Schoolchildren in Business

If we educate the children to hold jobs, and there are no jobs, we have failed. Our education mission must include how to create jobs.

Rationale

It is traditional for high school students to have after-school jobs, and for all schoolchildren in farm families to have chores that contribute to family production. What should we do for countries that have no burgers to flip, nor anything else outside the home? How can we break the cycle of sub-subsistence agriculture? How can we keep children in school, and not slaving all day for pennies an hour?

How about teaching students around the world to go into business together, and tap into markets that have lots more money? *What do they need to know?

• Whom do they need to make contact with?
• How do they get financed?

We need materials for every age, starting with the Lemonade Stand game for first-graders, but particularly including handbooks for high-schoolers and the adults assisting them.

Team Building

People skills

• Personal connections
• Truth
• Commitment
• Accountability
• Focus

=Hiring and Contracting

What is the question?

The most difficult aspect of human communication is being able to tell that a misunderstanding has occurred, and determining how to rectify it. This is fundamental to any human enterprise, but business has its own particular versions of the problem. Cross-cultural misunderstanding is rife. Legal and financial misunderstanding can be disastrous. Lying, crime, and corrupt practices make these problems even harder.

The Society of Friends, better known as the Quakers, revolutionized the British economy in the 17th century by refusing to lie, cheat, or steal, and by working out how to detect and correct misunderstandings. In order to appear similarly trustworthy, the business community took to wearing Quaker gray, and still does, even without knowing why.

Trade Law

• Local
• International

Intellectual Property

• Copyright
• Patent
• Trade Secrets
• Trademarks

Marketing

• International branding

Logistics

• Packaging
• Storage
• Transportation
• Delivery

Technology

• Agriculture
• ICT
• Transportation
• Refrigeration
• Manufacturing
• Energy
• Environment

Finance

• Microfinance
• Savings
• Conventional business finance
• Cooperatives

Politics

• Misguided economic policies
• Perverse incentives
• Corruption
• Crime