Creative Ways of Saying No
For some, saying “no” is a challenge unlike any other. Here are a few of our preferred approaches for saying “no” nicely and professionally. Feel free to adopt the vocabulary and make it your own. Practicing in the mirror (or […]
December 2016 Tasks
Message from Elaine As 2016 crawls to a close, we wanted to focus on protecting creative, personal, and professional boundaries, particularly with the holiday season in mind. As desperately as we all crave community and support from those who value […]
A Process for Hiring Help
Occasionally, artists will ask me about a process for finding support. Usually, this comes up in the context of a solo-preneur wanting to hire his or her first employee (a sort of general assistant/marketing person), but the same process can […]
Niceworking. It Isn’t Awful.
One of the best headlines I’ve seen this year was in Inc. magazine. It said, “The Most Creative Types are Introverts. And Extroverts.” I absolutely love the absurdist contradiction contained – and in fact emphasized – in that headline. […]
Advisors & Experts: What You Need to Know
Last week we talked about building a core community of support – your own “dream team” of mentors, advocates, and technical experts who support your creativity. In the not-for-profit world, such support often exists for free in the form […]
Building A Dream Team
Remember the 1992 U.S. Men’s Olympic Basketball team? The team was called in increasingly grandiose terms “the greatest collection of basketball talent on the planet” (Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame) and “the greatest sports team ever assembled” (Bob Costas). It […]
November 2016 Tasks
Message From Elaine People can be awful, can’t they? Never has that been more evident than in this political season. Stories about troubled relationships, tense family exchanges, and neighborly grudges fill our news feeds. It would be easy to […]
Docs to Keep Handy
It is really hard to manage time when things keep changing. And in a creative career, everything is always changing. Rarely do two projects look exactly the same. (Thank goodness.) Rarely do two clients want exactly the same thing. Rarely […]
The Secret to Time Management
Spoiler alert: There is no secret to time management. Oh sure, there are plenty of “secrets” each more life-hacky than the one before. But if you’re looking for a secret that comes with an embedded definite article (THE secret, THE […]
Room to Breathe
I often ask my students to read “The ‘Busy’ Trap,” a delightful personal essay by Tim Kreider about the temptation to rely on our own busyness, whether actual or self-imposed, as a “hedge against emptiness” or a confirmation of our […]
