71 Things I Know: Lessons from the Workforce

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As we're in the midst of graduation ceremonies, end-of-fiscal-year performance reviews, and nostalgic reunions , I find myself reflecting on my journey in the workforce. Inspired by Jerry Seinfeld’s 2024 Duke commencement speech and "Things I know" posts (x50 and x100 ), here are 71 insights I’ve learned along the way that have shaped my career and personal growth.

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Career Growth and Development

1.????Early Career: At the beginning of your career, say “yes” to all kinds of projects, opportunities, stretch assignments.?

2.??? Prioritization: Saying “not now” means you’re weighing priorities and choosing to not spread yourself thin. While it may be hard to say goodbye to missed chances, it’s more gratifying to complete what you’re committed to.?

3.????Self-Study: Self-study can be one of the greatest ways to level up, read business publications, listen to podcasts, invest in that external course.?

4.??? Practice Interview Skills: It’s healthy to interview seriously once a year. It’s a decision to stay in a role, with a company, as much as it is to go.?

5.??? When you leave, know your “why.” Not that you need to share this with anyone, it’ll make your decision clearer. (Credit to a former mentor)

6.????“The grass isn’t necessarily greener, it’s a different shade of green” (Credit to former colleague)?

7.????Seek Guidance: Interested in a new city, a different role, a specific company? Talk to someone who is doing just that. They’ll share first-hand what it took to get there, from strategy to sacrifices, and how their original expectations evolved.?

8.????Goal of the Role: There are roles to heal, roles to grow, roles to be uncomfortable, roles to learn as much as you possibly can.?

9.????Steady State: Your career is a marathon, not a sprint to the next promotion.?

10.?? You can do anything for a year. We’re unlikely to get every company, every role just right the first time. Do your best with the opportunity you’re in now.?

11.?? 70/20/10: 70% learned through on-the-job experiences, 20% learned through social support systems (mentorship, managers, peers), and 10% learned through formalized programs (classes, certifications).

12.?? Tell ‘em what you want: No one can guess what your career aspirations might be. Tell them and they can better help you get to where you want to be. I’d like to be president of a company, eventually own my own philanthropy. The next stage I see in my career is a people leader with direct reports. I’ll keep sharing that with anyone who listens!

13. ??Perks! Figure out all the cool perks at your company. Corporate programs can include matching volunteer hours with corporate dollars donated, financial health incentives (including getting paid to meet with health coaches on Virgin Pulse), and partnerships with professional organizations (like IFT). These add-ons are often overlooked parts of the compensation package.?

14.? ?Swing for the biggest opportunities. Apply for your MBA at Stanford and don’t get in. Start an investment firm with your husband and see the joy in his eyes. Get the dream internship and get put on a performance improvement plan. Move across the country to a city brimming with culture. Start a food vlog that doesn’t make it past three episodes. I know not everything has worked out the way I imagined (okay, planned), I can’t imagine life without having ever tried.?

15.? ?No one will ever care about your development and future as much as you do. Go make your own luck in the world! Jesse Itzler has several awe inducing stories from pitching Coca-Cola with Matt Damon’s help to interviewing clients on his private plane startup to flying across the country to get a demo track. Create the door for others to knock on.?

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Networking and Mentorship

16.?? Mentorship: Mentorship comes from senior colleagues, young colleagues and your peers. It can be a formal or informal connection, there when you least realize it’s needed.?Networking: Lean in to your network long before you think you need them. Just when you’ve got it all figured out. They’ll remind you how much there is yet to learn.?

17.?? Squad Goals: Surround yourself with those you admire and want to learn from. Friends who live abroad, friends who work in non profits, friends who are fantastic at strategy, friends who help you better yourself, friends who ground you.?

18.?? ?“Success is making those who believed in you look brilliant” (Credit to Vikram Ghosh for sharing this quote).

19.?? Having a best friend at work makes the hard days more bearable and the best days more enjoyable.?

20.?? Figure out your people! The hype person that gets you stoked. The reflective mentor to soundboard with. The coworker that’ll share something with everyone and anyone when you want to get word out. The challenger that’ll keep you honest and offer a dissenting opinion.?

21.?? Diversity of Thought: I love that we don’t all think the same way nor make decisions the same way. It’s part of the incredible ecosystem that keeps this world humming with activity.?

22.?? The friends and colleagues who show up for you in your time of need says more than when the seas are calm and the heel steady. Remember that.?

23.?? Something tells me I like understanding social structures, or at least I’ve spent a lot of time reading more. Another that’s stuck with me is types of social capital. What type of capital are you bringing to the table? Cultural (non-financial, education), political (influence, power, support), beauty (appearance, attractiveness), emotional (resilient, empathy), linguistic (proficient in multiple languages), morality (ethical, integrity), network (access to information, systems).

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Personal and Professional Balance

24.?? Healthy Boundaries: Burnout is not a badge of honor. It’s a sign of boundaries either crossed or non-existent.?

25.?? Self-Care: Take the vacation days to refresh. Take the sick days to recuperate. Take time away to mourn others. Take time to care for those you love. Life is too short, six months will pass by in the blink of an eye.?The work will be there when you return.

26.?? Physical and Mental Health: Taking care of your mental and physical health will pay dividends to your career engagement. A workout in the morning sets you up with endorphins, demonstrates discipline, and creates urgency for action. Healthy nutritious meals boost creativity and productivity.?

27.?? Know Thyself: Get to know yourself, your biases, your strengths, your weaknesses. Personality assessments like DiSC, StrengthsFinder, Myers Briggs are a way to do this. Enneagram has been my favorite, as it discusses core motivations. (P.S. Once you get to know yourself, you’ll also be interested to learn more about others around you.)?

28.?? Flex Schedule: Advocate for your unique situation with your manager, especially when it comes to work conditions. Colleagues have shown how decreasing the number of work hours to have Friday off, flexing the work week hours into the evenings for a half day Friday, and moving into a less demanding role were all ways to manage life changes.?

29.?? Travel Tips: Traveling for work has its pros and cons. Pros: Meeting customers and colleagues in person, building energy with those around you, opportunity to meet new people, getting in to the details of a project, seeing how others get their work done, tasting great prototypes, finally connecting with that coworker, frequent flyer programs. Cons: Long days from airplanes to all day meetings to dinners, an extrovert’s world of engagement, difficulty in getting workouts in, higher focus on drinking alcohol and big portion sizes, prep work in personal life before leaving, time away from loved ones. Figure out how you can personally manage: bullet train your way through or step out before post dinner drinks, maximizing your daily schedule or adjusting sleep schedules in the week before. Only you know yourself best!?

30.?? Zooms / Teams / Skype: Please don’t apologize for a pet barking in the background or kids on camera when they come home from school. If you’re working from home, we get it! The pandemic changed how we see one another’s lives and brought us in to each other’s homes.?

31.?? Environment: The whole nature side of the nature vs. nurture debate. Not every city or country is going to be a fit with your values and personality. Here in LA there’s a higher emphasis on new money, entrepreneurial ideas, and the outdoors. Some parts of that align with my Midwestern upbringing (hiking, performing arts), while others align with who I’ve become as an adult (open to innovation, value diversity and other cultures, proximity to trends), and others not at all (plastic surgery, fast fashion). All of these are a part of the diversity I bring into the workplace as a remote employee for a global company.?

32.?? Resumes: Of course there are career resumes, what’s on your life resume? While this is a professional platform, I’m fascinated to hear about coworkers riding the MS150, traveling abroad to a new continent, adopting a pet. I’m proud of my 200 hour yoga teaching certification and the process it took to get that accreditation.?

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Effective Communication

33.?? Figure out management’s communication style. Are they numbers driven? Get comfortable with financial statements. Persuaded with emotion? Tell a compelling story. Incentivized by ego and appearances? Share genuine compliments and speak highly of them in front of their leader. When you speak their love language, it’ll help you be more compelling in your asks.?

34.?? Manager Relations: Your manager can’t read your mind, help them help you whether it’s a development goal, struggles you’re having, managing bandwidth. ?

35.?? I recommend bringing others along in your journey. While they may be in the inner circle or a passing acquaintance, this life is too short to not live out your fullest potential. You deserve to become the greatest version of yourself possible. And I know that’s possible when we don’t go at it alone.?

36.?? Problem-Solving: Others appreciate when you bring forward solutions and not only problems. I’ll never forget when my friend Jeni came to us at our wedding: “We’re out of the original quantity of wine you’d allocated. We can encourage guests to shift to beer kegs, purchase additional cases of wine for $X, or make no changes. What would you like to do?” With much on our minds, it helped to refocus the problem into potential solutions. More wine, please! ???

37.?? Feedback: Feedback is the opinion and assessment of others. Some insights are perceptive and given to build on to reach your potential self. Other comments are based on envy, come from the ego. Learn to discern the difference, peers are often harshest on one another.?

38.?? Celebrate Milestones: Celebrate the incredible milestones of life that bind us together, from birthdays to graduations to buying your first house to moving across the world to promotions to retirements. Spread joy into the world!?

39.?? Open-Ended Questions: Try asking an open-ended question rather than close ended question, see what surprising nuggets the recipient shares. “What are you able to share about what you’ve been working on recently?” “How might we create a solution together” “Tell me more about the consumers’ needs with this brand.”

40.?? Human, All too Human: Even CEOs have to go to the bathroom and get dressed in the morning. Remember this if you ever feel intimated by someone more senior, they were once starting out and trying to find their way too.?

41.?? When someone asks “How are you?” Share as much or as little as you’d like. I’ve learned that by sharing a nugget about a concert I went to, an article I read, or a project I’m working on can open doors through conversation.?

42.?? Others will remember how you made them feel, rarely the words that you say.

43.?? When transitioning from a technical to commercial role, I quickly learned the type of information valued. As a food scientist, design of experiments, methodology, scientific reports, and supplier relationships were critical. Whereas in a marketing role, language around the brand messaging, innovation pipeline for retailers, strategy and campaigns for the upcoming year, and PR relationships were the norm. Emphasis was placed on different types of details, numbers from a trial were mirrored by numbers from a P&L statement. Now, being able to bridge this technical-commercial communication chasm is a space I inhabit with gusto.?

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Organizational Skills

44.?? Systems and Efficiency: Leverage systems to save your memory capacity. Have an upcoming appointment? Ask Siri to set a reminder. Need to create headspace for deep work? Set a recurring meeting appointment on the calendar. Meeting with a colleague? Take notes in OneNote. Have a birthday, colleagues favorite cake flavor, family members to recall? Create a system to track it like a file folder or note on your desktop. Remembering a colleague’s birthday (because you set a recurring calendar reminder) builds connection and a sense of community.?

45.?? Time Management: How you allocate your time demonstrates what you value. If you set a goal of 20% time for mentorship, it’ll show in the information you’re bringing in and connections being made. If you’re reading scientific articles or news articles, bring those insights back in to the organization.?

46.?? Not Fridays: Friday afternoon meetings are often the least preferred time of the week to meet. Certainly urgent issues come up, tackle those of course! But if it’s a long-range planning session, you’ve likely lost your audience from the moment the notice was sent. Colleagues want to catch up on their own work or head to the cabin up north early. Try and find a different day instead.?

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Professional Mindset

47.?? Locus of Control: Acknowledge what’s in your locus of control. Let go of everything else.?

48.?? Polarities vs. Problems: Know the difference between what’s a polarity to manage and a problem to solve.?A problem usually has a solution that exists. If traditional problem-solving skills are applied to a polarity, it will exacerbate the dilemma. A polarity is an ongoing, likely unsolvable paradox, conundrum, or contradiction.

49.?? Adaptability: Get comfortable feeling uncomfortable. Through discomfort, we forge new skills and build character, transforming into a sparkling diamond.

50.?? Continuous Learning: You’re never too old to learn new things! Go get that project management certification, join the float pool at the hospital, start running marathons, travel the world.?

51.?? Legacy and Impact: Figure out the legacy you’d like to live in the role BEFORE you even start. It’ll give purpose to your days and guide you when you’re ready to move on to the next chapter.?

52.?? Career Perspective: Rarely are careers a linear path, up a ladder for all time. Take a risk on yourself by moving to a different function, take a step back in title to get to where you want to be, move to a different organization when career opportunities / life priorities change. Then weave your narrative into your beautiful story.?

53.?? Assess your risk tolerance. If this is in the context of considering a new role at a start-up, assess the level of importance of income stability, evaluate your runway with an emergency fund, consider level of comfort with debt levels (cars, homes, credit cards, etc). Evaluate your emotional response to uncertainty and the load others take on in your life as your energy is diverted elsewhere. How do you handle the lowest of lows and the highest of highs? How does that version of you talk to themselves? Root your evaluation in past experiences, a strong indicator of future behavior.?

54.?? I imagine there will be times I’m someone’s favorite manager and some else’s least favorite manager.

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Practical Advice

55.?? Boundaries: Speaking of boundaries, I’ve created a few of my own that have been managing burnout. Things like a separate work and personal phone, powering down my laptop at night, no work Saturdays (lifesaver), calendar blocking for deep work, scheduling workouts or get togethers with friends in the evenings, practicing the pomodoro technique for time management.?

56.?? Constant Library: Always carry a library with you. A notebook, a book, a magazine. Something to enrich your mind a little bit each day, the effects will compound with time.?

57.?? Be extraordinary. Like the coworker who made a homemade sign to wish my nephew “Happy Birthday!” AND placed it in the nephews lawn the morning of as a surprise. Truly made me look like the best Auntie ever! (let alone that he followed up a year later for a repeat lap)?

58.?? Take care of your future self. Pre-order the book you can’t wait to read, cook delicious meals ahead of a full week, schedule an appointment you’ve been putting off. You’ll never hear what I say to myself.. “thanks past Allison”

59.?? Good vibes. I know the world is filled with good. When we put out positive energy into the universe, it comes back to us time and time again. The way we phrase a question, respond to a comment, make a compliment has the power to radiate good will. Not always in the way we expect it, be open to the magic.?

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Personal Reflections

60.??Taking care of your mental and physical health will pay dividends to your career engagement. A workout in the morning sets you up with endorphins, demonstrates discipline, and creates urgency for action. Healthy nutritious meals boost creativity and productivity.

61.?? I know that I love to start new things, that I’m challenged by starting up systems and creating tools and onboarding new people and building teams. I acknowledge I’m not the best person at maintenance, the steady state motion of a bike ride locked in at a set cadence and resistance. Figure out where you thrive.?

62.?? Humility: There will be times you mess up and don’t get it right, be truthful and apologize. Talk to the person who deserves to hear it, even write them a handwritten card. Years later you’ll thank yourself for being level-headed and the growth that came from the experience.

63.?? On Being Wrong: How important is it to be right? I made a lot of mistakes trying to prove my point to win the battle but lose the war. Humbly acknowledging being wrong is a work in progress. Though with practice it’s getting easier.?

64.?? Optimizers & Satisfiers: A friend once shared the idea of optimizers and satisfiers. How optimizers aim to make the most of every opportunity, researching ALL the potential flavors of watermelon before making a decision. Whereas a satisfier will look at a few options and go with one to keep things moving. A satisfier is more likely to find happiness in life, rather than an optimizer. As an optimizer this is difficult to swallow. I can’t stop this habit but knowing it’s my default preference stops me from overdoing it and just shipping it when incomplete. Likely my 80% is someone else’s 120%.?

65.?? Cultivate gratitude for what you already have. I’ve driven myself nuts with “what if” statements or “maybe..” Making a habit out of listing what I’m grateful for aloud, in a journal, saying it to others has been transformative.?

66.?? I’ve learned to shift my approach in different styles of meetings: zoom out big picture, highly detailed procedure, drive for results rather than consensus. If I’m day dreaming it may be because the style doesn’t energize me. So I play a game to listen more closely and figure out which style it is so I know how to better contribute. But if you ask me to be a part of a creative brainstorm? I’ll be the first to sign up!?

67.?? Empathy: Think of a person who you just can’t stand the idea of, they get on your last nerve, it’s difficult to work with them, every interaction is strained. Is there picture coming to mind? Now think of all the people who love this person, their parents, partner, friends, maybe even children. Name three things they may admire about this person. The next time you interact with them, name these things to yourself. Do this over and over again until you feel that relationship changing, for the better.?

68.?? Have grace for others. We’re all doing the best we can on any given day. If there’s a consistent issue that arises, address it head on. If it’s more like a one off instance, take a step back and realize outside, unknown factors may have led to it.?

69.?? Nothing lasts forever, even the Roman Empire eventually fell and gave way to the Early Middle Ages (an incredible time of political instability before creativity flourished). So cherish the high performing team you’re working on today and know the conflict with a coworker will be old news before you know it.?

70.?? Celebrations: Celebrate the incredible milestones of life that bind us together, from birthdays to graduations to buying your first house to moving across the world to promotions to retirements. Spread joy into the world!

71.??Have fun at work! Be silly if playing kickball on a summer luncheon, find an alternative way to incentivize the team (Bingo boards, anyone?), bring in homemade baked goods or coffee from a local shop, go outside to meet on a beautiful day, send the meme, dress up in costume, decorate cookies with the kids, make the jeopardy board. We spend so much time at work, don’t be afraid to cut loose.?

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Whew, you made it!

I acknowledge that was a hefty list, I hope well worth your time to read. Perhaps a few themes resonated with your own career experiences. What insights might you add to the list? Jot them down in the comments below.

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