SuperConference II

Today is our last day in Nashville at the SuperConference. Today, David is in a special session with Dan Kennedy and I have the whole day to myself. Well, sort of. Actually in just a few minutes I need to pack my things and get us checked out of the Gaylord Opryland hotel. This is truly an amazing place.... 3 gigantic hotels attached together with the convention center...and everything is all under one roof. All of the "outdoor" space is enclosed within an enormous glass roof. And all the landscaping is very tropical and extravagant. Restaurants have indoor and "outdoor" seating accommodations, and just about anyplace we go, we can be seated next to a waterfall. There is even an indoor river running through the place, offering gondola rides to guests. This must be what it's like to live in a biosphere.

Friday we got to hear from an amazing speaker named Nido Qubein. He's immigrated from Lebanon, and went to college in the United States not knowing a word of English. Today he is the president of High Point University in North Carolina. This man is an incredible motivational speaker. And all Freshman students at High Point are required to take his "President's Seminar" course about learning through experience. At the end of the course they are required to write a paper reflecting on what they have learned. He read a paper from one of the students. Her name was Kylie, and she wrote about what an extraordinary school High Point is. She wrote about being somewhat of a procrastinator, and the skills she learned to help her overcome that. She wrote about being inspired to become an extraordinary person. That was last fall. She went home over the holidays and was killed by a drunk driver at the end of 2007. Nido called the family right away to express his condolences and to offer all the resources of the university to be at their disposal. 40 of Kylie's friends flew to her hometown to attend services--all expenses paid by the university. Wow.

Nido's message to this room full of entrepreneurs was to operate your business for the purpose of achieving significance. He said that business people must be prudent about making money...in fact, this is the responsibility of all business people to make money. But it is very unfortunate if that is your only goal. Achieving significance is what it is all about.