Networking is awkward but it doesn’t have to be. Here’s how I get over my nerves and create stronger connections.

How do we rewrite our brains to understand the tools we need at our jobs? And as a company, how do you improve the onboarding experience so you can frontload all of those years of knowledge into the kind of tutorial that makes an AI-driven tool feel like a ballpoint pen? 

I recently spent a week camping in the upper peninsula of Michigan this week getting some well-earned R&R. I read exactly 2.5 novels, survived a thunderstorm in a tent on High Rock Bay, and thought about work zero times. 

I promised I’d write about how to survive a merger and even paper cup wine will not prevent me from this goal. Unless the banana macron gets me first.

Managing an international team in a global crisis isn’t something you find in a how-to listicle. It’s not something you can prepare for. It’s like asking how you learn basic math but the answer is actually how you learn to paint.

If I could say one thing to leadership everywhere, it would be this: you have to acknowledge what is going on in the world. You cannot proceed as if things are normal. Nothing is normal.

The dust is settling. Emails have been sent, clients have been called, and I’ve begun to wrap up my transition plan. I’m staring at a chair full of things that used to live on my desk, and I’m already seeing my team move on without me. As I write this, I have one day left in my current role.

As a marketer, my bigger failures stemmed from the copy on the wedding website, the language on our invitations, and the logistical details of the afternoon. In sum, it was the marketing that kept me awake at night after the sun burns and unwrapping were faint memories. 

People say that being a middle manager is tough. People are right. What I didn’t realize is that management didn’t have to be selfish. It was never about the title or the power. It was about the team I was building.

In our world, we talk a lot about digital noise. We produce a lot of content and we watch our metrics, and buy beer every time a platform updates their algorithm because platforms that aren’t owned are Satan’s paradise. But sometimes we need to stop and remember the early internet.

I don’t really care about bravery in work; I care about results. If that means that my copy makes me laugh, that’s great. But that’s not my goal. Professionalism isn’t dead. And neither is creativity.

Working in a startup is weird. Being in a startup has broken my brain, put it back together, and thrown glitter on it. And it’s been amazing. Here are the 10 weirdest things about working in a startup.

It’s a long series of no strategy and no roadmap and decisions without foresight. I guess that’s what makes us good: the guts to jump without thinking about gravity.

The best advice I ever got on writing for a brand was that you should speak as though you were the brand’s biggest fan. And these guys and gals? They get it.

Of course, I had to teach the team about what memes are first. And we tried working through cartoons that they thought were funny and that I sort of winced at. But it started with a meme.

I was a theater kid. You can probably tell from my fearless ability to act like a dork. I wasn’t on stage much but I loved my classes. The ability to rehearse and perfect a single moment in time appealed to me. The community we created in that black box theater was my safe place in high school. I didn’t know who I was beyond the red lipstick and shirts I insisted on cutting up, but I knew I belonged there.

Be respectful of who and what was there before you. You are not a cowboy. This is not the wild wild west.

This is a story about all of the crazy things that bosses have said to me over the years. Not that I don’t love all of my former bosses, you crazy snowflakes. You all taught me something and for that, I’m very grateful.

Marketing is ridiculous when you think about it. Most of the day I have to silence my inner Liz Lemon so I don’t shout about hipster nonsense.

Diagram the heck out of everything. Create process maps so detailed your dog could write your blog and update your email algorithms.