of contract between two people that you're exchanging some type of value, I think is important. Yeah. Hmm. And do you think because mission you is going to be free, but they're going to see a job at the end, there's some accountability there or you're guaranteeing, you know, kind of guaranteeing this. Yeah. I mean, the way that we look at it is it's debt-free. That said it, you know, at some point in time, you will have to contribute dollars back for the

services that we're providing. We're investing tens of thousands of dollars into every student that we're going to take on. In order for us to be an ongoing institution, we need to recoup that at some point, but we believe that we should share that risk with the student. In fact, we'll take it on up front. The tenancy promise, they're not promising these schools to get a job afterwards either. You're saying you can come to school, but then there's no promise afterwards. Right. Correct. Got it.

Yeah. Now you just had two kids, twins, right? Boy and a girl. Yeah. Dylan and Bayla. Dylan and Bayla. So cute. And a few months old now.

Yep. What's that like being a new dad? It's the best. I mean, it's exhausting. It's the best. I mean, it's exhausting. It's absolutely exhausting. You know, I never knew that I could sleep this little. I never knew that I could love this much. I never knew that I could, you know, live with my heart outside of my body in the way that I feel like I am every single day. And, you know, it gives you, I think, a renewed sense of priority and purpose. That's probably the thing that I would distill it to is having children gives you a

renewed sense of priority and purpose because you look at how you spend your time very differently. Things that I would have done before, you know, of course I'll go for drinks with this person, or I'll go to that brunch, or I'll take that trip to spend time at that conference. You know, you kind of recognize, especially when you have at that conference, you know, you kind of recognize, especially when you have twins, that now you're missing two sets of experiences that you can never get back. And, you know, these kind of micro moments that they're experiencing every single day, and the growth that they're, you know, incurring as this little human is so incredible that I want to be there for as much of it as I can. And so, you know,

it's changed my priorities and how I spend my time. And then from a purpose standpoint, you know, I, uh, I told my wife this, uh, I think like the first or second night that we brought them home from the hospital and they were in the hospital for about two weeks in the NICU cause they were, you know, small and came a little early. But, um, you, I would say the first 30-ish years, was really committed to living as big as I could. I wanted to walk into a room and have people know what my name was. And I wanted to make an impact on the lives of others in a way that transformed their well-being and as many people as I could. And I think in a lot of ways, part of that was driven by just this internal desire to prove something to myself, you know, that I had worth that, that, you know, after coming out of, as you

know, I had this certain death experience on semester at sea when I was 21, you know, to prove to myself that I had survived for a reason. And that reason wasn't just for me, it was to benefit hopefully as many people as I could. And when I brought the babies home and again, cause they, you know, came early and then it's scary to see your little babies in these little incubators and think about their health. You know, I said to my wife, I said to Tehila, I was like, I've never wanted to live so small in my whole life. Everything right now that matters to me is in that little nursery over there. And all I want is you and me and those two babies and the four of us to never have to leave that room. And it was a really challenging thing to reconcile, right? To go from wanting to live as big as possible to wanting to

live as small as possible. And it took me a few weeks. And I think what I eventually realized, and I wrote this in a blog called, you know, on my website on adamrod.com, I think it's just called the new dad's letter to his newborn twins, was that, you know, I had to come to grips with the fact that I now had this purpose, which was to be an example to them. And that means living big and trying to impact people in a really big and positive way and being true to that kind of smaller life where I'm present for their wellbeing. And it's the push and pull between those two things that gives me a renewed sense of purpose. Wow, man. Yeah. Everything you do, do you ever, do you feel like you're more productive now? I mean, you're launching a

business. Everything's more purposeful and intentional. I got three babies at once. I got two twins and a, you know, a new venture to launch. And your baby and your wife too. You're a real baby, right? Yeah. Your baby love. Right, right, right. Um, and so, yeah, I mean, I think, I think I said the exact words last night when I got home was I cannot imagine how I could be possibly more productive in a given day, given that I'm balancing no sleep, babies, company, obviously quality time with my wife. Health is quite important, as we've talked about a lot as well. And so, you know, you just, you don't have time for fluff anymore because you recognize every moment is so meaningful that you could be spending with your children. And if not with your children,

then you'd better damn be making an impact in your business. Wow. Crazy, a whole nother life, man. Do you think you'll send them to traditional college if they want to go? I've thought a lot about this. I can tell you unequivocally Mission U is being built so that my children have a choice. That's why it's being

built. So that nobody has to go through the injustice that I believe my wife went through. And so that my children in the future have a choice. So one thing that really, really sat with me, I think I lost a fair amount of sleep over this, is in thinking about higher education and then thinking about, this is even before we had kids, I thought, how much is college going to cost in the future? So how much am I going to have to pay for whenever the family that I have? 20 years, right? Yeah. So I ended up doing the research and Forbes put out a study projecting the cost of college in the year 2030. Okay. So my children, 18 years from now, you know, call it, you know, in the 2030s, but the year 2030, they projected

the cost of one year at a private school. Guess what that was? $110,000. $130,000. Gosh. Just over 130 grand. One year. Yeah. For one year of experience. It's 500 grand. Right. And this is also post-tax money. And keep in mind, most people don't graduate in four years. So, so I heard that and I thought, geez, it hurts me. That is crazy. And if that is crazy to me, how do, how does the most, the rest of the country feel from people that are in all different types of financial positions? Right. I know my earning capacity my earning capacity and it concerns me. And I think about how is, you know,

any kind of normal family in this country gonna send two or three? I mean, it's just not feasible. It's not possible. This is not a sustainable system. And so that's when I started, you know, this was probably a year and a half ago I learned about this.

And I was like, we have to create a model that allows every student from every single background to have access to higher quality education. That's why this, you know, debt-free model arose out of Mission U. But my guess is, if I really had to project out, one thing that you learn with twins, especially boy and girl, fraternal twins, is they're so different. They're three months older already. They're so different. And my guess is one of them will probably take a more traditional academic path. And if they get into a great school where the return on that investment is clearly there, I'd say, absolutely, you should go. I don't think

every college is a bad idea. Some are a phenomenal idea. But if the other one of them says, you know, I'm really interested in business, or I really want to go down this path, or I don't want to spend four or five years on a campus, that's not for me, I want to get more real world experience, then I want them to be able to go to Mission U. And so it's being built so that there's another choice. The other thing I would say is for anybody, you know, that's in the current economy, you're no longer just going to go to school from the ages of five to 22 and then be a working professional. All of us have to have some experience of continuing education, right? We're going to be lifelong learners. And so it doesn't make as much sense that you should have to spend four or five just in a learning phase. It makes more sense to spend

a shorter increment of time, both learning and then also implementing, right? Then you go into the workforce, maybe you go back to school, maybe you take a month long program, maybe you take an online course in your evenings, but that whole landscape is going to shift. And so if one of my kids wants to go to college, if they get into a goods college, then I'll certainly tell them they should. But for the one that might not, MissionU is going to be there for them. Do you think there will ever be a time, and if so, when, when this model will actually crumble? Will they actually have to all go free or some type of super cheap model, or they just go out of business? Yeah. I mean, there's another person, a guy named Ryan Craig, who I've gotten close to, who

writes a lot about this. And I believe in his theory, which is that we're going to see something very similar to what happened in retail. So basically, call it the top 20, top 50 even schools. They're insulated. They're going to be protected. I mean, Harvard, Stanford, Princeton, they're not going anywhere because their brand is so powerful and they

actually get you a great life and the network gets you a great job. They have donors. Yeah, the experience is really strong. They also have such big endowments that they can provide full financial aid. Stanford is entirely free if your family makes less than $125,000. So the elite schools aren't going anywhere because they have a premium play and they have a brand identity that protects them. I think the kind of community college system in the United States, which has historically been

the backbone of higher education, also isn't going to go anywhere because it supports so many students. More than half of all students in the United States go to a community college. Really? Oh my gosh. But where I think you're going to see like a hollowing out is in that middle ground because what's happening right now is you have private nonprofit colleges that charge the same amount of money as Harvard charges. So there's no market force in place. There's no correction that says this school that has very, very low graduation rates, very low starting salaries, can't charge $55,000 to $60,000. And so they do. And because students

are told to go to a college and they want an experience, they're going to them. And I think people are going to question this. They can't get into Harvard, maybe. Right, right. They have to go somewhere else. Right. So I think the schools that are just below the top or even the second tier, the ones that are just below that, especially those that are charging a lot of money, I think a lot of those are going to shut down in the coming years. And I think state schools,

because there's such a little budget going to them, they're going to have a lot of trouble too because they're charging a lot of money and local students aren't able to pay. And so the only correction is getting students from out of state and that's going to change the internal culture. Oh, man. But they're getting funding from the government, right? Some funding or the state schools? Minimal. So, I mean, historically, large colleges, 60, 70, 80% came from the government. That budget has dried up almost entirely. So, I mean, as an example,

Berkeley College of the United States, I don't know the exact number, but I know that I think it's something like less than 15% of their entire budget comes from the state. So it has to be subsidized, has to be covered by students' tuition. How many schools are there? Do you know? So there's 4,400 registered colleges in the United States. 4,400. Half the ones that I know

are because they play in the NCAA tournament. And so I picked them in a bracket and that's why I've learned the names, which will probably tell you that you and I together can maybe name 200 colleges, I would guess. But there's 4,400 registered in the United States. 4,400. That's public, private, state school, and community college?

Yeah. Yeah. 4,400. Yep. Wow. And yours will be 4,401? What's the different category? Well, we're not a college.

I mean, we're a college alternative. That's the way that we look at it. Got it. We're a higher education institution, but we don't want to play by the same exact rules that everybody else does. So we really view ourselves as a college alternative for the 21st century. And literally, I mean, as of today, any person can just go to missionyear.com, hit apply, and start that application process to join us. So we're asking people to apply. If they're wanting to get a job, then this is for people that want to get a job and in what type of field yeah mission you great question so um this is for students that

we consider career starters people go to college for all different reasons some go for academic preference some go for coming of age experience sports yeah um but if you're a career starter if you're going to college because you want to get a better job as soon as possible then mission u is for you um there's no sports teams. There's no, yeah, no. You know, we think that you could sign up for the local YMCA. So in terms of the initial track of focus, what we call a concentration, what we're launching with is data analytics and business intelligence. That's the kind of initial track track.

Now that is one quarter out of the four quarters you spend. The first quarter we call foundation. It's eight hard skills that we think will make you incredibly valuable at any company. These are things like public speaking, business writing, Excel modeling, project management, you know, a whole host of those. There's eight of them that you're trained on. And you're learning these by doing real world projects too. The second one is all about soft skills. That's our second quarter. We call it discovery. We also have a bit of that kind of coming of age experience where you do deep introspective work, trying to understand where you want to point your compass in life and why, as well as we call essential knowledge, which is things like how do you balance a checkbook?

How do you pay taxes? Stuff that like are never taught. Never taught in school. That's all part of discovery. That's our second quarter. Our third quarter is the intensive, really immersive sprint on your specialization. So that at launch would be just data analytics and business intelligence.

But as we grow, we want to add more focuses so that like a college, you can choose your track. And then the fourth quarter, you're broken up into small teams and you act as agencies working on real clients, mainly nonprofits and social impact businesses so that you can build a real public portfolio of work and prove that you've done the thing that you're going to get hired for. So it's like an internship, but it's an internship that we actually kind of control and therefore you can scale with quality. It's not an internship where you're just getting coffee

or doing social media management or something, whatever. Yeah, I mean, internships are super valuable except the quality of them is really difficult to control because it really depends on the company you work for and the manager. With this approach, where we're essentially breaking up into agency and then having you align with real world clients,

we're the ones that are overseeing the quality of your experience. Because an internship for an employer sounds good, but actually bringing someone on and realizing they have no clue what they're going to do. They have no clue how they can help or do anything to improve my business or this company or whatever. And like you said, they're more work. It's a lot of energy, a lot of like, I need to train this person. Right. And then they don't have training programs for interns. Yeah.

They don't have someone leading that. So they just kind of get left by the side and say, okay, we'll just shadow these people and here's some spreadsheets. Yeah. I mean, the way I've described it, I wrote a blog about this, I think a year or two ago, but I wrote it because of someone that I hired and I wanted them to understand how I manage and how hopefully they could really be a star performer. But, you know, the way I think about it, there's three types of people. Um, and they

have three different approaches. Interns come in, uh, at a company and day one say, what can I do? How can I help? What do you want me to go and lead? Um, employees are the second category. Employees come in and say, here's what I know how to do. Here's where I think I can add value. What do you want me to go focus on? And then you have executives. And executives come in and on day one say, I looked at the challenges of the business. I've identified where the holes are. Here's the three things that I'm already starting. And here's the three ideas that I have for us to go execute going forward. And I think anybody that comes into any company, if they take that executive mindset and approach, even if they're an intern, they will rapidly grow through the ranks.

It's true. If you think of how you can solve problems and see what's working, what's not working, I always talk about that. Figure out what's working for you. If you want to work here or if you want to intern or whatever, then show me what you're going to do that's going to help bring in more business. Make something easier. Streamline something more efficient, whatever. Totally. If you can't show me that, then it's more work for me to train you. Right, right.

I mean, some of the best advice I ever got in my career, my first job out of college, I was working at Bain, arguably the top training in the world. And there was a superstar who was in my bay, the area where we sat. And he said to me, it's very simple, Adam. The best thing that you can do is make your boss's life easier. That's it. You make your boss's life easier. Make them think. You make their life easier and you will be successful in any job you take on.

And it was so simple, but I've seen it be so true over now, you know, a decade or so. Wow. So how can people start thinking differently on how to be kind of self-starters or problem solvers as opposed to just tell me what to do? Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of it is certainly mindset, right? I mean, there, there's a mindset of scarcity that says other people have to tell me how to go and lead X, Y, or Z, right? And then there's a mindset of opportunity that instead a person, once they adopt it, is able to see themselves as a catalyst for change rather than the reaction that somebody else has driven throughout a company or an organization. And so, you know, I think a large part of how a person becomes more, you know, valuable and a larger contributor to any organization, company,

team, whatever they're a part of, is to start by saying, I have certain gifts and abilities, and I have certain ones that I'm lacking. The ones that I'm lacking, I want to invest in my personal growth, and I'm going to make sure that I get as strong as possible in these certain areas. and I'm going to make sure that I get as strong as possible in these certain areas. And for the areas that I already possess those skills, I'm going to try and add to the existing kind of foundation that exists in this company. And so I'm going to start training others. I'm going to start putting together projects, whether I'm asked or not. And eventually it leads to another idea, which is simply there are certain people who ask for, you know, permission. And then there are those who instead ask for forgiveness later. And I find the people

that consistently add value are the ones I got this advice when I was like an interning in college, actually, I was working for a company, I was kind of interning directly for a senior leader. And I asked the general counsel of the company if I could do a certain thing. And that guy looked at me and he said, Adam, asking for permission is asking for denial. Just go do it. And you just say, no, you can't do it. Yeah. Yeah. So he said, ask me for permission is asking for denial. I was 19 years old and I haven't forgotten that statement to this day. Wow. So how many people do you piss off by just taking action without asking? Probably a fair amount over the years. I've certainly pissed off people by doing it but you know the truth is i think um taking that mentality actually has yielded so many

more positive results than negative yeah and if you're always worried about stepping on people's tails you're never going to probably do anything right right there's a great winston churchill quote and i don't know the quote exactly but it it's something to the effect of, um, you know, if you haven't made enemies, then you haven't stood for something. Yeah. What do you think is going to be your biggest challenge with mission you over the next few years? You know, I think, I think one of the challenges is going to be, um, you know, we want to grow regionally. Um, so, you know, at launch right now, uh, we're accepting applications nationally. So regardless of where you live, you could live in your parents' basement,

you could listen to this, and you could say, I want to be a part of it. I would encourage you to apply right now. As we talked about when we looked at our intern class, which we kind of view as our pilot, we turned down multiple students from Stanford and Berkeley, and the superstar that we ended up taking on lives in her sister's house and chose not to go to college at all. But she was the top performer in our admissions process, which we ran with them. So I think a challenge is going to be, we're likely, I think, because our team is based out

of San Francisco, to have a first cohort in the Bay Area. But we're totally open to wherever the demand is. But I think that as we grow into different cities, because the cohorts, the only requirement is you have to live within 50 miles of your cohort city to participate. So meeting up once a month. Yeah. And to make sure that you're close to the employers that you're going to interview for jobs at. In that city, yeah. Yeah. So I think our challenge is going to be identifying the right geographies to grow into as we continue to scale.

Because you have to be really thoughtful about it. And the jobs that you're training for have to be relevant to the local economy. And what might be meaningful in New York could be different from Boston, which could be different from Jackson, Mississippi, which could be different from San Francisco. And so we got to be really smart about the skills that we're training for. But I believe that these are really solvable things. And so it's about building a cultural movement and then getting the right people behind it. Sure. So applications are open today. If you go to mission, the letter U,.com, missionu.com, you can go, you can apply. How long does it take

to apply? So, I mean, the initial first step of the application is two to three minutes. So if you have two to three minutes, go to MissionU, fill out the first step. You'll get an email. You can take on the second step whenever you want. It's on time. There's no one looking over your shoulder. But I'd encourage anybody, kind of convert the intention that you might be feeling right now into action.

We've talked about this before, wrote about it in my book, the most wasted resource in the world is human intention. And someone out there is gonna listen to this and say, oh my God, I need to be a part of this or I know somebody who needs to be a part of it. And I would encourage them, first of all, go to mission.com and just fill out the first step of the application, because you can come back to the second and third and fourth step later. And on top of that, we're offering to any person that is listening to this,

if you go and fill out that first step of that application, you'll be asked who you're referred by. If you just type in greatness, being referred by Lewis, we'll give you a $500 essentially scholarship or credit towards that backend contribution. So $500. Paying back. Right, right. Because you're not going to pay anything up front. You're not going to pay anything back until you're making great income and we'll remove $500 off the top. So Mission U doesn't get paid until you get paid. Correct. You're gonna save 500 bucks if you use greatness when you apply.

Correct. As a code, as a referral. So use greatness. Yep. And if you are a parent who's an entrepreneur, who's got kids, send them to this as well, right? Right, so anyone out there

that wants to refer a top student, I mean, our goal is to really identify great talent, regardless of what, you know, part of society they're coming from. You know, we want a really diverse student body because we want this to be representative of the population that we have in this country. And so if anyone goes on, you can actually refer any other student. And if you refer them, you can actually send them this $500 as well. And you yourself will earn $500 if they get accepted. Love it. I love it. And it's a one-year process. When will they find out if they're accepted, if they apply? Yeah. Our process is pretty smooth. It's pretty fast. Part of it is dependent on how quickly

you're able to schedule your third and fourth step interviews, the group and then the individual. But from kind of starting to completion, you should get a decision within about somewhere between two to four weeks. Of you being accepted? Yeah, you'll be notified within about a month from the day at which you fill out that first step. And we're opening up these applications and the first cohort of students will start this September. So rather than going back to school or off to school,

at a traditional college, we hope you join us at Mission U. Amazing. It's exciting. Any questions you have for me? I've got a few questions left, but anything you have for me? Yeah, I mean... Anything you want me to ask you specifically? Sure. You know, I would be curious,

given your experience as somebody who has educated so many others, why something like this makes sense to you? I mean, what excites you about this? Yeah, as an athlete coming out of high school, it wouldn't have made sense because I wanted to play football in school and stuff and sports. But for me, it makes sense because, you know, luckily my dad paid for a lot of my tuition but I still was left with 20 I think 6,000 or somewhere around there 24 26,000 that I had to pay for and I felt like man I worked my butt off for these you know seven years whatever like serving these schools yeah for sports and I was like a trained machine yeah to be there for them now it's there for me as well I was gaining from but I was like a trained machine to be there for them. Now it was there for me as well.

I was gaining from it, but I was like, they're benefiting from me training. And so I just feel like it didn't set me up for anything in terms of getting a job. And it didn't give me those skills. Now I had to kind of create those skills

in sports and things like that. But I didn't know how to speak in public. I didn't know how to communicate with an audience. It wasn't until I went to Toastmasters for a year and essentially did like my own mission. You, I was like, I need to learn these skills and find mentors and like put myself through a

curriculum that's going to work for my life. Learn about how to make money. Learn about how to manage my finances, taxes. Like I didn't know how to write a check in a checkbook. I didn't know any of these things. Right. When I was 24. Most of us didn't. Yeah. And I was like, uh, bookkeeping. I don't know how to write a check in a checkbook. I didn't know any of these things, right? When I was 24. Most of us didn't.

And I was like, bookkeeping, I don't know. So I think it was really the soft skills that I learned after school. How to connect with people. How to open up. How to deliver a message and get your point across. How to just have confidence and poise and all these different things.

And it sounds to me like that's what the first six months of mission is going to be about. Totally. If that's the case, then that's a no-brainer. Because if you can learn those things when you're 18 to 23 and be prepared to go get a job that's pretty much almost guaranteed for you afterwards, if you do everything you need to for a year, you're going to get the job you need. That's going to be a quality job with an awesome, cool company with potential for growth.

I feel like it's a no-brainer for me. If you're in that position, if you're an athlete and you've got other dreams, then it's not for you right now. Maybe after you're done with the dream, you go back and apply. Yeah. Right? Yeah. I mean, that's the goal here is to recognize that the current college system

is no longer an effective one-size-fits-all model. And for different students, they should take different paths. Like you, I was a college athlete. Mission U was not built for someone in my shoes. Mission U was built for someone in my wife's position, in my dad's position. Someone who was looking at college as an avenue to get a job and to enter the workforce and not be put behind, but instead get ahead in life. That's powerful. Yeah. I like it, man. I like it. Lucky 25 would be the first 25 people, right? You're only taking 25 to start. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we'll be starting new cohorts every quarter. Okay. But the first cohort starting this September is just 25. And then every quarter,

you'll have multiple eventually in different tracks and different regions. Yeah. I mean, you would always be in a small group, 20 to 25 students. Amazing. But, you know, you could envision, I can certainly envision 45,000 students starting across the year at Mission U doing, you know, Mission U LA focused on, you know, whatever that specialization is. Right. Mission U in New Orleans and, you know, starting more frequently than even every quarter. That's pretty cool. Could be every month.

It could be every week eventually. Yeah, I mean, I think the vision would be to get it to just about every month. Amazing. In a given city and operating in dozens of cities. Amazing. What about internationally? That's a huge part of the ambition. I mean, you know me.

I'm a global citizen. Global citizen. I mean, this is needed all over the place. I love it, man. MissionU. I mean, this is needed all over the place. I love it, man. MissionU.com. A couple final questions for you. This one, I'm going to ask you a different question. I usually ask a question called the three truths.

Okay. I didn't ask you the first time around. Maybe I'll have you do both. But someone asked me a question yesterday on an interview that I did, and I was like, I'm going to steal this. So, Dr. Lowe, I'm stealing your question idea. I'm going to steal this. So Dr. Lowe, I'm stealing your question idea.

This is, if you have right now, 7 billion people put on headphones and are listening to this live. Wow. And you have a moment to say whatever you want to, is it 7 billion people on the planet right now? Yeah. 7 billion. They've all put on their headphones.

They can all understand English. They've been introduced to who you are. And you have one opportunity to get a message across to the world. What would you say? I would say that regardless of who you are, regardless of where you come from, you have some internal truth that you recognize is authentic

to your very existence. And that is a little voice that no matter what anybody else tells you to follow is the path that you should be following. And there may be societal norms around you that try and lead you in certain directions. But regardless of what those other outside voices are telling you, always, always, always make the little decisions with your head and the big ones with your heart. I like it. And then this one's called the three truths. We'll add this on there so the three lessons that you would say if if your book was erased if all if your university was gone and it was the last day many many years from now for you and you got to write a piece of paper and a pen three things you know to be true yeah what would those three truths be first truth would be that um your friends are the family you choose, but your family

is the foundation of unconditional love in your life and that you should always deeply love your family members and be there for them at all times. That's the first one. As a new dad, I think about this. The second truth would be that you're only going to get one shot at this life. And you will certainly regret the things you didn't try or do much more than the things that you tried and failed at. And so if you have something out there that even though it may seem insurmountable, you want to try and pursue, make that effort and put yourself in a position to try the thing oftentimes that may even scare you most, that you believe may unlock your inner greatness.

third truth would be that the most meaningful experiences and creations that you will ever be a part of in your life are those that fundamentally serve the well-being of others. Love it. MissionU.com, AdamBron.com. It's Adam Braun or is it? I'm on brawn on social media. It's Adam Braun on Instagram and just Adam Braun on Twitter. Okay. And it's Adam Braun on Snapchat. Got it. Someone else has got Adam Braun.

Someone is out there. And he's probably, he's probably a great Adam Braun. I'm gonna acknowledge you, Adam, for a moment for your incredible friendship and for your drive and your ambition to make children's education better and also higher education better. I think what you're doing to kind of tackle these problems is so

powerful. And to have the audacity and passion to go out and tackle massive challenges that most people don't have the courage to go after is super inspiring to me. So I want to acknowledge you for that. I want to acknowledge you for being an incredible father, because I know how much it means to you to have these two little ones running around now, well, almost running around us. And just to know that you have such a great foundation and the family that you have. You're such a good human being and I know you're going to be an incredible father. So I'm excited for all that to come.

Thank you. I'm a little bit scared of when they do start running around. I know, man. Because it's man-to-man defense at that point. They're two on one. My final question for you, I've already asked you your definition of greatness. I'm going to ask you, what does it mean to be a great man?

Yeah, I'm, I'm fortunate that I, I've had some great men in my family to look up to. I think each of my grandfathers, my father, you know, my father-in-law, they're all great men. And so I draw from their example. I mean, I, I think a great man is somebody who leads by deed and example above all else. And they understand the responsibility that they carry to those who will come behind them in future generations, because, you know, saying to somebody that they should be a certain way is almost meaningless compared to how you act. And so my, my real definition of,

of a great man is someone who leads with integrity. They lead with ambition. They lead with love. They lead with vulnerability and they lead with tremendous aspiration to improve the wellbeing of not just their life, but the small circle of those that they love most. And then the large circle of broader humanity that we're all a part of. Adam Braun. Thanks so much, man. Appreciate you. My pleasure. There you have it guys. If you felt this was powerful and inspirational in any way, then please share this out with your friends. The show notes is lewishouse.com slash four,

six, one. Let Adam know what you thought over on Twitter or Instagram. Tag us both over on Instagram at Lewis Howes and let me know what you thought while you're listening to this episode. And if this brings you value in any way, then head over to itunes.com slash greatness and leave us a review. We do this show every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

And the more people that listen and subscribe and review, the more we're able to spread the message of greatness to people all over the world. So thank you guys so much for being a part of this community, for listening, for sharing. It means the world to me. And you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great. Outro Music