Genius Hour Tips
There is no rule book for side hustling; however, everyone needs a proven framework to guide them through their hustle to succeed. There are many side hustling approaches and no better place to learning about the basics of entrepreneurship than now. One useful approach is Project-based learning.
Project-based learning is a student or professional development-centered approach to exploring one’s passion and acquiring in-depth knowledge through active exploration of real-world challenges by posing questions or scenarios rather than applying instructions and repetitive memorization. This approach is connected to Genius Hour, where individuals explore their passion and come up with innovations that solve real-life problems. The Genius Hour is an idea that originated from Google, where employees were allowed to spend 20% of their time working on personal projects. High school and middle school students I have worked with over the years always appreciate the freedom to explore their own interests and passion during Genius Hours.
“Nothing becomes real till it’s experienced” — John Keats.
One might ask, what is the correlation between a side hustle and Project-based learning? As a side hustler, you can adapt this system to explore your passion or skills. Regardless of what you do full time, identifying your skills, passion, and leveraging it into a side hustle can earn you a secondary income. Educators, design thinkers, creatives, and side hustlers can use this professional development approach to incubate and support their side hustle.
You get to spend time doing what you love; the project-based learning approach gives you an open space to explore your creativity and think outside the box to develop innovative ideas for your business. Having a side hustle that you’re passionate about can be both rewarding and fulfilling. What better way to promote innovation than to allow your imagination to flow and not be afraid to try new things.
Next is to integrate technology.
Technology has made everything easier and accessible; you can easily incorporate technology into your side hustle in many ways to have the upper hand in the market and a headstart from production to marketing of your business. A rule of Genius Hour is to conduct research using reliable sources to identify which resources, digital tools, software, or platform, would be needed for your project. Researching your interest area equips you with the right knowledge to make informed decisions. If, for instance, you can’t afford a professional camera to start a YouTube Channel, what other options can you explore? Some of my students use their Genius Hour time to research and study the production processes of famous YouTubers, and TikTokers, and then create their own media content using their cell phones.
A former student of mine and fledging filmmaker Anthony Rivera, used Genius Hour in my class to explore his interest and passion in poetry and film. Eventually, he leveraged his interest and contacts, to produce a short documentary film that premiered at BlackStar Film Festival several years ago (Click here to watch a trailer for I Am Philly.)
Pitch
Another cue to pick up from the Genius Hour is engagement, learning from, and interacting with experts or resource persons in your interest area. Project-based learning encourages constant interaction with other people within your area of interest or profession, improving your people skills and network that you can leverage.
One crucial step that I have all my students do is to pitch their Genius Hour ideas. This simple pitch approach could be applied to your side hustle ideas too:
I am going to … and I need to learn how to …
I am learning this because …
I am going to pursue my Genius Hour/ SideHustle project, by …
My Genius Hour / Side Hustle project will be a success if I …
Learn From Others and Have Fun
If you are incubating your side hustle, the best way to support its sustainability is to learn from others who’ve been in similar situations to test your creativity, intuition, and ability to think outside the box through real-life scenarios. You get a clearer picture of the business landscape and exposure to real-world expertise that promotes professional development. Project-based learning teaches skills, foresight, intuition, qualities of an entrepreneur, and qualities a hustler should consider.
With project-based learning as a tool, side hustlers inculcate the habit of fun, curiosity, initiative, and courage, whether you’re opening a lemonade stand or starting a YouTube channel. You learn from the onset that work comes with challenges, and with challenges come opportunities.