When I joined Deem, I was impressed by the diversity of our team. We had people of all ages, cultures and experience levels at the company. Deem now has offices in three countries with team members representing a multitude of backgrounds.
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Many of my colleagues are now sharing tight quarters with spouses or roommates. They’re taking Zoom calls from their dining room table or master bedroom. Pets and kids make frequent appearances, looking for affection and snacks.
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Simon Sinek starts his Ted talk with this question. He’s explaining the importance of starting with Why. How companies who clearly communicate their purpose and vision to employees and customers are inevitably successful.
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It’s easy to win an argument inside your head. But when you face an active audience, you have to be convincing. You have to step up your game. It’s a fundamental human motivation to increase status, self-esteem and reputation. Clive Thompson, author of Smarter Than You Think, calls this the audience effect – the shift in performance when we know some one is watching.
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It’s easy to forget Mark King runs a $1.7 billion dollar company when he tells you his mother said he’d amount to nothing. Born to middle class parents in America’s Midwest, King had a love for sports – baseball, basketball, football and golf - which led to a scholarship at Northern Illinois University. King amounted to something indeed.
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Imagine this: you’re sitting at your desk, performing the same task, over and over, day after day. You’re entering all the information from a 1980s telephone book into an excel spreadsheet and you just reached the Bs. You’ve got a long way to go. Now imagine this: you step away from your computer to take a break and you’re struck by an idea.
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Infant death is common in developing countries like Liberia and Ethiopia - one hundred out of a thousand. Many of these babies would have survived with access to incubators, but modern incubators are expensive and hard to maintain.
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China is a difficult country to decipher. It’s such a vast place – geographically and culturally - and I’ve seen only the tiniest slice. A slice made up mostly of Starwood hotels and polite general managers. Primly dressed staff usher me into modern banquet halls and a translator is always ready to assist.
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Dublin is like that song you’re not sure you like. It’s not a top 40 hit or a karaoke staple. It’s the song they bury on an album and play in the middle of a set. But if you listen enough, the lyrics catch your attention and the melody sticks. Suddenly you realize you love this song. It catches you and doesn’t let go.
When you think of a beach destination, you picture white picket fences and ice cream parlors. You see condominiums soldiering along the waterfront. You imagine clean white sand and patio seating. That's not the Rockaways. An hour from Manhattan and a single subway ride means easy access for the millions living in the five boroughs.
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I like Berlin. I admire its understated confidence, its calm demeanor, the orderliness of day-to-day life. If you ignore the occasional curmudgeon, the people are unfailingly pleasant and polite. For the depths of winter, they are remarkably happy. New Yorkers whine about the cold and the snow and the dark. Berliners are strikingly stoic by comparison.
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Prague airport looks like a shiny new department store. Our plane lands at 3pm on a Monday, a day you expect will be filled with the bustle of tourists and commuters, of people in business suits, of rambunctious children and school groups, but we are greeted by quiet hallways and bored customs officers, by efficient luggage carousels and the scent of expensive air freshener.
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We are comfortably seated on a sparkling train to Rome Termini. The lilt of Italian surrounds us like melodic background music. If not for the espresso we savored at a stand up café, I’d be lulled to sleep by the cadence of conversation.
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It’s common knowledge the British are plodding and apathetic. Their food is tedious, their weather grey, their culture insipid. Dull-eyed smokers cluster on street corners and commuters trudge from tube to office, their faces stamped with lassitude.
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I’m sitting alone in Cognac, a French restaurant in Hells Kitchen. I’m drinking a glass of Beaujolais Blanc and waiting for a very French sounding tart. It’s 6.50 on a Friday night. I don’t often find myself without company in a public place, in a restaurant. I’m usually careful to craft my days so that I’m at work, spending time with friends or staying in at home.
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When I was eight, dad took me and my sister sailing in a Hobie Cat. The three of us huddled on the center trampoline as dad maneuvered into the wind-chopped lake. After a reassuring wave to the rental guy and a few tangled lines, we made it to the middle of the lake where it was time to turn around.
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