The Voluntary Life

Latest Episodes:

99 Taking Risks With Money And Business Mar 09, 2013

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This episode discusses the question of risk in investment, speculation and entrepreneurship. When is it a good idea to take risk and when isn't it? I share my own personal opinion. Podcast Episode

98 Entrepreneurship Part 15: Scaling Your Business Feb 25, 2013

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An episode on how to scale and optimise your business to make more profit and enhance your competitive advantage. The issues covered include:

Standardisation: making one version of what you do
Proceduralisation: making one version of how you do it
Optimisation: speeding up and automating your procedures
Knowledge Capture: maintaining and growing your operation within the context of staff coming and going
Optimising at the level of the whole business: only doing the things that it makes sense to do

97 Entrepreneurship Part 14: Employing People Feb 18, 2013

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This episode is about employing people as an entrepreneur. Topics covered include:

The destructive legacy of the reward and punishment paradigm from school
Why pay isn't as important as you think
The importance purpose, mastery and autonomy in motivation
The problem with relying on interviews for hiring and alternative ways of finding great people
The value of freelancers or independent contractors
What employing people teaches you about taking responsibility for your side of a relationship and how it deepens your respect for individuality

Show Notes:

Dan Pink Talk on Motivation
Discipline Without Punishment by Dick Grote
Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type by Isabel Briggs Myers

96 Entrepreneurship Part 13: IP Is Bad For Business Feb 11, 2013

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An episode about the problems with Intellectual Property, from the perspective of an entrepreneur. I started off thinking that IP is an integral and necessary part of entrepreneurship. I thought that it would be very important for my business. I have now come to see IP law as something that:

prevents innovation,
is immoral,
promotes conflict,
diverts resources to unproductive uses
and is ultimately unnecessary for making money from ideas.

Show Notes:

Against Intellectual Monopoly by Boldrin and Levine
Article about the Shopping Cart case
Against Intellectual Property by Kinsella

95 Judd Weiss on Business Relationships Part 2 Feb 04, 2013

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Part 2 of an interview with entrepreneur Judd Weiss, talking about business relationships. In this episode Judd talks about:

The pitfalls of employing people
The benefits of partnering or affiliate relationships
How to create awesome relationships with clients

94 Judd Weiss On Business Relationships Part 1 Feb 03, 2013

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Part 1 of an interview with entrepreneur Judd Weiss, talking about business relationships. In this episode Judd shares his thoughts and experiences about how to approach working relationships in general and the question of going into business with others.

Should friends go into business together?
What makes a good business partnership?
Why do so many business partnerships go so badly wrong?

Find out in this episode.

93 About The Voluntary Life Part 2: Empowerment Jan 23, 2013

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Part 2 in the short series of podcasts about The Voluntary Life. This episode is all about the podcast itself.

The podcast comes out once per week and is a mix of solo-casts and interviews. Some topics are covered in more detail as a series, like the entrepreneurship series.
The aim of the podcast is personal freedom empowerment: providing ideas for finding the maximum freedom in your own life, within an unfree world.
The podcast always takes a constructive approach: the angle on any topic is- what can you do to maximise your freedom in this area of life?
All the topics are about things that are actionable and personally relevant at an individual level.
The podcast aims to explore the approach of living a free and voluntary life across all aspects of life (work, personal relationships, finances etc).
We showcase examples of voluntary living through interviews with people who have maximised their freedom in a particular aspects of life.

92 About The Voluntary Life Part 1: More Free Is More Alive Jan 18, 2013

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The first in a series of podcasts introducing The Voluntary Life, both as a concept and as a podcast. This episode explains the concept of living a 'voluntary life', which is a life lived according to the principle of free choice. The extent to which we have the freedom to make our own choices about our lives (and to respect the free choices of others) is the extent to which we are leading the voluntary life. This concept applies across aspects of life, as diverse as freedom at work, financial freedom, freedom in personal relationships and psychological freedom. The following principles underpin the concept of living a voluntary life:

Voluntary living is the highest expression of individuation possible. The deepest experience of being alive comes from our ability to express our personality and individuality in our free choices. The more free you are, the more alive you are.
Voluntary living is the only truly moral way to live. A voluntary life is one lived in accordance with the Non-Agression Principle, which is the fundamental moral framework from which all valid morality is derived.
Voluntary interaction is responsible for all the greatest achievements of humanity. Peaceful co-operation of individuals through trade and entrepreneurship has given us all the enlightenment, technological progress, economic development and civilisation (in the best sense of the word) that we now enjoy.
The voluntary life must start from the individual and his or her own choices. You have to be the change you want to see in the world. This is why the show is called "the voluntary life" and not "the voluntary society".

91 Entrepreneurship Part 12: JFDI Jan 10, 2013

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A podcast about how to overcome indecision, paralysis and procrastination about entrepreneurship and JFDI (Just F-ing Do It). There are some objective hinderances to creating and running a business, especially if you have other major commitments in your life that you need to focus on first. However, often the battle is really an internal psychological one. How do you get into the mindset of being able to JFDI? This episode contains some suggestions about giving yourself permission: