Notes

Since I started riding a motorcycle, the most popular comment among friends and family is: "I'm not worried about you; it's everyone else on the road." I remember hearing the same when I was learning to drive a car. Had I not gone through the motorcycle training course, I may have shared this sentiment. Now, it feels like a hopeless outlook. 

I get it, though. It's another way of saying, "I trust your ability, but not the million other drivers out there." But at the same time, it suggests that I am the victim of my surroundings, and if something goes wrong, there's always someone else to blame.

I prefer to adopt a different perspective: I am in control.  No matter what comes my way, the outcome will come down to what I did or didn't do. ‍

When I flick the starter on my bike, I'm encouraged by this mindset. It invites me to do everything in my power to ensure a safe ride. Taking this level of ownership also provides an opportunity to learn and improve, rather than blaming conditions that are "out of my control" and repeating the same unwanted outcomes. It's the difference between blaming the driver ahead of me for stopping abruptly and admitting that I was following too closely behind. The former teaches me nothing. When it comes to leadership, I believe in the same approach.

Leadership means taking ownership over your decisions and actions, and as a manager, those of your team.

The other night, I took my wife, Dana, to try a local restaurant to celebrate her birthday. We ended up chatting with the rmaître d' who was filling four or five roles at once due to being short-staffed. He and just three other employees were serving 100-some guests on their own. He mentioned that they have had a tough time finding experienced help and went on to tell us a funny anecdote about a young kid they recently hired. Let's call him Sam.

On Sam's first day, the maître d' asked him to go around the restaurant with a pitcher of water. So, that's just what Sam did. No, not filling any cups — simply walking around with the pitcher.

It's no surprise that the maître d' was frustrated. He vented to his manager, who replied with this: what did you ask Sam to do? The maître d' realized it wasn't Sam's fault; it was his own. He hired Sam with little experience. Eager to do a good job, Sam loyally followed the maître d's instructions to a tee. 

The maître d' sat in silence, regretting the harsh feedback he had already given Sam. By taking ownership over the impact of actions, the maître d' saw an opportunity to improve his communication with all the wait staff, chat with Sam and help him get better.

I can empathize with the maître d' on many levels. Whether it's an employee poorly handling a client situation or a project going off the rails, it's easy to place blame and analyze everyone else's behavior. However, when I stop and look at my involvement, I always find there's more to gain.

As a manager, I sometimes struggle with navigating conversations where a direct report shares their experience dealing with an issue that I know is an issue but is large enough that it will take weeks or months to feel progress. I don't want to leave them hanging or downplay the situation to try and make them feel better. So, I listen. But, at times, I feel helpless. It can feel as though bricks are piling on my back one at a time, then soon enough, it's hard to walk.

I shared this experience with Chris, my coach, earlier this month. He responded with this: the person who offers the most hope is the one with the most influence.

All month long, I've carried this statement with me. I've even shared it with some folks on my team. It's a reminder that I don't need to provide a quick-fix solution to be a leader for my team. Nor should I become consumed by seemingly urgent issues. Instead, I can acknowledge the current reality then anchor the conversation on the future vision and provide hope. 

Hope helps us see that our challenges today are temporary, and frankly, the journey to overcome them is worthwhile. It means we'll achieve a brighter tomorrow. Without hope, we lay in bed at night, sleepless, asking ourselves: what's the point?

In keeping with the brick metaphor, Chris urged me to take the brick off my back, look to the future, and ask my direct report, "How can we lift this together?" It's no longer about me solving the problem alone or asking them to go figure it out. It's about working together to see what small steps we can take today to ensure long-term progress tomorrow.

Prior to hiring our Director of Client Services, Kate, our client relationships were managed by the Barrel partners or our Director of Business Development, Dan. In some cases, this worked well. In other cases, we missed opportunities to have meaningful conversations about our clients's businesses, ways of working together, and opportunities to better support them in achieving great outcomes.

When Kate joined, we officially introduced the Client Services team. Since then, Kate has been instrumental in bringing energy and momentum toward a future where account management and client service are unparalleled.

As we onboarded Kate onto existing client accounts, the partners took a backseat. We thought that staying too involved would not only confuse the client on points of contact but might get in the way of Client Services' ability to own the relationship. We did our best to transition Dan's accounts to Kate.

Flash forward to the present day. Our Client Services team is growing and almost every client is represented by Kate or an Account Director. However, we're noticing a gap.

Every client has a different set of stakeholders with a range of titles. But if we generalize for a moment, it is simple. There's the day-to-day contact and the day-to-day contact's boss. Sometimes, the day-to-day contact's boss has a boss, too.

In a nutshell, an Account Director's job is to:

• Make sure Barrel is delivering on what we set out to do
• Coordinate the Barrel team
• Solicit and address feedback
• Identify opportunities to better support the client

More often than not, an Account Director is working directly with the client's day-to-day contact. They may get face time with their boss, but these conversations often include other team members and focus on the work.

The gap is a missing dialogue around Barrel's performance as an agency and insight into the client's future trajectory. How is their team evolving? What is their top priority this year? Next year? What opportunities do they see? Where are they investing resources?

To make progress, we're experimenting with introducing an Executive Sponsor to every account. An Executive Sponsor can be a partner, Kate, or Dan. No matter who they are, they are a designated Barrel representative to periodically facilitate one-on-one conversations with the client's key stakeholder, typically C-Suite.

In some ways, the Executive Sponsor can act as a third-party participant, offering a unique perspective without being caught in the details of the day-to-day. They are there to listen and offer up ideas on how to strengthen collaboration.

For existing accounts, we will align on who will be the best rep. A number of clients already have an informal "executive sponsor" who acts mainly as an escalation point. This roll-out will simply confirm their role and open the door to additional conversations. For new accounts, leadership will look for opportunities to connect with key stakeholders early on to establish a relationship for future check-ins.

Prior to one-on-ones, it is critical that executive sponsors touch base with the internal Account Director for any recent developments of the account. The Executive Sponsor can use these points to solicit feedback during the conversation.

Some questions an Executive Sponsor might ask:

1. Thinking back to the start of our most recent engagement. Do you feel like we're on track for what we set out to do?
2. What have you appreciated most about our relationship? Where do you see an opportunity for improvement?
3. How could we improve the communication and collaboration between our teams?
4. Have there been any moments on the account that you think I should know about? Positive or critical?
5. What are you most excited about for the future of your business? Most concerned?
6. Where are you investing resources for next year? Any important initiatives in the works?
7. If you could wave a magic wand, how do you wish Barrel could deliver results on your key initiatives?

We're looking forward to kicking off this initiative with the team and seeing how it evolves in the coming months.

We talk a lot about outcomes at Barrel.

The outcomes our clients want to achieve as a business and as a brand.

The outcomes we want to achieve together as a team.

The outcomes we want to achieve as an agency.

In this context, an outcome is the desired result of our efforts. When we're scoping new business or kicking off new initiatives, it's easy to forget about outcomes as we attempt to map out the "perfect" process. We become consumed in WHAT we're doing without considering the WHY. An outcome is the WHY.

When we go down this path, we start making decisions based on personal preferences and risk missing our target. We become task-masters, thinking that if we can just get the task done right, we'll be good.

An outcome is:

• Client: To increase the average order value (AOV) of a client's commerce website.
• Team: To create an environment where feedback is welcomed and wanted.
• Agency: To attract X number of qualified leads per week.

An outcome is not:

• Client: To organize a UX immersion workshop.
• Team: To invite a feedback expert in for a workshop with the team.
• Agency: To launch a beautifully designed landing page on the agency's website.

Why Outcomes?

There are a number of benefits to focusing on outcomes. Let's take a look at a few I've experienced.

Promotes learning

Consider a person looking to get fit and healthy. If they choose to hire a personal trainer, they don’t do it because of the nuances of their programming. If during the sales process, that's all the trainer talks about, the potential trainee may appreciate the trainer's enthusiasm for fitness but wonder if they can actually help them. In contrast, if the trainer gets curious about the trainee's outcomes and shares how they've achieved similar results with others, the trainee is bound to hire them.

By focusing on the trainee's outcomes, the trainer may also find that their typical process may need to evolve. Perhaps the trainee has a background lifting weights and won't need the same basic training upfront. By re-thinking their process, they'll not only learn something new, but they'll get better results.

Outcomes push us to look beyond ourselves. When we take the time to understand an outcome, we're forced to seek out new perspectives and question what we know. The more we focus on outcomes, the more we re-think old beliefs, and the more we learn.

Invites innovation & experimentation

The beauty of outcomes is that they anchor us on a future result, not the path to get there. Outcomes give us the permission to experiment. Sure, we may have a proven process or set of best practices but if along the way, we face an unforeseen challenge, we'll be ready to pivot.

Let's take the example mentioned above. Let's say that as an agency, we're looking to amplify qualified leads coming in each week. We do our research and discover a landing page template that has generated results for other agencies. Within a week, we design and launch a new landing page that speaks to our positioning.

Over the next few weeks, we see some uptick in qualified leads but not at all what we were hoping for. We don't give up. We don't change the copy and hope for the best. We realign on our outcome. We dig into what it means to be "qualified" and discover that there's a gap in understanding where clients see the most value in our partnerships.

We decide that interviewing key clients and getting their take on the landing page may generate helpful feedback. These insights inspire us to test multiple landing pages and target new type of potential clients. In the process, we go deeper on the services that our clients find most valuable. We not only end up generating new qualified leads but grow existing accounts along the way.

Encourages ownership

There's an innate sense of ownership that comes with centering ourselves on outcomes. As a manager, I see this every day.

There have been times where I lay out a process that I think will achieve a result. I anchor the team on what needs to happen at every step and how to move the process along. The trouble with this approach is that the team is more concerned about doing WHAT I asked them to do, not WHY they're doing it. When they hit a roadblock, they're lost, looking for the user manual on how to troubleshoot the issue. Well, unfortunately, the manual doesn't exist!

By shifting the team's focus from the process to the outcome, the team can take ownership of the work. They're no longer trying to get it "right," they're working together to achieve results. They're not only encouraged to experiment and innovate, but they understand how their efforts align with a greater purpose. This ignites a hunger to find the opportunity in setbacks and a passion to see the project through, no matter how the journey unfolds.

One-on-one time with employees, especially direct reports, is precious. But what happens when it feels like there’s nothing to talk about? Do you end early and give them the time back?

I remember asking myself this question during a one-on-one a number of years ago. It helped me see that it was up to me to create value in my one-on-ones; I couldn’t rely on the employee I was meeting with. That meant that I needed to come prepared with questions and a clear idea of what I hoped to create during our time together. Not every employee is an open book, especially when they're new.

The aforementioned one-on-one was with a junior designer for their 3-month check-in, a ritual at the time to get a read on how new hires were settling into the team and role. For the purpose of this story, I'll refer to the employee as Melanie.

We were at the office meeting in a conference room known as The Cellar, a dimly lit, brick-walled room housing the stash of bourbon that we poured on Fridays to toast to the week. Since expanding our office's footprint a few years ago, we sadly said goodbye to The Cellar.

Melanie was a particularly positive person. Always smiling, even in the face of a new hurdle. Despite having just joined the team, her fellow team members were already remarking on how she brought a lightness to tense situations.

I kicked off our conversation with a simple question, how are things going? Eyes wide with optimism, Melanie responded, "Good." I'll admit, I was hoping for more… just good? Silence filled the room and my mind wandered to second grade. This must have been how my parents felt when I came home from school.

• Mom: How was your day!?
• Me: Okay...
• Mom: Just okay?

Melanie and I had an hour blocked off. There had to be more to discuss than "Good!" I reminded myself why Melanie and I were meeting in the first place. How is she feeling about her work? Her role? Working with the team?

Just days before, I chatted with the lead designer on Melanie's current project and heard that it got off to a shaky start. I used this as an opportunity to dig in and asked: How has your experience been working with [lead designer] on your current project? She went on to talk about how much she enjoyed the project, a positive take as expected.

As Melanie's described her enthusiasm toward the project, I wondered if she sensed the same shakiness that the lead designer had. I was upfront about my conversation with them and asked what Melanie felt contributed to the last-minute feedback and late nights.

The same hour that once seemed like it might be a long painful trek now felt like a sprint. We were moving fast and without any time constraint, probably would have gone for another hour.

By the end of our conversation, we had uncovered areas of opportunity for Melanie to grow as a collaborator and even identified a few pieces of feedback for the lead designer. Feedback that otherwise would not have been discovered and therefore, never shared.

I've carried this experience with me for some time now. That one hour with Melanie underscored a lesson that I was used to applying when working with clients but hadn't yet considered as a manager.

If I lead with ambiguity when talking to my direct report, client, colleague, friend, wife, family, or future child, I can only expect more ambiguity in return. To create engagement and value, I need to first know what I'm looking to achieve and then, be specific.

It's the difference between "How is your day going?" and "You had a big presentation this morning! How did the client react to our insights?" Both help get a sense of the employee's state of being, but the latter inspires detail and can be a great jumping-off point for a much deeper conversation.

A few weeks ago, I learned a valuable lesson after chatting with co-workers. Let's call them Jared and Joan. I meet with Jared and Joan weekly, so we are comfortable being open with each other and speaking freely. Jared was dealing with a situation I'd dealt with in the past, so I felt like I might be able to offer some helpful advice. After he talked through what was going on, I jumped in to provide insight.

One piece of advice I shared was to seek context from the other party involved before making assumptions. As the words left my mouth and lingered in the air, I realized I was doing just the opposite. Here I was offering advice without really understanding the nuances of Jared's situation. I assumed he was asking for guidance and hadn't tried the tactics that I thought might improve the situation.

Jared responded with more context and kindly shared how he tried a few similar tactics in the past. Our meeting was coming to a close, so we wrapped up and moved on.

After the meeting, Joan and I caught up. I was curious to hear her perspective on how I handled the discussion. Sure enough, she observed the same thing I did.

It didn't matter how good my intentions were. By not getting curious, my advice came off as if I knew better than Jared and implied that he was doing something wrong. Not the case! I could see that my approach was making Jared somewhat defensive and resistant.

Albeit a short interaction, it was a powerful reminder to lead with curiosity. When I think I can help someone navigate a situation, it doesn't matter how strong our relationship is. It is critical to ask questions and dig deeper before offering any insight. Gathering context will not only show a desire to learn and understand, but it will also make the conversation that much more productive by being better informed by the other person's reality.

My friend, Sara, reshared this post from Adam Grant on LinkedIn yesterday, and it resonated quite a bit. As I progress in different areas of my life, I find that growth is as much about learning as it is about unlearning.

When we enter the world as babies, we are a blank canvas. We soak in everything and can pick up just about anything over time. We are not afraid until we have an experience that scares us. We feel like we can conquer the world until someone tells us otherwise, or we suffer pain, or we hit a roadblock.

For better or worse, these experiences shape us, the way we see ourselves and the world.

Grant refers to unlearning as having the integrity to admit when you were wrong. While I agree, I think it goes deeper. To me, it's having the integrity to question your beliefs about yourself and the world.

I used to set goals, looking for answers on how to make progress. At work and home, I didn't realize how my own beliefs were holding me back. I had to unlearn to move forward.

Some examples that came to mind when I read Grant's post:

I'd imagine what it would like to be fit, but for years, I'd steer clear of exercise, thinking, "I'm the music and art kid. I'm not supposed to be fit. I don't play sports." Then, I went to college and met art kids who went to the gym. It took time to see myself differently, but I've enjoyed exploring fitness ever since. Getting up on stage to compete in powerlifting competitions meant so much to me because it was so far out of what I thought possible for myself. Funny enough, most of my powerlifting crew was in a creative field.

I think back to years of complaining about stomach aches, searching for answers. Meanwhile, I believed that a meal wasn't a meal without meat. Eating a plant-based diet seemed absurd, so I never entertained it. When I learned about the impact of constant meat consumption, I decided to experiment with cooking plant-based proteins like tofu and seitan. I found that I not only enjoy eating plant-based meals but guess what? No stomach aches.

This week, I started reading Grant's book Think Again which dives further into this concept. I'm enjoying it so far and look forward to continue practicing how to unlearn.

Proud to share Barrel's new reel (sound on):

Years ago, the idea of creating a reel seemed complex and arduous. We didn't have any well-versed "animators" on the team so we figured it would take 10x longer than necessary. At one point, we tried hiring a freelancer. However, we ended up pausing the project when they proposed a much longer timeline and heftier budget than expected.

I'm not sure how much time passed, but eventually, we revisited the project with our internal team. I realized that we spent more time over the years talking about how difficult it would be and trying to come up with the perfect approach than just giving it a shot and taking small steps.

I enlisted Nick, Designer - now Senior Designer, to help make it happen. We put our heads together and reviewed references before sketching out what we hoped to create. We set up regular check-ins, and within weeks, Nick had a working file. Before we knew it, we had a final reel.

I'm pretty sure I got goosebumps watching it through for the first time, thinking back on all the time spent questioning ourselves in the years prior.

It's been a while since we launched that reel. With some exciting recent launches, we knew it needed a refresh. For any motion nerds reading this, we built the first reel by treating each client project as a clip in After Effects, making it easy to add, remove, and re-arrange projects in the future.

With a tight system in place, the team was able to jump in and update the reel with confidence. Big props to Nate, Senior Designer, with help from Jennifer, Design Intern, and Eric, Junior Designer.

All of this is a good reminder of three important lessons:

1. Don't lead with doubt, in yourself or your team.
2. Never hesitate to take the first step.
3. The time spent building systems is time well spent. Without them, you never stop reinventing the wheel. With them, you can build upon them, improving the process with every step.

Since relocating to PA from Brooklyn, my fitness routine has been all over the place. Well, that's actually true of the last year or so! While I still make it a point to exercise at least four times per week, I miss training in the gym on a program and competing!

I plan to join a local gym in the next few weeks and figure out my next fitness goal. However, for now, exercising with Peloton videos, repeating workouts from Park Slope Crossfit's Zoom days, and trying out various online programs are enough to keep me going.

No matter what I do, I like to keep in mind these suggestions from Todd Hargrove's book, Playing With Movement:

"If you want to 'play' with fitness as a way to improve general health, here are some 'rules of the game' to keep in mind. Have as much fun as possible within these basic constraints:

• Aim for at least half an hour and up to two hours of physical activity almost every day.
• Movement should be varied in terms of volume, intensity and type. Most activity can be fairly light. Walking is the most natural and beneficial movement for human beings.
• Occasionally include some high intensity work that significantly challenges your strength, power, and/or capacity to sustain high energy output for a short period of time. Climbing, running and resistance training are logical choices.
• Include movements that challenge coordination, balance, and range of motion. Or to put this in even simpler terms: Move around a lot at a slow easy pace. Frequently move with some urgency or pick up something heavy. Every once in a while, move like your life depends on it."

They're a great reminder that exercise can and should be fun, and sometimes, simply going for a long walk is better than not moving at all.

There are two approaches that I commonly seen taken to resourcing projects:

1. There are people and tasks. Like a game of Tetris, as tasks flow in, the goal is merely to arrange them on each person's schedule, avoiding gaps.
2. There are people and tasks. Every person has a unique ability and future vision. Tasks are an opportunity to challenge people and help them grow, moving them closer toward their vision.

As much as I'd like to say that the former works well in a setting like a supermarket, I can't get on board. Having spent most of my teen years working at Wegmans, I find the latter approach has merit, no matter what the work entails.

I started at Wegmans pushing carts and ringing up customers. Through my several years there, I did everything from stocking shelves to managing disgruntled customers at the customer service desk to making drinks in the coffee shop. Somewhere along the line, I became a Front End Coordinator, scheduling cashiers for the day and addressing any issues during a customer's checkout.

I was always learning, and that variety kept me going. If it wasn't for that, I don't know that I would have stayed as long. I still apply what I learned at Wegmans to my life and work today.

All in all, I believe that people tend to stick around longer when they feel challenged in their job and see their efforts moving them forward. In that way, I see no difference between shifting an employee from cashier to customer service and assigning a designer on their first e-commerce project.

I had a refreshing 1-1 today with our design director, Christine. I always look forward to our Friday meetings, but today was particularly special because we tried something new.

A few weeks ago, I introduced a new format to organize our conversations in Notion. In addition to keeping shared notes, there's now a place to track growth areas and capture wins. I also pitched the idea of distinguishing between day-to-day conversations and higher-level visioning, which could happen monthly. Christine welcomed the idea, and we decided that the last weekly 1-1 of the month would focus on taking a step back to see the big picture. Today was the first of these meetings.

It was energizing to invite Christine into some of the works-in-progress around vision and team rituals that I'm currently exploring. She had great insights and feedback, adding momentum and inspiring me to keep going. We also uncovered new areas of opportunity for our team that I'm excited to develop further.

I'm looking forward to continuing these higher-level visioning sessions alongside Christine's regular 1-1s while also experimenting with the other managers on my team. I see them morphing into conversations not only around our team's development but our personal development, specifically how we can continue to show up as stronger leaders.

When I see an employee working late or looking overwhelmed, it is my instinct to jump in with them, discuss the work causing the late nights, and help course-correct. At first, everything usually evens out, but too often, the cycle repeats months or even weeks later. If nothing changes, the employee eventually moves on, citing burnout as the cause.

Before we get too far, let's align on burnout. Burnout is when an employee feels mentally drained. They stop caring about the work and have no motivation to continue. You might think of burnout as being stuck in a dark hole. The way out feels unreachable, and the light is slowly dimming. The employee has lost all hope for change and only sees themselves falling deeper.

Not fun! In any way, shape, or form. While an unrealistic workload can be a contributing factor, I think there's more to the story.

Simply put, burnout is complex. It is not going away, especially in our increasing remote workforce, where our deskspace may be steps away from where we lay our head to rest. Combine this with care and love for our work, and it can be pretty hard to disconnect.

Looking back to the earliest days of my career, I'd think nothing of staying at the office past 6 pm. Was it because I said yes too much? Sometimes. Was that because I wanted to learn as much as I could? Always. Did I get burned out? No.

What kept me going through those exhausting moments was that I knew my contributions served the client's desired outcome. In addition, I saw these experiences were fueling my growth. I've been lucky to work with supportive leaders who supported me in finding my direction forward, personally and professionally.

When an employee cites burnout as they walk out the door, they may attribute their current emotional state solely to having too much on their plate, but deep down, it's likely they concluded that it was all for nothing.

In the book, An Everyone Culture, authors Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey state, "research shows that the single biggest cause of work burnout is not work overload, but working too long without experiencing your own personal development."

In a company setting, everyone may be aligned and fighting for the same outcomes, but there's no hiding that each of us wants to be getting better through the process. I don't necessarily mean getting promoted or changing titles, which doesn't always reflect growth; I mean feeling challenged, overcoming hurdles, and seeing positive change in yourself. If this is not true of our experience, chances are we'll start questioning whether our current position is the right fit.

Keeping this in mind, when I notice an employee looking swamped, I do my best to fight the instinct to intervene with assumptions. Even with the best intentions, I've learned the hard way that taking work off their shoulders can have unintended consequences, like robbing them of a growth opportunity, making them feel like they couldn't succeed on their own, or taking them away from work that they love. Each of these can create an impact that sticks.

Instead, I try to lead with curiosity and unpack what might be contributing to their anxiety.

• Do they feel supported in their work?
• Are they happy in their role?
• What excites them most about what they do? Least?
• Do they see themselves progressing in their goals?
• Are they being recognized or acknowledged for their contributions?

From career ambitions to time management, these conversations can yield incredible insights. If one of the challenges is the amount of work, I can help them delegate it. The beauty is that we can decide together while also helping them stay on track with their personal development.

I love when people ask me questions that I've never answered before. In most cases, I can take a few moments to form an opinion and find my way to a response. In certain instances, it requires a follow-up.

Today, a potential candidate asked me: What type of personality does Barrel look for in a candidate? Who would be a good fit? This question was one of those questions.

In the moment, I'll be honest, I just started thinking out loud. Long after the call ended, my mind was still going. Hence why we're here now!

Anyway, my first thought was that we don't look for a personality type. What I love about our team is the mix of individuals that, together, make Barrel a special (virtual) place to come to work every day.

Second, what is a personality type anyway? When you think about it, it's kinda silly to label anyone as "outgoing" or "reserved." We all have our nuances, and as a proponent of personal growth, I believe we change a little bit with every passing day and experience.

As I continued with my stream of consciousness, I thought about each of our core values. We call them the Four C's:

• Collaboration
• Community
• Creativity
• Candor

I realized that the first three values are harder to achieve without the last, candor.

Collaboration. To collaborate and work toward a shared solution, we must be open, honest, and willing to give and receive feedback, judgment-free. Clients and employees alike.

Community. The communities that make us feel welcome and supported are those that accept us for who we are. It takes vulnerability to put our whole selves out there. To accept and be accepted. If we cannot be open and honest, there is a lack of trust. Without trust, a true sense of community may be out of reach.

Creativity. To me, being creative requires us to be in touch with ourselves, our fellow human beings, and our world. If we are unwilling to open our minds and listen to any of these three, we're missing out on what it means to be creative. To be inspired and learn from all that surrounds us, fueling our innovation.

So, what does this all mean?

It's not about personality types. It is about how we work together, treat one another, and discover new possibilities. At Barrel, candor is a priority. When I think about those who thrive in our company culture, it is those who openly share their ideas and accept others when they reciprocate. It is those who are unafraid to give feedback and receive feedback. They see props and criticism as the same: a tool for future growth.

Is Barrel some dreamland where everyone is honest and never leaving things unsaid? No. For everyone, including me, it is a neverending work-in-progress. However, when you make something a priority, that means you keep it top of mind in everything you do. From team meetings to debriefs to performance reviews, we look for opportunities to practice candor together every day, getting a little better and a little more open at every step.

Years ago, I learned a valuable lesson about communication when a client chose not to continue our relationship.

While we did some preliminary research when scoping out the project, we had an aggressive timeline to meet, so we moved forward with many stones left unturned.

Weeks into the project, we realized that the time buffer we had given ourselves was not enough. The client agreed to a launch date a few days later than planned. Little did we know, that was the beginning of the end.

It wasn't the delay that bothered them; it was all that happened leading up to launch. We knew we had our work cut out for us, so we put our heads down and got to work. What we didn't realize was the anxiety the client was feeling.

Our work was to update the website to support the launch of an exciting new collection of products. These products had been in the works for almost a year, so hitting the timeline was critical. We took this very seriously, but that didn't matter if it wasn't clear to the client.

There we were, doing everything we could to ship a quality product, on-time. Sometimes, putting in late nights. What did the client see? Nothing. We went into a hole, so the client had no idea what was going on.

By the time we resurfaced, days before launch, their imagination had run wild. It didn't matter how far along we were. They had lost trust. The anxiety of not knowing whether or not we were on track far outweighed any progress.

I did not know any of this, by the way, when we were in the thick of it. We could sense the client's discontent, but it wasn't until after launch, when I reached out to the client to chat, that I understood why. Luckily, we ended on good terms. About a year later, they actually came back willing to give us another chance, but the project fell through.

I've taken this experience to heart. It was one of the first accounts where I led the team, so it hit particularly hard. I felt like I let them down, but I'm grateful for what the experience taught me: bending over backward for a client doesn't strengthen trust in the relationship if they get left in the dark.

Since then, we've introduced rituals like recap documents and weekly status calls and established new ways to involve the client more in our process. As important as it is to err on over-communication, we've found that clients often feel most energized about the work when they feel like they have a hand in it.

We've come a long way, and I'm excited to continue working on our system for managing projects because when we're going at full steam, it's easy to forget to pop up and say, "Hey client, here's what's happening!" The goal is that we never have to remind ourselves; it's second nature.

When I first started hiring folks, I viewed reference calls as a chance to verify what I heard in the interview. Then, the more calls I got on, the more my mindset changed. I found that I learned so more about the candidate when I got curious.

What was it like collaborating with them?
What did they find most exciting about their work?
How did they handle feedback?

If we hired the candidate, it felt great. I learned more about their working style, strengths, and opportunities, creating a solid foundation for our relationship. 

I realized that if verifying information was all I was after, there was no trust in the relationship, and they hadn't even joined the team! I started trusting what I heard and, instead of verifying, used it to guide what areas to go deeper on. 

These days, I enjoy reference calls quite a bit. For me, they are just as important as the interview itself, and each delivers a unique value. In the interview, you get to learn about the candidate's background and what led them to apply to work with you. In the reference calls, you have an opportunity to get an inside look at what it might be like to work alongside them, from past managers, co-workers, and in some cases, direct reports.

Together, these can paint a full picture of the individual, giving you that much more background to set them up for success in their new role should you choose to hire them.