Learning to Succeed

I recently went one on one with Adam Enbar, the CEO and co-founder of Flatiron School. Adam created Flatiron School as a response to his own experience with education, with the goal of providing students the tangible tech skills they needed to succeed. Flatiron School has a 93% employment rate and many graduates go on to premiere jobs at organizations including Google, Facebook and NASA.

Adam: Thanks again for taking the time to share your advice. First things first, though, I am sure readers would love to learn more about you. How did you get here? What experiences, failures, setbacks or challenges have been most instrumental to your growth?

Adam: My parents emigrated to the United States from Morocco and I didn’t learn English until I was 5 years old. We ended up living in a motel for a while. It wasn’t easy. But through everything, making sure I got an education was my parents’ first priority. When it came time for college, I took on enormous student loan debt -- and spent years sitting quietly in lecture halls being taught in the same ways I would have if this were hundreds of years ago. And you know what? I didn’t graduate feeling any more prepared for a life and career than I did going in. So, what gets me wound up, what keeps me going, is thinking about all the ways in which our education system isn’t working, and ideas to fix it. Because the irony, of course, is that “education” is our single best idea. Right now, though, we’re just doing it wrong.

Adam: What do you believe are the most important skills anyone should develop?

Adam: In terms of universally relevant hard skills, I’d say sales, no contest. If you’re great at selling you’ll always be employed. That might be true about other things like spreadsheets, etc… But the top of every ladder, in any function, at any company, requires a lot of selling. That could come in the form of recruiting, fundraising, motivating a team, etc… But there’s no escaping that.

Adam: What are your best tips for college students and recent graduates?

Adam: What you do when you graduate from college absolutely does not matter. The industry doesn’t matter. The company doesn’t matter. The role doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is that whatever you’re doing, you’re the best at it. Early in your career if you work hard and deliver results, in any capacity, you will be noticed. And doors will open. Don’t be in such a rush to find the perfect job or perfect career. Just spend a couple of years getting to a place where the people who do know you say “that person is an absolute star.” That will be worth more than anything else on your resume.

One good way to do that is to, what we say at Flatiron School, “find what to love.” We’re all told to go out and find our passion when we’re young. That’s terrible advice. Because it implies that it’s out there waiting to be found and we just need to find it to be happy. Nonsense. There is value and learning to be found anywhere. It’s on you to find what to love about what you’re doing. You can be passionate about anything if you’re curious and open minded. Don’t go looking for something that you happen to love. Focus on finding what to love about whatever’s in front of you.

Adam: What are your best tips for mid-career professionals?

Adam: Find something to be great at. Throughout high school, college, and even early in our careers, we’re taught to be “well rounded.” We try to focus on our weaknesses so we can round them out and be pretty good at a lot of things. At some point though, if you want to progress, you need to be great at one thing. The CMO should be great at marketing, not just good at a lot of things. Same with any other leadership role. Oftentimes, that path could feel backwards, for example moving from a generalist type of role in an organization to a more focused mandate. But having real ownership over something, no matter how small, is more valuable than being a cog in something big.

Adam: What are your best tips for people late in their careers interested in staying as relevant as possible in the workforce?

Adam: As technology becomes ubiquitous, the most valuable skills are the ones that can only be performed by humans. Those include things like management, communication, strategy, etc… The value in having experience is in your ability to recognize patterns and come to the right decision faster and more often than people who are just figuring things out. Obviously, it’s helpful to keep up with modern tools and trends. But your real value late in your career comes from the instincts and expertise you’ve developed from everything you’ve seen and done. Lean into that experience. Smart leaders will recognize and value it.

Adam: What do you believe the future of education entails?

Adam: That’s a giant question. But I think there are a few noncontroversial predictions I can make.

First, the idea of “learn for four years and work for the rest of your life” is dead. Our world moves too quickly for that. Learning and working are going to merge into each other as people progress in their careers. And the people who are most motivated to keep learning will be the ones that are most successful. Second, the value of a credential is disappearing fast. Sure, an elite degree will carry benefits for a long time, particularly in terms of signaling and a network. But for the most part, employers already don’t care if you went to college at all, much less where. So the focus will shift towards delivering real outcomes.

Adam: What are your best tips for entrepreneurs in the education space?

Adam: There are no silver bullets in education. Every year Silicon Valley spits out another company that’s going to be the “future of education” and inevitably they all fail to deliver. That’s because the most important thing in education is delivering great outcomes. And that’s really hard. It can’t be done (yet) with just technology or software or content. It requires a lot of hard work and a real understanding of whom you’re serving and how. Don’t get distracted by the headlines. Focus on delivering real value to students.

Adam: In your experience, what are the defining qualities of an effective leader? How can leaders and aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level?

Adam: The best leaders I know, and generally the smartest people I know, are incredibly good at asking questions. That fact says a lot about a person. It means they listen more than they talk, they engage with people, and they take time to really understand things (which is necessary in order to ask good questions). If you want to develop both your leadership skills, and your reputation among your peers as a leader, focus on listening and asking great questions.

Adam: What are your best tips for leaders and aspiring Leaders?

Adam: I think the single most important thing you can focus on is gratitude. And I do believe it’s a skill. Being able to express gratitude, even to oneself, is the single best way to stay positive, grounded, productive, and happy. It’s not always easy to have that perspective, but I’ve found that people whose attitude biases towards gratitude for what they have, rather than disappointment in what they don’t, are the most well-adjusted and satisfied.

Adam: What is your best advice on building, leading and managing teams?

Adam: My job is to clear a path in front of you, but it’s your job to execute. I have to give everyone what they require to perform. It’s not just about tools. It’s also space to think, try things out and lead. Your team will tell you a lot about what they need if you just pay attention. And everyone gets to make mistakes because it’s the best way to learn. To get to good ideas as a team, we have to decide together which are the bad ones.

Adam: What is the single best piece of advice you have ever received?

Adam: Focus. Doing one thing well as a company is very, very hard. Doing multiple things well is a guaranteed path to failure. It’s easy to look at companies like Google, Facebook and Amazon and see the giant range of things they’re involved in. But all of those companies got very big, and very profitable, by focusing on a single product. Do one thing and do it better than anyone else.