EP 187 Harvard vs $100K

Yo, what's up people? I am your host Jay Will. This is Inspire Guys people where we balance faith and business to guide you to your purpose. Today is episode 187, Harvard versus 100k.

So some people like to argue, I like to think, you know what I'm saying? I like to think about my life experiences and I think this time of the year at the end of the year is the perfect time to reflect. I think about what would you do differently in life? You know, what are some things that you've done Will?

And if you could go back in time, what would you do? What decision would you make? I'll tell you this. One of my favorite movies of all time, don't judge me, back to the future.

I love back to the future just because of the idea of like, if you go back, if you change one thing, everything changes, you got to deal with all these layers and things. And I guess in life we deal with so many regrets. And sometimes we think in that like, yo, if I could just do this over, you know, but sometimes that's not the best thing because you wouldn't learn a lesson you would learn. So I pose this hypothetical question on social media today asking people if they could go back to their 18 year old self and, you know, have this person choose between $100,000 and a full rise scholarship to Harvard, what would they do?

And today we're going to dive into what people say on social media. I'm going to unpack all my thoughts and the details. We're going to talk about the terms that are involved, like, you know, is the money taxed or not taxed? Does the scholarship include room and board or not?

And then I'm going to give my answer after I go through a whole bunch of information unpacking this with the entire goal being like wanting people to think about, you know, critically think about these things like, I know a lot of people might have just had an answer off the top of, you know, they're mine and just shooting from the hip. But I'm always trying to think and challenge myself. Like, why do you think like that? Why do you believe that?

And I think I'm going to be able to share some things with y'all about my experiences in corporate America working for a fortune 50, organization for 16 years now, some of the pros and cons and things I've learned. Also being a college graduate and how I feel about having a degree versus not having a degree. So we're going to jump into the intro and then when we come back, then I'm going to kick it with you and we're going to answer this question. We're going to think about it.

You know, it ain't about right or wrong. It's just about how you think about it and being critical in your thinking and not just shooting from the hip. But would you take $100,000 or Harvard scholarship? We'd like to find out in one second, man.

Let's see what y'all say. So the promise did not inspire. Be inspired. I can see beyond the tears you cry.

I saw every hill you had to climb just a minute here. When you say you ain't afraid to die. It's a fucking fear. All right, y'all.

We are back and we are about to dig into this topic. Harvard versus $100,000. No, I'm going to tell you this. I asked the question on Facebook and most people, so my surprise to be real, most people said that they would choose the $100,000.

You know, it's not like I had a crazy amount of comments, but it had enough. And I was actually surprised at how many people was just like, like, easily like that. Like, basically, people like it's not even close. They'll take the $100,000.

So I'm like, you know, let's take this to the podcast. And let's really like, like, y'all kind of took me back a little bit. So I'm like, I need to really think about this and talk to this. So first things first, let's deal with the terms, you know what I'm saying?

Because we even talk about that. And I'm like, you know, people did ask some questions, you know, shout out to the ladies that asked questions because they had to be thorough. But so first of all, here are the terms. It is the you today, right?

Like I said, my favorite movie, one of my favorite movies is Back to the Future. So the idea is, is the version of you today, you know, making this choice for the 18 year old version of you. That means you know everything you know now. So that's the first thing.

That's the first part of the terms is that this is not your 18 year old self or what do you think you would have did when you were 18 years old. It is what would you, what decision would you make today for the 18 year old version of yourself? Like, how would you advise yourself, you know, in this situation? So that's the first thing.

It's you today knowing everything you know now and making the decision for the 18 year old version of yourself. The hundred thousand dollars is tax free, you know what I'm saying? So, you know, you're talking about getting $100,000 cash, you know, wire transferred to your bank today at 18 years old and trying to think through what you would do with that and how you would invest it or spend it or, you know, so on and so forth. And then on the other side of that, it is the Harvard education, which is a full scholarship to Harvard University, including room board meal plan books with her.

I don't even know what's all included in board. What's room and board? What's what's board? Somebody help me out.

Alright, so that's the terms, right? The terms are full right scholarship to Harvard versus $100,000. Not like I said, most people on my Facebook page flat out said they're going to take $100,000. Alright, I want to start thinking through this.

The first thing I want to realize is, I want you to realize is, again, a lot of this stuff, it's not like I did heavy crazy research, nothing you can't do yourself. Just looking at Google, looking at various sources, trying to kind of see what was the most common thing. So just take these numbers as a grain of salt. But it looks like Harvard is about $52,000 a semester without room and board.

Room and board makes it close to $75,000. I think it was like $74,000. So when you look at that, you know, that Harvard education, I'm sorry, a year. I think that was a year.

We're saying a year, $75,000 a year. That takes you to about $300,000 over the life of the scholarship. Now again, that's just the estimate. So that's the very first thing I want you to really think about as you answer in this question is, alright, you got $100,000 cash, but you are getting something that right off the top is valued at $300,000.

So the Harvard scholarship costs three times as much as the $100,000 can provide. And alright, you're 18 years old. So some of the things that I really want to think about is before I jump into that, let me share. I want to share a couple of things about what I learned, you know, kind of in corporate America, you know what I mean?

So for those who don't know me, if you haven't rock with this show in the past or wherever you might be listening to that on a replay, I have worked at a Fortune 50 organization for 16 years now. I graduated from college with a business marketing degree from Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, and Oakland is a pretty good academic school. So super proud of that and started my corporate career three days before I officially finished my final class. So I actually walked in May of 2006 and I had one more class that I finished in August of 2006.

And I got the job at this Fortune 50 organization three days before my final class was finished. So that was a real important thing for me. And so I started entry level. That's the other thing to know.

I mean, when I say entry level, I'm talking bottom of the barrel entry level. Nothing wrong with that, but I'm just trying to give you an idea of like my experience. I'm also from the inner city in Detroit, Eastside kind of, you know, came into corporate America, a little rough around the edges. I don't come from money or anything like that.

Great family, you know what I mean? But no one in my family had worked in corporate America prior to me, as far as my media family, no one had really gone on this journey that I had gone on. I had to kind of go on it blind. So for me, what corporate America taught me about networking is really the value of networking.

And when you start trying to grow your career as I have over the past 16 years, I've been blessed enough to do eight roles. I think I'm on my eighth row in 16 years. So on average, that sounds pretty good. Like, oh, so I've done on average, you know, a new role every two years.

But that wasn't the case. When I came out in corporate America, I was in my first row only like three to four months because they had created a new role and I jumped into that. But I was in those next two roles that I did was over the course of like six years, I think I had went from 2007 to 11 and one row, 11 to 15 in another row. I mean, it's like almost eight years.

So when you really look at those first eight years of my career, I had done about three jobs. And it was, I was really just in there by myself. Like, I ain't nobody. I didn't know how to get promoted.

I didn't have any mentors. Anyone kind of got me along the way. And I would always see people getting promoted, see people who were buddy buddy with managers and things like that. And, you know, I didn't know the first thing about how to develop and feel those relationships.

Now, you know, y'all could judge me if y'all want some maybe somebody out there like, oh, you should have known that ain't nothing, whatever. But you talking about a young kid in his early 20s, you know, coming from the inner city, coming from, you know, the most segregated city in America, at least one of them, probably the most at the time. I know it's one of the top five most segregated cities in America at one point in the past few years, Detroit was 88% black. So if you kind of take that fact that I had only spent my entire life really around black people before I got to corporate America.

Now, college, that really leads me to my second point that I want to talk about. So corporate America taught me about the value of networking and seeing people and understanding that you is really not who you know. It is what I mean, it's not what you know, it really is who you know. And the higher up you go in really, you know, any area of life and business, you start realizing that firsthand that there are people who are not as good, but they have strong connections and they can go much further than people who are super talented and don't have a sponsor, a mentor, a supporter, or anything, anyone kind of in their corner in those rooms that are making decisions and speaking on behalf of that person.

Now, for me, if you like me, again, maybe a lot of people might know way more than I did and might be way more experienced. But for me coming out of the hood, it was like, I didn't know about that stuff. I really did not just thought, all right, I'll go work hard. And when I work hard, then I'll get promoted or I get opportunities and you really realize that the fact of the matter is that's not the case.

So what's the point I'm making the first point that I'm making is that just having spent 16 years at a fortune 50 organization when I'm going back and making this decision for my 18 year old self is coming from the mindset. The first thing that I'm checking is I'm like, yo, Jermaine, there's a lot of value in a network like a network is like really what drives the people network. I didn't make that up. I know that's like a cliche that people say, but it is when you see it in action, the biggest thing I could say to you is like, when you are in these rooms or you seeing people get, you know, life changing jobs with life changing salaries.

And I'm not saying people get those simply just because they know people. They are qualified, but you start realizing that if you like at a certain level, everybody's qualified. So that's one of the one things you realize is like, hey, you know, when you're going after an entry level job, you're like, hey, I have a college degree and that's like a real big deal. If you're going after an executive job, everybody has a degree now people have multiple degrees.

You know, so it becomes more challenging at that point, but it's the network, right? We all are meeting the qualifications at a certain point. It's the network. A lot of times that is the difference between success and, you know, really being maybe average, you know, just to be honest, it's very easy to get stuck being average in life in regardless of what area in life you in is very easy to be stuck being average.

So let me go into the next part. That really leads me to my greatest regret in college. So it wasn't until I went in corporate America and has spent some years in corporate America before I realized what my greatest regret in college was because like I told you, I came from Detroit, super segregated city. I mean, it was like two or three white people that went to school with me and they acted black to me.

So it was like, we really viewed them like we didn't view them and I don't mean it's like, you know, the world so sensitive today like this. I don't know if this is offensive or not, but it's like when you have just think Eminem, there you go. So I went to school with two or three M&Ms and when, you know, Eminem, y'all might view him like I'm sure, you know, a lot of people culturally view him. It's like he's white and all that.

But like, I mean, from Detroit, Eminem is, you know, he's just, it's different. That's all I can say to you. So because culturally what you're being exposed to, you know, white people who grew up in the hood around me were culturally the same. They weren't culturally different.

So it ain't even about the color of your skin. It's just like from a lifestyle perspective and culturally I can relate cool. Well, my biggest regret in college, you know, looking back at college was that I didn't develop a network. Now that's not to say like I got friends and people that I'm cool with today.

And there are some people that I've been able to do some cool things with and music and I value those friendships and stuff. So I don't, I'm not throwing shade at the people that I'm still connected to. But what I did overlook was like when I was in the college of business, that was really one of the like Oakland was in a black school was my point. So in college, I was around whites and other cultures.

I don't want to start naming ethnicities or whatever. But I was around all types of people. But because I came from a segregated city, like we were segregated like in college, the black people hung with the black people, the white people hung with the white people. Now I'm not saying like, you know, I knew a couple, I had a, you know, I knew a couple white people mostly through like basketball team type stuff, just being around my friends.

It was on the basketball team, not me, but like I wasn't kicking it with them. I wasn't networking and building relationships on a personal level. And when I look back at school, there are different people, you know, I mean, include myself, right? I've been blessed to go on and do some good things in life and at least have some small form of success, if you will.

But like there are people who have gone on to do things that I'm like, oh, I knew that person like we could have kicked it. We could have, I could have brought value to them. Maybe they could have brought value to me, even if it's just as I'm going through these experiences through corporate American business and learning how to have some success and kind of going from poverty transitioning into success. There are people that I could have stayed closer to and we could have conversations and we could have, you know, iron sharp and zion, right?

I didn't take advantage of that network when I was in school. So that's actually one of my absolute number one regrets in college is that I did not network properly. You know, again, I had people that were my friends, but that wasn't even those people who are my friends. We didn't build relationships based on what our majors were, what our dreams were, what our goals were.

So even today we might have friendships, but we never did business together. We aren't picking up the phone to call each other for with opportunities or, you know, helping each other in those ways. And so for me, that was a huge regret. And the reason I'm laying this out this way is because I think the first thing you have to ask yourself before you make this decision for your 18-year-old self.

And maybe you are 18 or 20 and maybe you're real close to it. So it's maybe it's easier for you to say what you would do. But for those who have any, you know, have a little more life experience, the first thing you got to really step back and think about is what is this decision? What are you really deciding?

Because the first thing for me that I really thought was the Harvard decision is all about the network for me. Because there's two different ways you can look at this Harvard experience. You can look at the route of I'm just going to go to Harvard and I'm going to get a degree and work a job, right? That's one way to make the decision and say, is that more valuable than $100,000 to me?

Or you might ask yourself, well, what if it's about me going and being in the Harvard environment? Like, and we can't like, we cannot underestimate the environment, the potential network of Harvard. I want you to think, I got it. Let me see.

I'll write some stuff down because I'm like, yo, like, when you talk about the Harvard, before you make this decision of, would you take $100,000 or would you take a full ride to Harvard? Now, I've already told you that it cost about $300,000 for a four-year degree of Harvard, including Roman Board. So we're giving you a $300,000 education at one of the most prestigious universities in America, in the world. But on top of that, it's the environment.

So again, I'm going to talk about me. And this ain't no knock or no shade at the people and the environments that I grew up in on no level, right? We just talking business, success, and we being real. For me coming from Detroit, you know, that young, I had never really been around.

Okay, let me not exaggerate this, right? There are times in my life my parents had me in certain environments outside of where we lived, right? And I got to be around some successful people. I got to see success in different ways.

So this ain't a knock on that. But I'm saying this is on steroids when you say that it's a difference between seeing success and being close to it and having access to it. Like, it's a whole different thought or situation. When you close to something where you have access, I'm going to give you an idea.

So I'm going to go on to Pistons games. I remember one Pistons game where my boy, Kale, came in town, one of the plays basketball professionally in the Philippines. There was some coach or something here from the Philippines that knew some Pistons people. And Kale had us, we weren't in the locker room.

We were down there right outside the locker room. So we were right outside the players locker room as they were going in and out. What's my point? I was close to the players.

I remember Brendan Haywood came out the locker room. Brendan is like seven, too. That was probably the first time I've been around somebody that's legitimate and it's tall as a tree. And I was just like, yo, he's so tall, it's funny.

It don't seem real. And my point was I was close to Brendan, but I only have access to Brendan. I couldn't pick up a phone and call him. We weren't chilling at the dorm eating pizza.

You know, you've been close to celebrities. You ever seen somebody and asked them, could you take a picture? You were close to them. Being close to something and having access to something is a completely different situation.

And so for me, when I think about the Harvard experience, one of the things that I'm thinking about is not just the $300,000 education and the fact that I'm going to be able to have a degree on my wallet and say Harvard, I'm going to be able to have on my resume Harvard. We know that there is value in that. If I told y'all right now that I had a business degree from Harvard, most of y'all would instantly think I was smarter. Like, regardless of like instantly, it would instantly have some level of value or present some level of credibility to people.

If I told if I walked around saying I had a business degree from Harvard. Now, you can say it's right. You can say it's wrong. I just say it's real.

At the end of the day, there is value in a Harvard degree. Alright, so let's keep let me tell you this. So this is just some of the facts about people who have graduated from Harvard. Now, of course, this is over probably a hundred years or different times in life in the early 1900s, late 2000s, whatever.

So the time and it's not what I'm that day when I'm focused on. I'm just trying to give you an idea of the type of people that will be your classmates. Again, if you somebody like, you know, like me, I got classmates that, you know, unfortunately, were in the streets. They didn't make it.

They didn't, they not alive anymore. I knew, I knew gangbangers. I knew drug dealers. Like, like some people ain't ever been close to that.

Some people have never had access to somebody who was, you know, living a wildlife and maybe living a life that you could write a movie script about. Right. And people, there are literally people who I grew up with who were my friends who were not here no more because they were in the streets. I had access to that.

That was the type of access I had more normally people who were living, check the check, who were, you know, employees, not employers, like those type of things, right? And no knock against nobody. I'm just being real about, you know, what we have access to in kind of the world we live. Let's go to the comments real quick.

CBS TV media, what up the name Harvard alone can open a lot of doors just to say I've been there, but the money has this park. Hmm, which one? Yeah, that's and that is what we were thinking through right now. Exactly.

The money definitely have its perks and we're going to get to that. Let me name just a few of the people who have been Harvard graduates and I'm not going to name names necessarily, but I want you to know there's been eight US presidents, most recently George W. Bush in Barack Obama, Harvard graduates, eight presidents. What does this mean?

This means that your best friend, your dorm mate, the person that you are, you know, at lunch with or what in the cafe or whooping with like as you're building these relationships, you could literally be building a relationship with the next president. All right, cool. On top of that, 150 Nobel Prize winners. One 50.

150 Nobel Prize winners is the Pulitzer Prize different. I couldn't tell when I was like searching, but they're looking like about almost 100 of those 5200 Pulitzer Prize winners. Then I'm going to name just some of the companies who have at some point in the last, you know, since the 1900s had a CEO that was a college graduate. And I want you to just really stop and think about this because, no, let me just name them first, some of the companies.

Goldman Sachs, AMC theaters, Boeing, the jet company, I don't know why that name itself funny to me like Boeing anyway, I know that's weird, but Microsoft, Steve bomber, crap, heins, you know, you like catch up, Viacom, Universal Pictures, the Airbnb co-founder. Imagine you are in class with the co-founder of Airbnb and he kicking it with you about this idea that he's going to have this revolution. These are the kind of people you can be building relationships with and presenting an opportunity to either a go in business with them or B because they know you and they have relationship and you are also credible, right? A lot of this isn't, I don't want you to think networking is about taking advantage of people.

Networking is also about understanding the value you can bring. So you have to be a credible person when you think about wanting to network with somebody. A lot of times we think networking is just knowing somebody with a major name or what success. And you got to look at it from their point of view.

If you can't bring them any value, why would they want to network with you? But maybe this co-founder of Airbnb also knows that you are a dynamic salesperson where you have these attributes and you're on your way to success as well. Success as well. Maybe they co-found Airbnb.

It gets to a certain level you've kept in touch. You got a phone number. Hey, I would love to come and lead your North American division. And then now you have direct access and relationship and credibility and trust that you've already built and other people who are going on to be successful.

Now, that's not it. Let's keep it going. American Express had a CEO at some point that was Harvard Graduate, American Airlines, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, Chase, Ford Motor Company, Levi's, GE, McDonald's, Sony Pictures, Starbucks. Those are companies who have at some point in time their CEO has been a Harvard graduate.

So I want you to stop and think about something. We got $100,000 on the table that you're trying to decide. Do I take this $100,000 or do I take this $300,000 Harvard experience this full scholarship? Go get educated at one of the most prestigious colleges in the US for four years.

And also over those four years, because remember I said, this is the you today making this decision for the 18 year old you meaning you know everything you know now. So I would be going back knowing the value of networking. I would be going back understanding that network is something networking is something I need to do intentionally, not just kind of see what type. Oh, we both play basketball.

Let's be friends. No, I need to be also cultivating the other skill sets and things that I want to do a lot of times. I made friends based on hobbies. And there's a difference between based based on friendships and meeting people based on hobbies hobbies I can talk where's where's my cup at.

I can talk where's it at. Can you see it? Okay, it's not. Why is it not.

Hold on. That's about to make me mad. Why that ain't. Should have went to Harvard.

Should have went to Harvard. All right, now I lost my point. I can talk. I used to build friendships based on hobbies.

I should have been building friendships based on goals, dreams, visions, what I was going to actually be doing in life because I'm not a basketball player in the NBA. So, hey, it's great that you play basketball too buddy, but we should have been talking about other things because neither one of us made it to the NBA. Hey, I love the rap. You like to rap too.

I met a lot of people freestyling in different dorms and stuff like that, but I never talked to them about something beyond a hobby. So if you were going back and had the opportunity knowing that this university produces presidents CEOs Nobel prize and Pulitzer prize winners so on and so forth. Now, not only did you might say, Oh, it's been 100 years since that person went there. Okay, where do you think they send in their grandkids and their kids and where you think they kids are sending their kids.

So now you have a network. You have families. You have history there. The access to that network, in my opinion, is the decision that needs to be made.

That would be me. Like if if I'm making this decision, I'm making a decision based on the access to that network. No, there's something really important that we need to talk about. And that is instant gratification versus delayed gratification.

Now, this isn't to say that most of the people who decided that they want the $100,000 was simply based on instant gratification, but I will, I am asking the question and I'm asking you to think about it as you think about this. What is more important that I get something right now, or that I have something that will be worth something in the future. This to me outside of networking is really one of the keys to success. It is understanding that yes, you want to take advantage of the opportunities that present themselves in the moment in today, but you always want to be weighing out.

How does the how does the decision that I'm making today age over time does this decision age well, not all decisions age well now. So sometimes we make decisions based on the sunny weather today, but then you travel and go wherever you going and it's like always raining or it's snowing like yeah, you bought the plane ticket and Joan bro, but you took the trip in December. And so you always need to be thinking about those different dynamics whenever I travel for instance when I'm traveling to like, you know, somebody or water some ocean with some sea or whatever. I'm always trying to I'm always googling when is the hurricane season in this particular area because I want to make sure that the decision I'm making don't just feel good today when I'm buying a ticket, but that there is like, oh, when I get there, I'm going to have an experience that last so what's my point with that.

Instant gratification is sometimes how we make decisions when we just want to when we are short site when we just want to quick fix and we like go $100,000 is right there right now I'll take $100,000. I'm not saying you wrong for taking $100,000. I'm not saying that $100,000 automatically makes you an instant gratification person. I'm saying that is worth thinking about in this regard.

Now the late gratification might mean this Harvard experience that I'm going to have, which is producing no money right now. It's not going to produce any money for four years right. But I so I have to wait, but the question is which one produces the most over time. Now I think this really comes down to a major a key question and that is what will you do with $100,000.

Alright, so a lot of people like I said on my Facebook post said they would take the $100,000. So my question is, okay, and do what because what you do or don't do with that $100,000 is what's going to actually like tell you whether or not this is the right decision. So a lot of people as an example said this. I saw a lot of people on the post said I'm going to take some money, save some money, and then I'm going to use some of it to go get a college go get an education at another school.

Okay, cool. But here's the question. So you're you're already telling me that your plan is still to go and work because you're talking about going number one $100,000 doesn't make you not be able to work. Alright, so I think that's another look this this is this is the other question I really want to ask people is does the $100,000 make your life more comfortable or is the $100,000 life changing like that that is an important question to ask to me is $100,000 life changing.

I'm not saying it is I'm not saying it's not. This is going to be different for different people. It may also vary depending on if you've actually ever had $100,000 at one time or not, because if you had $100,000 at one time or not, then you actually have some history on what you have done with $100,000. I would even argue you can even estimate this out if you've ever had $20,000 at one time.

If you've ever had $50,000 at one time, what did you do with it? How much did it change your life? Because if $1000 if $100,000 is worth what people are seemingly making it to be worth being valued at more worth more than a full scholarship to Harvard, then if you have $50,000, you must be you got to be well off now because I know you know people say oh I'll invest it. You know how risky investing is investment is one of the most risky things you could do in life.

You know, I know that there's no guarantee with investing. Look, just pull up the stock markets today. So you got to understand the risk. So there's no way you're going to tell me that you're going to take $100,000 and completely invest $100,000.

Now, if you do, that may be that's a gamble, but you may be weighing it out and saying, well, going to Harvard is a gamble. And if I'm thinking of delayed gratification, maybe my $100,000 investment today won't be worth nothing for 10 years, but maybe in 10 years it'll be worth a million dollars. So I actually think there's an argument for that. The people who say they'll take the $100,000 to pay deals.

That's just so to me, that just gives you a more comfortable life, but it doesn't change anything. You don't have a broader network. You don't have access to successful individuals. You are not, you know, have not gone into the 1% of college graduates in the world, you know, from these Ivy League type of schools and stuff.

And I'm not saying all Ivy League graduates, it just means you're going to be successful. There may be some Ivy League graduates out there that can provide some other perspective and be like, no, you don't understand. I went to Harvard or I went to Brown or wherever. And it's not what, you know, all this crack up to be that maybe true too.

I don't have that experience. So there's a part of this where maybe I'm even naive. But my point at the end of the day is what are you going to do with $100,000? Are you going to still go to school?

Like, you know, is it light changing? And that's a question that you have to ask yourself as you make this decision about when you take $100,000 or a full scholarship to Harvard. Now, a couple more things I want to say about this, this whole idea, this decision. To me, if I get to, I'm going to get to my answer in a second.

If I get to my answer, my answer has to be based on a couple of things. My capacity to learn, to adapt and to network. Like, so that's what I would be banking my decision on. Are you able to go in this environment and learn?

Do you have the capacity to learn? I believe I do. Do you have the capacity to go out and build relationships? I believe I do.

Can you adapt? And adaptation is important to me because I'm talking about going into a new environment with a level of thinking that I've probably never been around in my life consistently. Right? Doesn't mean I don't know anybody at this level.

Doesn't mean I work at a Fortune 50 organization. There's a bunch of smart people that I work with every single day. But what I'm talking about is when you are in an environment like that, it is going to cultivate innovation, success. Even people who drop out, I mean Zuckerberg dropped out of school, Bill Gates dropped out of school.

You got people who dropped out who met people at college, dropped out and created some of the most significant organizations in the world. So if you happen to go to Harvard, what are the chances that you can bring value, you can adapt, you can learn, and that you have the ability to network with people who also have those same skill sets. And together, y'all may either start a business or come up together in business, but at the end of the day, it's the value of that network. So I'm an actual question.

Right now, let me change the question a little bit just for a second. If I asked you, would you rather have $100,000 or become a personal friend of Barack Obama? Which one would you choose? Oh, we asking good questions today.

If I asked you, would you rather have $100,000 right now cash or become a personal friend? When I say personal friend meaning cell phone to cell phone, you can connect with your friends. You can call them. Y'all can go out the lunch.

You can mentor. Like, would you rather be Barack Obama's friend? Now, keep in mind the reason I'm using Barack Obama is because this could have been possible had you going to Harvard at the same time as him and been his friend. Maybe you're both like a hoop together and go to the same cafe or have interest in politics.

My point is Barack Obama went to Harvard. I am sure that there is somebody who went to Harvard met Barack Obama during that time. And that meeting, that relationship that was developed here is worth far more than $100,000. Would you rather be Barack Obama's friend?

I would say, well, I speak for myself. I would choose to be Barack Obama's personal friend over having $100,000. Because I think being Barack Obama's personal friend, over time, once he knows me and understand the things that I'm capable of, the skill sets and the value that I can bring, I would argue that that my capacity and my skill set with someone in my network like Barack Obama would produce $100,000 a hundred times. Give what I'm saying?

This is how we have to look at it. Now, if we're looking at it that way, I do want to throw out a couple more things. Because people may say, well, what's the average? I wrote some of this stuff down so I wouldn't forget.

Let's see the average salary for a Harvard graduate within six years of graduation. So Harvard alumni within six years of graduating on average is $97,000. Now, again, these numbers are estimates. I got some of these numbers from indeed, some of them from the Harvard Crimson.

I was just online, you know, just searching for different data. So it's not like I fact check all of this. I look for different variations and what the commonalities were and these seem to be fairly safe numbers to assume. So if the average Harvard graduate makes $97,000 within six years of graduating, so let's round that up to $100,000.

Now, here would be my question. Let's just say if we went out 15 years, if we judge the decision from year one versus year 15 year one, you get a $300,000 scholarship that's covering the first four years, or you get $100,000 cash. The person who chose $100,000 cash in year one, clearly won the race, right? But let's project this out to your team, year 15.

If I graduated from Harvard and on average, making $97,000 $100,000 within six years. So that means within six years, that $100,000 you got has become my salary within six years of graduating. Now, 52% of Harvard graduates make $70,000 from day one. That was according to the 2017 graduate graduating class, 70,000 from day one.

You get what I'm saying? So the way that I look at these numbers is has the person that took $100,000 produced any more money beyond $100,000. And that's why I asked, what, what are you going to do? Once you pay your bills and you live in a comfortable life, cool, like now what?

Now you, because you didn't go get the Harvard education, so you're not going to get the same potentially not going to get the same quality of job that you would have gotten. Or at least you're not going to get it as fast if you would have gotten in at Harvard. You don't have the rolodex that you would have in the network had you gone to Harvard. So, and again, I'm not saying this to say that it is impossible for $100,000 to be the better decision.

It's just that as you see, you know, my mind is thinking more about this network. And I am saying, there is no way possible because this is even without the network. I can go make $100,000 within six years leveraging a Harvard degree. That obviously increases more and more over time and gets into the multi six figures very fast.

So you're talking, you know, 10 years later, you can be making 220, you know, so on and so forth from there. I mean, you make 220 for five years, you know what I mean? Like that's 10 times, you know, that original that original $100,000. If you go and make that $100,000 when you were 18 and then go into work a job where you make, you know, $50,000 a year and it's nothing wrong.

Working a job to make $50,000 a year, by the way. But my point is the numbers just won't add up. You won't have the network. You won't have the Harvard name on your resume.

You won't have the credibility. The $100,000 will probably be gone in 10 years, I think it's safe to say. Unless you are a wizard and you are very bright and know exactly what to do with this $100,000, then you could also argue I could do a lot more with $100 today because I know what to do with it. I know where to sit it.

And within that six years that that person got away to make $100,000, I can already be a millionaire within 16 years. That is also possible. So I'm not saying that that's wrong, but I'm really just, I'm really asking has people thought through this in that way. Like, are you really thinking about it?

Are we just going with the money because the money there today? Now, here's the other thing. Again, I'm banking on this. So now we don't get to this is my answer.

My answer is I would take the Harvard education. I actually think the Harvard education within 10 years could be valued at over $1,000,000 versus $100,000 that you could give a person when they were 18. Number one, I'm 18 years old. So I got, you know, I never like, let me be careful.

I say this, I have enough, you know, let's assuming, you know, by the grace of God, that 18 year old lives to be 100. Let's just say 100, right? And I know everybody's going to be 100, but I just want to say a high number and speak life. This person is 18.

They have years to potentially mess up with business and there's no urgency around them having it figured out. So I could take those four years of graduate, you know, of going to Harvard developing relationships and, you know, learning, like learning right as well, but also networking. And I could take those four years and maybe even a couple years after that, I'm only 24, 25 years old. Even if I failed at everything but got my degree from Harvard and started at that point.

I'm going to be successful. If I have a Harvard business degree, trust me, and I'm smart and capable and I actually learned, even if I started a business that failed or we tried to start Airbnb competition, whatever, and that didn't do well, I still have those relationships. Now, as I go through corporate America, let's talk about that. Now you're in corporate America, you had a job.

You're probably one of the only people at your job with a Harvard degree. Let's be honest, people are going to value that. Okay, let's say you're single, right? You're single.

You're a single guy. You're a good looking guy. Let's just be real. I like to keep it a hundred.

You meet that girl. You talking to her parents? Yeah, I have a business degree from Harvard University. Harvard, the heart.

Come on, bro. You get the girl. You got the job. You slurp.

You accept. Like you're going to find your way to success. And you have access. Now, again, this is, I'm speaking personally for myself right now.

One of the things that I didn't have that I see other people in corporate America have it is that access to a network. I believe I'm talented. I believe I'm I've proven that like I've been a part of major projects. I've had a lot of successes through my career.

But there have been times where I've seen one difference and one difference only. And that is that someone else at different at different times throughout my career had a relationship. And I didn't even always know it at the time. There were times that somebody might have gotten a job and it turns out that they daddy went to school with the manager.

They got the same. I'm a moderate. They say it from the same distance. This, this, being where I'm from.

I'm like, it ain't too many people from where I'm from here. So you don't have that commonality. And I want people to think before, because I know some people don't like being real about this type of stuff when it comes to networking and access and success and things. But I'm going to tell you like, just we ain't talk.

We ain't got to get deep about race. We ain't got to make it about nothing that's going to make you uncomfortable. People like things and people that are familiar with them. I'm going to give you an example.

If you take your favorite sports team and let's say I'm a Detroit Pistons fan. If I go to California to a Lakers game and I'm in there with a Pistons hat on and I walk past the dude in a Pistons t-shirt, we probably going to speak to each other. Why? Because we're in an unfamiliar place, but we see something familiar.

We see something that we haven't come. So one of the things about networking that I like and that I'm even learning more and more today, a lot of networking is about building those familiar areas with people because a lot of times people, we're not, I'm not walking around with a logo for the things that we have familiar like the Pistons might be pretty obvious or if you're in Australia and you have an American flag on your hat and somebody else has it on your jacket. That's something that can kind of call out, hey, we're both American, right? And maybe you stand in line with that person and you all have small talk because of it.

But there are some things that are familiar areas that are not as recognizable, right? Because we like to think about things like skin color and stuff like that. But we're human beings like trust me, some people get blind about that stuff and they miss all the other familiarity. So a lot of times people get boxed out of the club and you can't get in there to build the relationships because you don't have those outside factors where they don't see the common logo or the familiar trait or whatever it may be.

And so sometimes it can be difficult from someone who doesn't come from that culturally and I'm gonna be honest too. One of the things for me as well is if I just use as an example like where I come from culturally, like I grew up in Detroit, I grew up in church, like something as an example, drinking is not a casual hobby for me. So a lot of times even now, like when I find myself in corporate America, so much of the networking is built around drinking. So it's like, how do I get through that?

Right? How do I find ways to steal, build relationships when really culturally the environment is not conducive to things that I do or even enjoy? To be honest, there are a lot of times it's like, I'm at corporate events and it's like, it's just genuinely, I don't enjoy this stuff. And so those are things you have to work through to figure out how to network with people.

And a lot of times when you're trying to do that, when you're in your career, it is challenging. It is not easy to network with people as full grown adults who are already stuck in your ways, already have your biases or stereotypes, your preferences. Like that is challenging a breakthrough because people also tend to judge you. You know, if it's a person that drinks and you don't drink, they always want to know why you don't drink or that could be a negative to them.

Nobody's going to say it, but that's life. That's just how it works. I'm always aware of those type of things. And I'm always mindful as I'm trying to build relationships and things that like, hey, where's the common ground?

And I'm just being real. It's not always easy to find. It's not always easy to find the common ground. So the 18 year old me could have went to Harvard.

It's much easier, in my opinion. It was much easier for me as a 18 to 20 year old to find common ground with people versus being an adult because when you're an adult, now it's about politics. Now it's about, you know, you voted for this and you believe in this. It's about it.

It's about all these things where I was younger. It's just like, oh, we hopin. What up? Let's start here and be or.

Oh, you like to play man. I like to play man. You know, you like fashion. I like fashion.

Oh, I got the red jays. You got the black ones like cool. Like when you were younger, it's easier to build those genuine relationships because you don't have all these built up negative things that have come into your life over the past 10 or 15 years. And maybe that's different now because I know the world is different and a lot of times kids now are also very highly politically driven.

But what I could tell you is when we were in college, I could not tell you who my friends were voting for. I couldn't tell you if they liked whoever. Like I had no idea and better yet. Neither did I care.

So my answer is I'll take the Harvard education because I think if you take the $300,000 that it costs and you even factor out the amount of money that you would make, even if you make $100,000 for 10 years. And I'm not even considering the relationships. I am going to bank on effective. I go to Harvard for four years.

I am going to at least meet one person is going to be worth knowing in my future. One person that I can have that I can call or, you know, communicate with, whether it be mentor, whether it be I can help them or they can help me. There's going to be at least a valuable relationship that probably produces more than $100,000 over the life of that relationship. So that is how I view the question of $100,000 versus a Harvard scholarship.

If I'm being real with you, I find it very hard to even consider the $100,000 in this and I would again I'm open to other points of view. This is not me saying it's a right or wrong thing. I'm just sharing my strong opinion about it. And I just don't see.

People would have to show me where they have successfully done the right thing with $100,000 with $20,000 with 10,000 because there's people that get $10,000 profit sharing chicks or bonuses or whatever. And they don't have those now. And that ain't nothing but that 10 times. So it's like, well, if you had it once and you didn't do the right, if you've had $20,000 before and don't have any of it to show for it right now, that's only $20,000 five times.

Like, why should I believe that you're going to be able to take $100,000 and change the world with it. So that's just my mindset with it. And if I'm being real, I mean, you can get to the $100,000 without Harvard. So it's like 100,000 isn't something that's unattainable in my mind.

And it doesn't like the Harvard, the Harvard scholarship that's valued at $300,000, I mean, I'm going to be real with you. Somebody could almost offer me that today. And it might like, you know what I'm saying? Like, yo, like, all right.

Okay, whatever. I ain't going to get into all that. But what I'm saying is that even as an adult, if somebody told you, okay, for the next four years, you know, downsize, minimize your lifestyle, whatever whatever. And you're going to go take this Harvard Harvard degree and layer it on top of the experience and education and knowledge that you already have like even that I could take four years off and come back and light up the world.

You know what I'm saying? So, and that's that's a whole different conversation. But my point is I just see a lot of value and relationships, man. I see people who make it places in life.

I've learned that they make it there a lot of times off the relationships. And that's just the reality that I think a lot of times maybe people don't want to believe it. And the last thing I say too is like money don't solve money problems. So if a person, if a person wants that $100,000 because they broke, I'm just not convinced that like just adding money on it is like putting Vaseline on a gunshot wound.

You feel what I'm saying? What up, Leandra? How you feeling? How you feeling?

So you agree? Let's see. When most people graduate from Harvard, their entry level positions pay at least 100 K they will make that money over and over plus have all the connections. It's a no brainer.

I really couldn't agree more. Leandra, like, and I'm so confused. Where perplexed at how many people say they would take a $100,000? Because to me, it's not even close.

It is, it is literally not even close. If I told people today that I had a Harvard Business degree and I was teaching an online masterclass on Business, there are people who would literally just find credibility in me and pay $100 for the course. Like, just because. You know what I'm saying?

Like, oh, he went to Harvard? like, it's what I'm a realist, you know, and I think sometimes people struggle to be real. Those things have credibility. They do.

Like they do, man. So look, I appreciate you all listening to this today, man. Episode 187, Harvard versus 100k. If you just dropping in and please go and check out all the points that we made or I made throughout the conversation.

And let me know if I convinced you, if you were a person that was originally saying you was going to rock with 100,000, let me know if my argument was convincing or compelling. Maybe it wasn't. And maybe like, you know, I'm going to take the 100,000, I'm going to make you do what I do. But I just want you to realize that's a risk too.

And you know, if you go and take that $100,000 and I go and become friends with the next president and you know, end up working with them or own their campaign or whatever it may be, my life could be different. It's not what you know, it's who you know. And I don't think enough of us truly realize that as reality and not just a cliche, it's not just something to be said, it is life. And I think also the reason I like thinking like that is because even as I do my podcast, it has caused me to value people more.

I value every person that I interview, I value every person that I email. Some people, like I reach out to people every week to email them and talk to them. Some don't respond, right? And a lot of times when I even look at that, it's like, oh, they don't know me, right?

This, I'm telling you, knowing people and also bringing value to people is an important aspect of success because none of us can do it on our own. So you have to be willing to be in a position to learn about people, to ask questions, to learn from people, but you also have to be developing yourself so that you can bring value to people. And that's what I hang my hat on is like, hey, even when people come on my podcast and they're sharing their story, their successes and things like that, my hope is that when they are on this platform that they are also valuing the platform and realizing, oh, I might not have heard of this yesterday. May have never even thought or seen anything about inspired guys people.

Maybe inspired guys people doesn't have 100,000 followers or a million followers or whatever, it's not maybe we don't, but they're still value there. And maybe it's not instant gratification. Maybe in 10 years, inspired guys people will be worth something that you can't see today. Maybe we will have built something that you can't see today.

And if we have built those organic, you know, relationships and had those organic experiences, then maybe sometime later in life, there's going to be a phone, a friend or a member me that you can hang your hat on. But some of us, the problem is we don't value people enough to network with them or to ask questions or to learn about them. So we end up isolating ourselves to the point that we really only try to be around people that we can see that can do something for us in the short term. And we constantly chase that short term gratification, that instant gratification.

And far too many times, we don't have too many times of it leading anywhere. And that's what I would ask people, show me where somebody has changed the world that you know personally with $20,000. Because $100,000 ain't nothing but that five times. We're 10,000.

And what we do is we light ourselves sometimes and we say, if I had this, if I had more, and I'm telling you, money just doesn't solve money problems. I've seen so many people who have a poverty mindset get more money and just end up in more debt when it's all said and done. That doesn't mean it's going to be you. Hopefully you enjoyed this deep conversation about this idea of choosing between a Harvard scholarship and $100,000.

I definitely appreciate you watching. Please do like, subscribe, share, check us out on YouTube at Inspire Guys, people also on Instagram at Inspire Guys, people I try to share short clips throughout the week. So I'll be doing that with this episode. If you missed it and you want to catch some of the short clips and you want to share it with some friends and some family or you just want to like on the show some love, check us out at Inspire Guys, people.

And until the end, man, y'all have an amazing, amazing, amazing day. I appreciate y'all.