Written by Nick Lush

Nick Lush is the Director of Learning & Development at BeatBox, where they build people-first programs that scale with heart. With five years of experience in L&D and people development, Nick is known for designing impactful, human-centered learning strategies that solve for the business and employee growth at every level. They’ve worked with organizations like Tandem, Included Health, and Hunt Club, and they’re sharing insights on what it’s been like to build resilient, empowered, and engaged teams.

Connect with Nick on LinkedIn.

At the end of August 2025, I started an online Master of Science program in HR Management via Texas Tech University, courtesy of BeatBox Beverages’ tuition reimbursement program. I have found the return to school to be simultaneously energizing, exciting, interesting, and, frankly, a bit frustrating. I thought it could be fun to keep a running online diary of the experience. When I was an undergraduate, I had a Xanga site (look it up if you’re too young). Now that I’ve been a working professional, I’m writing my blog posts for a corporate partner. The more things change, the more they stay the same! 

It’s been roughly 17 years since I was last in school. With the exception of earning microlearning certificates from Coursera, Udemy, and EdX, I’ve never taken a full course that was primarily online before this experience. I’m about halfway into my first semester and I’m enjoying it, but it’s also opened my eyes to a few interesting things. Let’s talk about them! 

Going “back” to college is a different vibe when it’s just going back to your desk.

As the semester approached, I got lots of questions from people around me about how I was feeling. To be honest, I struggled with how to answer; I was excited, but I also knew there wasn’t going to be as much of a formal point of departure. It’s a different feeling to start a new degree program from the same desk at which you do your work, without your parents tearfully driving off into the distance after helping you move into the dorms. 

Gathering my undergraduate transcripts was also a great reminder that while I didn’t think of myself as a “great” student during that time — and I wasn’t when it came to general ed — in the coursework I cared about, I actually did really well. That built up my confidence that I would be up to the task of stepping into a program that was entirely built around a subject I cared about, both personally and professionally.

I work with a primarily remote team at BeatBox. One of the productivity tips we give our teams is that having a dedicated office space at home where their brain can shift into “work” mode. That also makes it easier to, after work, shift out of it by not bringing their laptop with them to the couch or the bedroom.

Now that I’m in school, I find myself needing to create an extra space to create the same mental break, both physically and in my schedule. When I’m at my desk, it can be too easy to be pulled into the regular working rhythms of checking Slack and email. As a result, I try to accomplish my schoolwork from my personal computer at my kitchen counter or dining table to establish a dedicated space that doesn’t cross over too much into either my personal or working life. So far, so good! 

Just because you build a tuition reimbursement program doesn’t mean they’ll come all on their own.

Selfishly, one of the reasons I started working on creating a tuition reimbursement program at BeatBox is that I was already thinking about pursuing a master’s program, but needed the extra financial help to put it within reach. I assumed there might be others in the org feeling the same who would also benefit, so I took on the legwork of learning just enough tax code to get it done. 

The results, so far, have been mixed. The program was greeted with enthusiasm, but we’ve only had one other student return to school on a regular basis, with a couple of others taking the opportunity to pursue individual classes or certifications. In a rapidly scaling organization, it has turned out to be a great lesson for me in the importance of building marketing skills as an HR professional. 

It’s not enough to build a great benefits package or some cool programs. You have to also make sure people know about them and how to take advantage. And that can often involve a lot of repetitive work. I encourage anyone going down this same road, or building a learning or lifestyle stipend in Compt, to invest equal energy in building out your communications plan to make sure your message is regular, multimodal, and clear. It may feel repetitive, but you’d be surprised how many people missed the first (or fifth) message.

New perspectives bring new clarity.

I chose the program that I did for two primary reasons. First, I am a big proponent of finding contact information for professors and staff in any department that you are seriously considering for a degree program and sending them an email to say hello and ask questions. Both in my undergraduate work at the University of Kansas and now in my master’s through Texas Tech, the responses from faculty were a huge selling point. The staff at TTU were immediately warm, responsive, and engaging. 

Especially in a virtual environment, I wanted to make sure my experience was going to be engaging and meaningful and not just me working by myself on my laptop with minimal interaction. To bring campus a little closer to me, I’ve also bought Red Raider gear and office decor, and on game days I always eat something with a tortilla because I can’t be there to throw ‘em. 

The second reason was that of the online HR programs I looked at in my price range, TTU’s was the only one housed in a school of business. Human resource development in academia tends to be viewed as more closely related to education and is thus often housed within that school, but I wanted to keep my focus on business settings. 

As a result, most of my classmates in my first course are actually MBA students, many of whom continued directly on from their undergraduate work. It has been an interesting perspective shift to be in a course centered on organizational behavior and design with so many young professionals and students as well as with so many classmates from different walks of life. My classmates who are veterans have excellent insights to share on organizational dynamics from a military standpoint. My younger peers provide an interesting perspective into how the career ladder and leadership are viewed from a generation just getting started in the office. 

We share thoughts and ideas in our message boards, while I also go through my textbooks. Between these two learning methods, I see much of the work that I’m doing day to day as a learning and development professional in a new light because I’m able to pair theory and academic grounding with activities we’re pursuing at BeatBox and evaluate their efficacy in new ways.

So far, the experience has been fulfilling and has energized me about further academic work in a way that I wasn’t expecting. I’m thankful to be in an environment at BeatBox where learning and professional development are valued and where I am granted the time (and a little extra cash) to invest in meaningful education for myself. 

I’m excited to see where the journey goes from here and what I’m able to bring back to my team.