The Hippie CEO Club.

"The delicate balance of mentoring someone is not creating them in your own image but giving them the opportunity to create themselves."

~ Steven Spielberg

In January of 2023, on a complete whim, i created this concept i called The Hippie CEO Club.

The idea was to create an open invitation, for anyone to book a 30 minute mentoring call with me, to talk about anything they wanted to talk about. i created one 30-minute slot every Friday. No charge. No expectations. Just kind of a way for me to “give back” if you will.

i didn’t know if it would generate much interest but before i knew it, i was booked every Friday through the end of July.

My Friday mentoring calls were amazing and i really looked forward to meeting someone new, learning something new, and hopefully offering a bit of value, every Friday.

All of the calls were incredibly unique and amazing. The topics we covered ranged from analytics to entrepreneurship to career growth to finding purpose both professionally and personally.

While some of my experiences proved incredibly valuable to the people i have chatted with, what i discovered is that our time together was really a journey of self-discovery for the people i met with.

i found myself simply being an active listener, observing these amazing people uncover insights, potential, and purpose that has always been there but perhaps just ever so slightly out of view.

The sessions were incredibly valuable for me as well. There was not a single call that didn’t result in me learning something new, that i haden’t gained some inspiration from.

i’m truly blessed to have had this amazing opportunity.

After each call, i would send the person i met with a hand-written thank you note and limited edition t-shirt, designed by my very good friend and artist, Shai Dahan.

People would say, “Wait, you are giving me your time and now want to send me a t-shirt? WHY?!?

My response, “Why not?”

i also had one participant publish a post about our experience together and in which he mentioned, “So he gave me his time for free, seriously, nothing attached, no sales pitch, he just wanted to help and then, get this, he sent ME a thank you note for having the call with him. WHAT?!?”

And while i’m no longer doing the “Hippie CEO Club” thing, i am still offering my time, for free, every Friday, as part of my Open Office hours initiative.

Through this experiment, and my on-going open office hours, i hope i have helped inspire others to perhaps do something similar. Maybe not the same format but some unique way to give back, to inspire.