Hey, what did you folks think about the recent Veterans Day Special we aired last week? The one we did on location from Friends of Danang Veterans Day Breakfast at the Marriott City Center.

First off, the Friends of Danang. What a great bunch of folks that put that whole event together. In addition to the great work that they regularly do for Vietnamese schoolchildren, they put this wonderful event together and invited us to broadcast OUR special show at the event.

Second, what about some of the stories that these veterans told on the air? I am so impressed by these folks that go and do their duty for their country. I’m not a big fan of warfare, that’s for sure, and I can’t understand why they just can’t put an end to war, but as long as it’s gonna be here, you have to be prepared, and you have to have the people who are willing to dig in and do the dirty work.

-My family and I are going to be taking some time off this week and heading down to Florida for the Thanksgiving holiday. It couldn’t have come at a better time for my health, as I’ve been fighting this cold for about three weeks now. It’s affected my energy for my radio show and other duties, and I’m really looking forward to this time off.

Did you ever see that movie, “Skipping Christmas?” Well, that’s what we’ve decided to do for Thanksgiving this year. It’s funny. I recently told some relatives of our decision well in advance, to give them some heads up, and I could feel the icicles coming through the phone line.

But all I thought was, “Hey, I’ve got to get out for a bit.” I’m sure you’re reading this right now and have thought the same thing from time to time.

-Going back to the Veteran’s Day Show for a second…I recently got a letter from a woman in Mt. Lebanon that brought me to tears.

First, some backstory: I was doing some prep for my radio show and it was 3:30 in the morning. I was dog tired, and all I wanted to do was go to bed. But throughout my entrepreneurial career, one thing that I’ve learned that has stuck with me is that you do everything and you do one more thing. You’ll ALWAYS be ahead of the other guy. I teach my kids that, I teach my employees that, I teach my Duquesne students that, and I practice it myself.

But I see this envelope. Honestly, I just wanted to bag it. Stick it in my briefcase and read it later. But I couldn’t. It came to our P.O. Box, which means it’s probably from a listener, thus, show-related. So I read it.

I must have read it six…eight….ten times. It’s probably one of the most powerful letters I’ve ever received. Definitely the most powerful since I started the radio show. I won’t share it here (it IS pretty private), but suffice to say that it stuck with me, and really showed me the power of what I do here.

-The other day, I was invited to speak to a group of high school teachers about Entrepreneurship.

These teachers, all from the Pittsburgh Public School System, are tasked with instructing and motivating young people (generally 7^th through 12^th graders) to start and successfully operate their own small businesses.

During my presentation, a younger gentleman commented, “You know, I hear every word you are saying. But how do I, and in good conscience, tell a young student that there is also a downside to entrepreneurship? How do I let them know that they might lose everything they invested and maybe even more?

“For example”, he continued, “my senior year in college, we had a business that fixed up dilapidated houses and sold them for huge profits. I remember my buddies saying, ‘yeah, this is a great deal while you’re in college, but you are now graduating, and now, you need security. You need a real JOB.”

How many BILLION times have I heard this? Particularly here in western Pennsylvania, where it seems like no young person can get through high school, much less college, without being asked the question, “So, who are you going to work for when you graduate?”

It just seems that we cannot get out of our heads the proposition that there is some magical guarantee of life-time employment to those who work for someone else, and that working for one’s self is an absolute ticket to nowhere.

First, let’s just talk (job) security. Security is that guy you shave with every morning. Security is the person who dabs on your make-up. The same person who changes your kid’s diapers!

Security is, and quite simply, your productivity … and this is especially true in a small(er) company.

Because it is in the small companies where performance trumps politics, facial hair, and one’s alma mater. In fact, performance is really all that matters in a small company.

My father put in decades of loyal service to a local Fortune 500 company. (They had a big blue logo.) Four of ‘em, in fact. Never sick, always productive and always faithful, he nonetheless was dispatched to the boneyard of retirement the minute he became “too old”. (He was 61.)

Think Circle Dub cared about performance? Obviously not. In my opinion, all they could see was a senior guy making twice the money they could pay a thirty-something and so his ticket out was punched. (And, in fact, he died not more than a year or so later.)

Put this same man into a small, entrepreneurial-driven organization and age is a non-issue. If only he could have made the mental transition.

Make this same man Founder and Owner of his own company and watch him produce for at least another two decades.

Henry David Thoreau once wrote, “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation.” Wanna see a perfect definition of this? Just park on the Parkway Center Mall overpass any weekday morning, from 6-10 A.M.. Here, you’ll see all kinds of “quietly desperate” people “betting against themselves” by rooting for the clock to hurry up while they mindlessly “trade hours for dollars”, counting the “days remaining” before their next holiday/vacation.

I think it was Teddy Roosevelt who wrote, “One must enter the arena in order to play the game.” Unfortunately, so many of us tiptoe around the periphery of that arena … never summoning up the courage to truly see what or who we are by betting on ourselves, and not someone who is offering a mere “job”.

Ask yourself … is there anyone on this planet you trust in more than you? If your answer to this is “yes”, then I say to you, “Go, now, and work for that person.”

But if you believe that you are the best steward of your own career and thus, future …. well.

So, I said to that high-school teacher, “Why not quote Bob Dylan to your student … “When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose” … tell him that there is no better time than right now to start taking charge of his own life.

Life is so short. Just a few minutes ago, I was that same high school student. I was trying to figure out exactly to whom I should entrust my future.

Today, I approach my 57^th birthday with two kids; an entrepreneurial career that was never for even a minute boring, slow, or predictable; and a very comfortable lifestyle that includes total “security” for those same two kids. (Well, assuming that I choose to provide them with such tenure --- and this jury is still out. WAY out!)

And all because I believed and trusted in me, and not some full-of-baloney recruiter who told me that he had MY best interests at heart.

‘Nuff said?

‘Nuff said.