Work Archives

Should You Talk Politics in Business? Or Stay Neutral and Keep Your Mouth Shut?

THIS WEEK, am I right? I literally didn’t sleep on Tuesday. Then I finally get to sleep, and wake up to this morning. How can you be talking about anything else right now? *cue the person who’s definitely sending out emails right now about making the perfect pumpkin spiced latte* Is that jarring to you? It’s a bit jarring to me—like someone running in the room and shouting, “There’s an active shooter outside and he’s coming for us all!” and

Oct 2, 2020

Introducing ? The 2nd Annual “Wipe Your Buns With $30,000” Challenge! (Haha, I’m Not Even Kidding.)

I know. I KNOW. I bring such an air of sophistication to everything I do. (See also: The Middle Finger Project book and the sweet, sweet letterboard in my living room that reads, “My Name is Inigo Montoya.”) But let’s be honest: “The $30,000 Money Challenge” just doesn’t have the same ring, does it? You know when I’m in your inbox. And you also know when I show up to teach you something, it’s going to be GOOD. Which brings

Aug 7, 2020

The Hidden Shame of Entrepreneurship—And Why For Some People, It’s Really Frigging Hard to Sell Themselves

I sell people online. All day, every day, this is what I do for a living: I make people sound like golden-voiced prophets with thighs of steel and very good ideas. I am very good at this. I can take a farmer in Kansas and make him sound like the CEO of Gucci in two lines or less. (Lord, you should see how I spun my ex-boyfriends.) You think your sister Sarah enables her drug dealing kid? Woo Nelly—try being

Jul 23, 2020

Is Your Bio Absolute Trash? It May Be Missing This Key Ingredient

You know who I don’t trust? Mean girls. The man who stole my cell phone in 2012. Iguanas (they absolutely want to eat your brains). Movies that didn’t cast Ryan Reynolds. AND…this one restaurant in Santiago, Chile, right there in the heart of the Providencia neighborhood that advertises two things on its sign: pizza……..and sushi. Pizza and sushi, pizza and sushi, pizza and sushi! That’s not even a decent name for a hipster band. I took it personally that these

Jul 16, 2020

Start a Boring Business—Not an Innovative One. (Also Filed Under: Business Advice I Never Thought I’d Give.)

I once met a guy whose job is to gut dead poodles and freeze dry their corpses—and I didn’t even get this luminary’s phone number. I know, the recklessness in it all! If I may offer some advice, anytime you meet someone with a business card that says, “We won’t turn your poodle into a puddle,” you follow up. At the very least, you’ll (finally) have a tip to submit to Unsolved Mysteries one day. Anyway, our poodle pal here

Jul 9, 2020

Your Job is Not to Change the World Overnight, But to Be a Tiny, Torturous Drip on the Forehead

There’s a new Karen in town, and I’ve dubbed her The Karen K-3000. (Even though the “K” is redundant, it’s a head nod to the villain in the Terminator movies—clearly how all of my columns shall start now.) If you still have no idea who Karen is, let me be the first to tell you: it’s an official Wikipedia entry. And since we all know “Wikipedia-entry official” is the nerd’s version of a blue check on Instagram, then rest assured:

Jul 2, 2020

5 Apps Every Creative Business Needs to Get Their Shit in Order (With Extra Love for Non-Planney Types)

Planning is not my strong suit, by which I mean if you come anywhere near me with a “party planning checklist,” I will immediately grab a knife. It’s instinct—you know, like the repulsion you feel when other species eat their young?—which probably also explains why, when I go to the grocery store, I end up leaving with forty-nine boxes of cherry-flavored condoms. Not on the list, but how can you not? It’s also why I’m persistently late at present-giving. I

May 22, 2020

“The Money’s Too Good to Give Up” and Other Nonsense I am GOING TO SPANK WITH A JELLYFISH

I am in NO MOOD today. Nope, no mood for pussyfooting around—and don’t be offended by my usage of that word, as its etymology is related to little kitty cat paws, which are adorable and sweet, just ? like ? me. [Cue sinister laughter] There’s one thing I have had it with, and I’m about to get out a giant alpine horn and shout it all over France. It’s not COVID-19 (though that over-seasoned crotch nugget* can hump right off),

May 19, 2020

10 Things That’ll Make You Go “Ooh, Oooh, Oooohh!” (Especially if You’re in Online Business)

SIX-HUNDRED DADDIES. That’s my shorthand for “dollars.” I don’t know why or when it started. Actually, just kidding, it just started right now. Not because I have daddy issues or anything (though clearly I do). SIX HUNDRED DADDIES was what I paid. Six-hundred! And you know why? Because I just had to import a slab of wood the weight of a small ocean liner. I just had to to send a ninety-million-hundred pound box all the way to the jungles

May 12, 2020

A Virus Can Keep You Inside, But It Can’t Keep Your Ideas There

You ever see people that look like your dead relatives and then you CAN’T STOP STARING? I do that a lot. Like this fall, in Dublin, when I creepily tried to take a photograph of a total stranger in a pub without his knowledge by casually waving my phone around in the air—#PROTIP: do not drop mid-operation—because I was convinced he looked like the spitting image of the one photograph I have ever seen of my father. This

May 6, 2020

Tag: Work