Hi - this is Jane White from the UK. I have just completed the April Teacher-Entrepreneur Challenge with James Liu. I joined as a Process Learner, i.e. someone wanting to learn the Process James teaches in the Teacher-Entrepreneur Challenge, as I did not come with a niche already defined as many did. Most of my working life has been in the commercial Business field, although a while ago I obtained a CELTA certificate. However, I entered the Challenge with very little actual teaching experience – knowing only that I wanted to teach adults, not children, but having found that that there was an abundance of opportunities to teach kids, but not that many to teach adults.
This course was indeed, for me, a Challenge! It requires you to watch a video from James, and also action certain tasks every day. No weekends off, I mean EVERY day! James pushes you to take on and absorb new information, and take yourself outside your comfort zone. However, once I got over the shock to my system I determined to keep up! The Challenge content is well-designed and laid out and James’ teaching is clear and precise. If you have questions – which you will have, James welcomes these – his mantra – “there is no such thing as a stupid question”! It is not a marketing or sales course, it is a course on how to build your business foundation i.e. a teaching business, and followed by guidance and precise instructions on how to use Linkedin and Facebook to test the market, and then market and sell to your chosen niche. If you do not start with a chosen niche, then James provides 2 clear examples to use, so that even as a Process Learner you can follow through the course, and gain experience as well as knowledge in the different processes James teaches.
I completed the April Challenge having learnt a lot of new stuff! It showed me how to define my niche, where my passion and skills actually lay, how I needed to change my mindset in order to make progress, and a blueprint from someone who had the business experience and my success at heart as to how go about building the online teaching business I knew I had wanted for a long time, but previously had no clue as to where to start or how to progress.
One word here – For me, anyway, it was good to know that the process of following the Challenge through, and then building my business on James’ instructions, is not a sprint, it is a Marathon! Yes, you need to keep up on the daily tasks and information required during the Challenge, and maintain the momentum after it is finished, but the actual process of setting up and building your business is not going to be achieved overnight, either during or after the Challenge. That is fine by me – now I know much more clearly where I am going, and have an understanding of the process I need to follow to get there, with James as a mentor, I now believe my goal is achievable!
