Weekly Digest: November 18, 2016

Sanibonani (hello to a group of people in Zulu)! Here is your weekly dose of my best tips for how to travel the world while you grow your career and make a difference.

Travel the world

A currency crisis provides a unique opportunity for travelers to save money. If you have access to USD, Euros, or other more stable currencies, your travel costs can be significantly reduced by paying attention to foreign exchange rates. There are a quite a few currencies in trouble right now. For example, the Egyptian Pound has lost nearly half of its value this year, despite local prices only marginally increasing. The British Pound took a huge hit after Brexit, the South African Rand has suffered from recent scandals with their finance minister and corruption, and the Argentinan Peso has been historically bad due to capital controls and inflation. In an extreme example, the Venezuelan Bolivar has become essentially worthless due to surging inflation. If you ever wanted to visit these countries, now is a great time to do so at a discount.

Grow your career

“Most startups don’t fail because they can’t build a product. Most startups fail because they can’t get traction.” The best resource I have found to grow your business (or spread awareness for your cause) is Traction, by Gabriel Weinberg and Justin Mares. They provide a philosophy for developing your growth strategy and break out the 19 different growth channels, with examples and interviews for each. Instead of trying to do a little bit of everything like most people, their method involves systematically identifying a specific channel and running the appropriate tests to determine if the channel can work for you at your current stage. Once you have enough data, you will know whether to double down or move on to the next test. This concept of listing out every possible idea, treating each as a test, and only focusing on one or two at a time, is a helpful way to think regardless of whether your career has anything to do with growing an actual product or service.

Make a difference

The recent presidential election in the U.S. is a great call for everyone to wake up, get involved, and love more. I highly recommend watching Prince Ea’s most recent video.

Fun updates:

• Most popular post on Instagram  –  Exploring Namibia, home to the world’s oldest desert and 2nd least densely populated country.
• Featured article  –  With the holidays coming up: The 17 Best Gifts for Travelers as Determined by Travelers
• Quote of the week  –  “Food is not the answer to world peace, but it’s a start.” – Anthony Bourdain

Thanks for your attention and have an awesome weekend!

Konrad

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