What Starting a School Taught Clark Howard About Success

If what starting school taught is on your radar, this short guide cuts through the noise. Here is what is worth knowing, and how to put it to work today.

Key Takeaways

• When I was young, I was not a great student.
• School was hard for me.
• Today, looking back at how I handled that challenge, the solution seems obvious.

When I was young, I was not a excellent student. School was hard for me.

Today, looking back at how I handled that challenge, the solution seems obvious. You change your approach and do things differently. But nearly 50 years ago, when I decided to found a school, that kind of thinking was not the norm.

I came up with an idea for a school that I named Career Action.

The Career Action Boot Camp

Back then, I saw a lot of young people who hadn’t done well in high school. Maybe they didn’t graduate, or maybe they did get a diploma but didn’t actually learn a whole lot. They were stuck in their 20s, kind of lost and trying to figure out what to do next. College just wasn’t in the cards for them.

So, I decided to build a program specifically for them. I basically founded a career boot camp with extremely strict rules. The school schedule was for only three months, but with long, intense nine-hour days. We started with the basics — English and math.

From there, we taught specific skills that could help someone land a decent-paying job in corporate America.

Can you imagine what we taught almost 50 years ago? Typing was a core part of the curriculum. We also taught students how to operate a 10-key machine — a piece of equipment most people haven’t heard of or seen in 30 years. We taught check encoding and manual bookkeeping because computers weren’t a part of the daily workflow yet.

Because we ran the school like a strict boot camp, we lost a lot of people along the way who couldn’t hack my rules regarding timeliness, attendance, and attitude. But for those who stayed, we taught them how to interview and how to dress for success.

The formula worked. The school was highly successful for decades. It ultimately ceased to exist after about 25 years, and though I wasn’t involved for the last 20 years of its run — I just set it up and launched it — it left a lasting impression on me.

The Danger of “Static Analysis”

The most interesting thing about this story isn’t that I started a school. What’s fascinating is that the school began two generations ago, and every single skill we taught became completely irrelevant within a single generation.

That is what I want you to think about today.

In economics and in life, there is a concept known as static analysis. This is the trap of thinking, “Well, that’s how things were, that’s how they are, and that’s how they’re always going to be.”

If you fall into the trap of static analysis, you will get left behind.

My take: Change is inevitable. To protect your wallet and your career, you must be willing to adapt.

How to Protect Your Career for the Future

Developing good habits is essential, and one of the absolute best habits you can build is remaining completely open to change — both in your career and in how you handle your money.

Consider this: A huge percentage of the jobs that students in high school, trade school, community college, or universities are preparing for today will not even exist in a generation.

If you want to maintain job security and financial independence, you have to do two things:

• Be a lifelong learner: Never assume your education ends when you get a diploma or a certification. Keep updating your toolkit.
• Adapt to the marketplace: Pay attention to where your industry is moving and pivot before your current skills become obsolete.

The world is going to keep changing. Your job isn’t to stop it — your job is to make sure you’re ready to change right along with it.

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Final Thoughts

The bottom line: a little research on what starting school taught goes a long way. Compare your options, watch for seasonal offers, and never pay full price when a better deal is one click away.

Originally published at clark.com.