Tonight I was in Central Square at a startup event for my friend’s company. I was with some of my favorite people, ones I love to spend time with the most. I left and walked to the T stop. I strolled along the side of Massachusetts Avenue in front of my old office where my ex-boyfriend used to drop me off on Monday mornings after a weekend together. I was always grateful for the ride to work, really thankful for his time. This will sound awful, but genuine appreciation aside, this other part of me felt relieved to get back to my weekday life, which felt more natural to me: sarcasm, work, startups, my friends, internet, the gym. Space. I wanted to want that weekend life, but I didn’t. It’s not my perfect life, and that’s ok. It’s ok.
Before I crossed the street tonight to get the necessary ingredients for my comfort food protein shake at Clear Conscience Cafe, I looked up at my old office where I met my next ex-boyfriend at a company party. I squinted at the window, noticing its fresh paint and new walls dividing the once open space into tiny separate offices. It looked a lot different. But I imagined what it used to look like, what it looked like the day I got a ZipCar on a Saturday morning to move out after we got acquired. I walked loads of office supplies and startupy knicknacks (ie, the Seth Godin marketing action figure) up and down the stairs.
I soaked it all in. It was a lot to take in. I would never come there to work again. So much had just happened.
Before I left, I stood in the exact spot in the universe where I first met him and took this picture.
“The most important career decision you’re going to make is whether or not you have a life partner and who that partner is. If you pick someone who’s willing to share the burdens and the joys of your personal life, you’re going to go further.”
I think this might be true.
Relationships can be motivating, and they can also be distracting and negative. Point blank, it’s homelife, and that impacts your mindset and the level to which you can focus on work. (For a romantic take, I strongly recommend John Steinbeck’s impossibly beautiful and timeless letter about love here.)
As I’m clearly unmarried, I don’t have much of an opinion on the stay-at-home dad discussion that Sheryl’s point often sparks. But what I do know is that who you date impacts your career in many ways, but in the simplest way because it impacts how you spend your time. Not all significant others are cool with you going to a tech networking event and hanging out with a bunch of other dudes, and not everyone thinks a great Sunday afternoon involves getting ahead on work for the week. But these are aspects of a certain lifestyle and career track. 50 coffees, right? A lot of people are less likely to achieve 50 coffees if they’re always worried about that awkward jealously argument before or after Starbucks. Dark roast, dark times. And even if there is no tension about jealously, those are 50 coffees you’re not having with the significant other. There’s only so much time to go around.
On a practical level, the relationships I admire set expectations and plan when to see each other. If you have work to do on a Saturday or have an event to go to on a Thursday, say so. But this stuff is also about compromise, right? So say when you’ll be done if you’re still going to see that person that night. It’s amazing what setting expectations can do to build trust. From the outside looking in, that seems to allow people to still pursue the things they want to as individuals (like careers, or hobbies) but not neglect each other.
Looking back even to my internship days, I wish I’d put my intentions on the table more in relationships. I wish I didn’t ask if I could go to an event or spend some time working. I wish I just presented it as something I needed to take care of. If I could go back, I would have compromised my time less and made it clear that these things were simply a part of my life. It would have been more fair to both sides.
But had I not been a late bloomer and just done this stuff in the first place, I wouldn’t be so complicated, interesting and choke-full of excuses to play this song and whatever cliche songs I want this week. Right? Right?
To finish these thoughts, I really wanted to make a joke about hiring fast and firing fast, recruiting A-players to your team, something witty about cofounders, probably something about dating/generating leads/sales funnels and maybe something dirty about conversion rates. Then finally I wanted to find a charming excuse to link to this post by Fred Wilson talking about the importance of family – because that guy blogs like six times a day and I heard he blogs like, on his Blackberry while on the treadmill while on the subway and if an overachieving badass yet also probably workaholic like him recognizes the importance of this stuff then. well. shit. We all should.
But I’ve got nothing. Just… fellow 20-something ladies, don’t be impressed so easily. Your attention and time is valuable – not to mention your heart. Texting you back isn’t a grand gesture. It’s just asking what time you’re coming over.
By the way, someone’s reading that freaking letter at my wedding one day. Whenever that day comes.
If you’re a professional, I’m sure that you’ve received at one point or another an inquiry from a college student asking about jobs, internships or advice. I respond and I think you should too. This is why:
1. People answered my emails when I was a college student.
I’ve written before how I got my first job in Boston. I sent a lot of emails asking people about their companies or for informational interviews. Granted, it was just one of those informational interviews that turned into a job. But all the coffees and email exchanges I had with other professionals provided me with motivation, direction, momentum and confidence. I am so thankful to the people who helped me, in every little and big way they did. 2 or so years later, how could I not pay it forward?
Granted, I can’t offer a ton of long-term career advice or hindsight. I’m too young still myself. But I can offer a pep-talk/confidence boost/talk about what has or hasn’t worked for me so far. Considering similar conversations I’ve had with people just a few years older than me, I know how even that can be quite helpful.
2. The college student you meet today is the employee you hire tomorrow.
In startupland, we talk a lot about how tough it is to hire talent. The right culture fit and the right skillset is tough to come by. Then we also talk about the importance of networking. There’s a missing link, though. We emphasize the importance of networking with people who can help us, like VCs or more experienced professionals for mentorship. I don’t think we talk enough about the opposite end of that spectrum, which is spending time with an up-and-comer who is that future talent you can add to your team.
3. I remember where I came from.
It seems like everyone wants a developer or a community manager/social media whatchamacallit/something-or-other these days. Where are these people? Well, they’re in college. They’re young. They’re doing annoying things that 20-year-olds do, like joining fraternities and drinking for any special occasion possible, like it being laundry day or Monday or maybe signing their emails to you with emoticons. In addition to internships, yes, that’s what some of Boston’s most promising young entrepreneurs did merely four or so years ago. They might not immediately come off to you as a child prodigy in that email or by a first glimpse at their LinkedIn.
That doesn’t mean they’re not an “A-player!” (And seriously, what the hell is an “A player?”) What it means is that they just don’t know what they don’t know, but they want to know and that’s why they reached out. It also means that ambition and drive can come with a lack of focus, because young ambitious people want to conquer the world. But if you have a conversation with someone and steer that motivation towards a clear direction of the right internships and experiences, they grow into the “A-player” people so dearly want to hire.
My favorite interns, and in my opinion the most successful ones, have been those that were hungry to improve – not necessarily the ones that did everything perfect. Perfect plateaus.
4. I’m busy. So what.
Social media/internet burnout is real. I haven’t blogged here in two months, and I’m inundated with a lot of “communication” in general per the nature of running social media accounts for work. Just like you, there are a ton of DM’s, @replies and emails coming at me. Maintaining ownership of my own time, timeline and inbox is important so I have time to communicate and spend time with the people I love offline.
We’re generally too busy and say yes too often, when it really should be a choice between “Hell yeah!” or “No.” I wish more people saw responding to college students as a “hell yeah!” kinda of an opportunity.
Respond to college students. Don’t just reply to the rockstars. Reply to the hot messes who need honest feedback and give honest feedback. Have coffee with someone. It won’t kill you, actually it’s kinda fun. Expect some of them to flake on you and not even respond back to your advice. Roll your eyes and move on, because there’s another student who will take your feedback and could make an absolute rockstar developer or community manager/social media whatchamacallit one day. If we want to find talent, we can’t forget the source of it.
I don’t think Diane Sawyer would’ve worried or complained about being an unpaid journalism intern. I can’t see her waiting around for her college’s career services center to place her in an internship. I envision her beating down doors to get the best opportunities she needed to perfect her writing, research and her on-camera presence, build her professional network – and, not to mention, craft her non-regional dialect of course. Her focus? Her opportunities – not her limitations.
This recent NY Times article about unpaid internships compelled me to share my thoughts my internships two years after graduation.
I have an admittedly odd take on unpaid internships. Students work for free but have to pay for college credit. The companies they work for can say they are paying they student with credit. (The student paid for the credit…so the student is basically paying to work for free…so…um…) All that said, if I was a college student all over again looking for PR, marketing or journalism internships I would not turn down learning opportunities at great companies just because they weren’t paid.
I took issue with several things in this article. I disagree with this:
“Colleges shouldn’t publicize unpaid internships at for-profit companies. They should discourage internship requirements for graduation — common practice in communications, psychology, social work and criminology. They should stop charging students to work without pay — and ensure that the currency of academic credit, already cheapened by internships, doesn’t lose all its value.”
Wow. Holy “face/palm” moment. Like I said, at face-value making students pay for academic credit for unpaid internships seems shady. But those were honestly the best college credits I paid for. And as far as the “cheapening of college credit”… Seriously? I’ve benefitted much more from internships than from a lot of the communications theory lecture crap they teach in classes. I was delighted to skip out on that theoretical garbage that wasn’t going teach me to deliver value for a business, get into an office environment and learn skills that’d make me marketable upon graduation. Finally, discouraging internship requirements for graduation isn’t going to solve the problem of huge companies not paying their interns. It’s just going to lessen the likelihood that college students are going to take these vital professional opportunities for their careers, making them less likely to get jobs upon graduation. Quick! Name all the under or unemployed ’09 or ’10 graduates you can think of… without taking a breath. We’ll be here all night…
Like the intensely career-driven 24-year-old I am today, I was a die-hard 19, 20 and 21-year-old as well and aggressively pursued internships. I did five in college in various areas of marketing, PR and journalism. Then I graduated in the economic shitshow known as May 2009 and moved to Boston two weeks later for a paid internship at a PR agency in Boston. A paycheck?! I was thrilled.
I did a ton of free work throughout college other than internships. I ran my college’s newspaper for free. I did PR campaigns for local businesses through this student-run integrated marketing agency, PRIMA Connectionsfor free. This free work helped me build a portfolio that I could bring with me to those internship interviews – where I would work… for free.
If I were a college student today, I wouldn’t wait around for a minute for my career center to place me in an internship. Why? Because the job market doesn’t work that way. Life doesn’t work that way, either. Your college career center isn’t going to be there for you after college to pick your apartments, find you a dentist in a new city, find you a boyfriend who calls you back – none of that. Remember: good things come to those who wait, but only what is left behind by those who hustle. Some would argue that things like a career center is what you are paying a college for. I would argue that if you are a communications student like I was, you are paying a college to support opportunities like a school newspaper etc for you to hone your skills in addition to internships. I didn’t pay St. John Fisher for daycare, thanks.
Again, I would not turn down an opportunity I really wanted because it didn’t pay. You might have to work weekends or do the internship part-time to make time during the week for a part-time job. Most importantly, remember: You are not above Starbucks!
(Side note: If we’re going to take up real estate in the NY Times to talk about issues of unpaid internships, let’s really focus on the people for whom this isn’t an option. Perhaps single parents maybe who don’t have time for school + unpaid internship + jobs?)
When I was an unpaid intern, I complained a lot to my unpaid intern friends about the unfairness of the fact that I wasn’t being paid. It was really exhausting to wake up, work out, go to an internship all day, go straight to the restaurant, work all night, then come home…and do that all week and/or weekend.
So was this always fun? No, it was stressful a lot of times. But it was my time to pay my dues. A little hard work never hurt anyone, in fact – all that hard work helped prepare me for what I’m doing now. And that’s exactly what internships are supposed to do – prepare you for your career. I am glad I did what I did and I would do it again in a heartbeat.
The NY Times article recalls the “plight” of unpaid WNBC intern Will Batson who “scrambled for shelter” during his summer internship in NYC. To Mr. Batson and other unpaid interns I say this:
One day, gentrified and successful, you will be married and live in a house on a cul-de-saq with things like “sofas” and “duvet covers.” You will have non coin-op washers and dryers from legitimate stores like Jordans and not Craigslist or the side of the road. Your fridge will be stocked with essentials other than Bud Light and hot sauce and when the hand soap runs out you’ll buy new handsoap instead of passive-aggressively re-filling it with water until your roommate buys new handsoap. You may have a salary, 401k and savings. Most of all you, will have security. You will have certainty. You will have a career. You may attend block parties or BBQ’s with other former unpaid interns. After a few too many you might talk about college or that crazy summer you spent in NYC couch-hopping and how much fun it was. You’ll laugh until your stomach hurts.
If we really focus on our opportunities and not our limitations things work out in the end. I hope so. I’ll let you know.
In your late teens and early twenties (your unpaid internship and entry-level years) I think there’s this balance of being really comfortable, but yet at the same time being really uncomfortable, with the uncertainty that defines those years. How so? What do I mean? My discomfort at ages 19 through 22ish with not knowing exactly what kind of PR/marketing/journalism (or maybe law school? I considered a lot of things…) job I wanted after graduation or not having a job lined up drove me to internships. Action comforted me because it gave me direction. Being “just” someone’s unpaid intern wasn’t the most glamorous role. But I was comforted by the certainty that I was definitely gaining great experience at that moment, yet simultaneously discomforted by the fact that I so badly wanted to do more than that and earn more than that one day.
So that’s where I am today: content yet restless. Happy but unsatisfied, I’m constantly driven to do better and learn more. Oh and I get paid now, not in tips, and I don’t wear a name-tag, apron or tuxedo to work. That still feels really cool.
The title of this post is a play on a quote from Eat Pray Love. During the “Pray” portion of the author’s year-long, post-divorce, tour de self reflection/indulgence, she takes a few months to meditate in India and tap into her spiritual side – ultimately deciding one truth: God exists in you, as you.
This isn’t the blog or time or place for me to contemplate the validity of that statement. But 2010 has taught me something somewhat similar: home isn’t a matter of location. It’s not found in other people. Home, your comfort, your point of reference, your strength, your truth… home exists in you, as you.
Home is: Choosing your choices
When I first moved to Boston in June 2009, I was extremely homesick all of the time. I went home every six or eight weeks. I constantly longed for my car, the suburbs, Wegmans, Tim Hortons, and most obviously – my family.
Something clicked for me when I was home this Thanksgiving. A year and a half later after moving to Boston, I woke up one morning and wanted coffee. Walking to Dunkin Donuts, like I do most mornings in Brookline – not driving to Tim Hortons like I was about to do in Buffalo – made more sense to me. I don’t know what it was. It was just what I wanted to do more than driving to Tim Hortons. I missed the city. (I drove to Dunkin Donuts.)
Later that day, I walked into Wegmans (a colossal, multi-department supermarket foodie-dreamland emporium) and was overwhelmed by the aisles and aisles of choices – I longed for the brevity and hustle of the Coolidge Corner Trader Joes. There’s one choice for Ketchup, orange juice or string cheese. And you will walk a mile and a half home in the rain with your bags. But somehow the thought of that shopping trip made more sense to me. I wanted to walk a mile and a half home in the rain from Trader Joes with my overpriced hippie groceries more than I wanted to drive home from Wegmans.
It wasn’t about Wegmans or Tim Hortons or even City Life in and of itself: I realized that day that I wanted what I have in Boston. I wanted my choice, without the regret, “what if’s?”, or look backs on the life I could’ve made in Upstate NY. Up until recently, I lived here with a constant voice in the background telling me it was selfish to move so far away from my parents, selfish to want to be here for career opportunities. There was a lot guilt – like I valued the wrong things or something.
I know this is what I always wanted though. I look at pictures of myself and I see myself as happy here. I can tell. I needed to get out of my own way and embrace my own decision.
Me, happy in Boston – February 2009. Night before a bunch of job interviews.
Me, happy in Boston – July 2010
I moved here in June 2009. But I chose my choice this year.
Home is: Your comfort zone
Sometimes they emphasize the idea of stepping outside of your comfort zone to get things done and reach the next level. I’ll offer a counter argument: I think if you dig deeper within yourself and identify what really drives you, what you really like to do and what you’re really good at – you actually get further. You’re happier, more relaxed and more productive when you discover and embrace your comfort zone. When you do what you want, you are who you are meant to be, and you live your right life: no matter where you are.
This year I finally had/gave myself the chance to ask: What would I wake up and do today if I didn’t do what someone else expected or wanted? I’m so thankful for that.
I realized: My natural speed is 150 miles an hour. I feel fulfilled when I feel productive. I don’t like to worry if things will get done – I just like to do them. I’m just not a lazy morning kind of gal, or a lazy evening kind of gal, really. I need Janet Time. I feel smothered without it. It’s just me. No more apologizing for it.
What activities make you feel alive, make you feel most like yourself when you’re doing them? When I’m up at 5 or 6 am going for a run, writing a blog post, in a leadership role, or drinking wine and having a one-on-one conversation with a friend – I feel like Janet. What makes you feel like you? Do more of those things.
Home is: Understanding where you came from but going where you’re going
Remember where you came from. Figure out where you’re going. Now, separate the two.
My life isn’t in Buffalo anymore, but my family is. It’s the people, not the location, that makes it a part of my core. My bubbly personality is my dad. “Sassy Janet” – my assertive side which I’m so happy to say is coming out more and more – is pretty much just me channeling my mother.
Every day in Boston someone hears my accent and asks me if I’m from Michigan or Chicago. I’ll never be from New England.
But the 150 miles an hour? The startup chick? This girl:
Me on my first day at oneforty
All that stuff is completely me. Remember where you’re from: embrace it, love it, talk about it – it’s what makes you unique. But you don’t have to over-explain and over-justify where you’re going to people who want differently for themselves.
Home is: Being at peace with the pieces
My definition of home isn’t about having it all figured out. Trust me, Hello Kitty debit card in hand – I’m hardly a real adult yet.
What this all means to me is taking the pieces that you do have figured out and clawing on tight to them. Focus on your strengths. And think about how you figured those things out, and how you can apply that process to the parts of your life that you don’t have figured out yet. Because that’s the beauty of home: once you find it, it translates to whatever, wherever.
