Thought Leadership and the Creative Hustle | Sam Seidel & Olatunde Sobomehin | 452

Many professionals end up in a career that might not represent their passion or the bigger purpose they might want out of life. So what do you do then? To explore how to discover your purpose and find the ambition to go from idea to reality, I've invited Sam Seidel and Olatunde Sobomehin to share their thoughts with us. Sam Seidel is the Director of Strategy and Research at the Stanford d.school and author of Hip Hop Genius: Remixing High School Education, which introduces an iteration of hip-hop education that goes far beyond studying music as classroom content. Olatunde Sobomehin is the CEO and Co-Founder of StreetCode Academy, a nonprofit that helps bridge the digital divide, empowering communities of color to achieve their full potential by teaching the mindset, skills, and strategies they need to embrace tech and innovation. Earlier this year, Sam and Olatunde co-authored Creative Hustle: Blaze Your Own Path and Make Work That Matters. We begin our conversation discussing their book, which began as a course taught by Sam and Olatunde at the d.school. In the course, they taught about ways to identify and navigate your creative path, and how to make a living doing things that matter. It wasn't until co-workers approached them and presented the idea of turning the course into a book that they realized the direction had greater potential. Sam and Olatunde explain how the words "Creative Hustle" are perfect for their endeavor; a combination of imagination and ambition. They want to share insights about finding new creative paths that inspire, building diverse viewpoints, and creating ventures that benefit yourself and your community, while bringing enough entrepreneurial energy to move those ideas forward. In addition, we discuss the journey of co-authoring the book, which is often a tumultuous road. Sam shares how the experience of having a co-author is preferred to writing solo and how the experience bought him so much closer to Olatunde. Three Key Takeaways: * When authoring a book, you should also be considering the business models that can be used once it is published to avoid chasing the hype. * Working with a co-author allows you to push each other to be better and make sure your ideas are concrete. * During the process of writing a book, take some time to enjoy the process.