Jeff Smith and lessons on business, which he learned in prison

Jeff Smith had the opportunity to stay in prison for 1 year. And behind its walls he saw was not what I expected. Business savvy prisoners and their ingenuity struck him. And he thought, why not use this potential for the benefit and help the prisoners to contribute to society when they leave prison?

Jeff was released from prison with a whole mountain of new ideas for startups... perhaps a little strange (and sometimes very), but still.

For example, B.J. I spent $ 10,000 on a website where you can order the most expensive and luxurious women for sex in a car or on a luxury.

In its first week spent in federal prison, Jeff realized that everything is not arranged as shown on TV. He was in a team of ambitious men whose instincts in business in most cases been as sharp as some large companies CEO. 95% of people from the prison were dragdillerami or something similar, they had their own ideas about doing business and they told them to different jargons. And, believe me, is not taught in the first year of the MBA. You hardly ever hear a standard business schools.

Each of them are just trying to survive. In the US, the fact that you are in prison does not mean that you no longer pay for services or goods. You have to pay for soap, which are using in jail, for a toothbrush, toothpaste - for all! And it is difficult for two reasons. First, you pay for goods in jail for 30-50% more than in freedom. And, secondly, to earn money in prison - not an easy task. Jeff unloaded trucks, and that was his main job. For this he was paid $ 5.25, but not for an hour, and in the past month.

How to survive in such conditions? In prison, the prisoners manage to create something out of nothing. They make wigs scales. They can easily teach courses on release.

But in prison, you do not learn to make a business plan, there are no courses for rehabilitation, no one will tell them how to do legal business of what they like. They can not even find a normal job.

And the only really valuable lesson that can be learned from all this - do not waste your time in vain. When you lose a whole year and you see how people manage to somehow survive in these conditions, you realize that all barriers that previously seemed impossible to you, does not actually interfere with doing what you like and I want to. And that virtually any business can benefit from. Simply, we begin to see the subtle paths of survival only when we really strongly prizhmut.