Know-How Exchange : Student Questions

Look around your neighborhood for opportunities to provide a service ... cleaning something, delivering something, fixing something. There are always dozens of needs of consumers and businesses that are going unfulfilled. Fulfill a need, start a business and be a President now. You can run a business and still go to college, many before you have done it.

Just one option to think about. Good luck.

well ... my father taught at Cambridge and if Turl street says anything to you ... and I became a housewife.

So what?

Life's not about being a VP or a president. Life's about being you and facing the challenges you face. My father was a professor; my husband was a carpenter - and I know who got more out of life and who was happier. And yes, he did want me back.

Tough.

The point I want to make extends on what Steve is saying - you are a president already. Of you. Become your own corporation, that is to say, forget the pressures of driving a multi-national. Think carefully: what do you want out of your life. Make success something that is tangible and real, make it attainable in five years' time. You'll be surprised what you can do.

A little tale. Two American tourists meet a guy on the beach on the island of Zanzibar. He's sitting there on his beached boat, enjoying a beer and the sunshine and the sea. That's not hard in Zanzibar. In fact, it's pretty easy. Now the Americans ask him why he doesn't employ some people and they can do all the work for him. He'd be rich, famous even. He looks up at them. "Why would I want to go to all that trouble just to have what I have right now?"

Put happiness and satisfaction before everything else. I've just been around Saxony in the old DDR, and the place is so pretty you'd be pushed to find prettier. There's a view of the ancient cathedral from the back windows, just as there was from my home in Utrecht. The neighborhood is nice, the people friendly. Houses are piled as if on top of one another in small winding streets. There are churches, shops and trams.

Would you like a home in an old house that's stuffed with character and history in a town nobody has ever heard of - or reside in a featureless condo on the 150th floor on Fifth Avenue?

More to the point: there are lots of pretty houses that you'd love to live in - and only so many on Fifth Avenue. Plus you'd have the time to live.

It's up to you.

Find a mentor inside of Halliburton to advise you of what they're looking for, what life is like inside the company, and their future plans. Try to get an internship position with them - now if possible, to see things with your own eyes.

There are many routes you can take. The PhD in Engineering likely isn't the route that most likely will get you to a VP or CEO position, but it could work. My gut says that you would want a business education at some point. Perhaps a BS in engineering (some sort of engineering that goes toward what Halliburton would look for, so maybe PetroChem engineering) and then get an MBA. Maybe an MS in Engineering and then the MBA.

Also, do what you can to meet and talk to people at Halliburton. if possible, see if you can work your way in to an internship there.

This all said, it may be worth re-reading Moriarty's post. You do have strong set of goals, which is unusual for someone so young. Most high schoolers haven't a clue what they want. So in some ways that is good. But, as Moriarty says, money and power isn't necessarily everything.