Programme
People who have done the thing
Every course is taught by someone who does that work today.
Building with AI
My uncle prints his emails. All of them. He reads them at the dining table with a pen, writes his replies in the margins, then dictates them to whichever nephew is unlucky enough to be in the room. Last Christmas I showed him a tool that could read, sort and answer his inbox before his tea had cooled. He looked at it the way one looks at a snake that has learnt to speak.
The person who teaches this course lives on the other side of that dining table. They build with AI every day and know exactly where it is brilliant and where it confidently makes things up. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn to use AI tools to build working software, to do in a week what used to take a month, and to check the machine's work before trusting it.
My uncle has since asked me to set it up for him. He prints its replies.
The Craft of Selling
My barber remembers everything. My children's names, the job I hated, the football team I pretend not to support. Before I have even sat down, he asks how the interview went. I have tried three barbers closer to home. I keep going back to him.
The person who teaches this course knows the first sale is the easy part and the second one is the business. They know how to win a customer, how to keep one, and how to turn a single purchase into a habit. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn to find their buyers, earn their trust, make the case, handle objections, close, and build the kind of loyalty that brings people back without being asked.
Last month he raised his prices. I paid, and somehow left with his hair oil, his comb and a hat.
Numbers That Run a Business
Our neighbour runs a salon that is always full. Every chair taken, the dryers humming, a Saturday queue that spills onto the pavement. For three years she was certain she was making money. Then the rent went up and she sat down, for the first time, with the numbers. Her best customer had paid the same price since the day she opened. The braids that took six hours earned less than the trim that took twenty minutes. She had been very busy losing money.
The person who teaches this course reads a balance sheet the way some people read a novel, and sees the twist coming. Over the Sitting, the Boardies start with their own money: budgeting on an irregular income, saving, reading a payslip and filing a tax return. Then the business: pricing, margins, cash flow and books a lender will trust.
Our neighbour has new prices. The queue is shorter. She has bought a second dryer.
Standing Up
My cousin was asked to give the toast at his oldest friend's wedding. He prepared for weeks. On the day, he stood up, tapped his glass, looked out at three hundred faces and forgot the groom's name. He filled the silence with a story about a goat. Nobody knows why. Least of all the goat, who was not invited.
The person who teaches this course has stood where my cousin stood, and remembered the groom's name. They know a good speech is built, practised and built again. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn to speak in public, hold a room, take the question they did not see coming and keep their nerve. Every talk is practised, reviewed and given again, all the way to the AGM.
My cousin has been asked to give another toast next year. He wants to know if he can audit the course.
Working with People
My brother started a band in our garage with four friends and one drum kit. They had talent, ambition and a name nobody could agree on. Within a month the guitarist had stopped speaking to the drummer, the singer had formed a second band out of spite, and the bassist had become the manager, mostly because he was the only one still answering his phone.
The person who teaches this course is the bassist. They know how to bring very different people to the same table and keep them there. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn teamwork, how to give feedback and take it, how to disagree without falling apart, how to be managed well, and how to manage their first person.
The band is still together. They finally agreed on a name. The bassist chose it.
Law for People Who Build Things
A friend of mine once signed a lease for a flat because of its balcony. She had already pictured the morning coffee, the potted herbs, the little table for two. She signed all twelve pages on the bonnet of the agent's car and read none of them. Page nine said the balcony belonged to the flat upstairs. Their dog takes his breakfast there now, with the view she is paying for.
The person who teaches this course reads page nine first. They make the fine print work for you, and they keep the legal language to what you actually need. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn to read a contract before they sign it, how a company is registered and governed, how to protect a name and an idea, and how to handle other people's data lawfully.
My friend reads everything now. Last week she sent me her gym membership with three clauses underlined and a question mark in red.
The Ask
My best friend once asked her father for money to start a business. She arrived with forty slides, three charts and a projector borrowed for the evening. He watched all forty in silence, then asked one question: how much, and when do I get it back? She did not know. The meeting ended. The projector went home.
The person who teaches this course knows that question is coming and has the answer ready. They know what an investor hears when you ask, and what makes them say yes. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn how fundraising works: who gives money and why, grants, investors and sponsors, building the pitch and the numbers behind it, and asking without flinching.
She went back a month later with six slides and two answers. Her father invested. He now asks for quarterly updates and calls them board meetings.
Make It Work, Make It Matter
My grandmother has owned the same radio for thirty years. It has been dropped, rained on and once survived a fall from the roof that nobody in the family has fully explained. The dial is held in place with tape and faith. It still comes on every morning at six, and she will not hear of replacing it. My phone, meanwhile, is two years old and already sulking.
The person who teaches this course builds things like that radio: things that work every time and that people refuse to give up. Over the Sitting, the Boardies learn to design a product, build it, test it until it breaks and build it again, and make sure it holds up when thousands use it at once. Hardware and software, from the first sketch to the thing people would not want to live without.
Last year we bought my grandmother a new radio for her birthday. She uses it to hold the door open.
Guest speaker
On a long flight I once sat next to a man who spent six hours telling me how his business nearly died. Not the polished version. The real one: the cheque that bounced, the partner who left, the month he paid salaries with his car. I learned more over that sea of clouds than in a whole semester of lectures.
Every Sitting, someone who has built something worth talking about pulls up a chair and tells the Boardies how it really happened. The real version, with the near misses, the 3am doubts and the lucky break they are still trying to explain. Come for the success story. Stay for the parts they usually keep to themselves.
He apologised for talking the whole way. It was the best six hours I've spent in the air.