Coming back from a holiday weekend is kind of a nightmare. I woke up this a.m. completely overwhelmed with all the things I needed to get done and a foreboding about all the meetings my dumba** decided to line up on the day after a holiday weekend (who does that). I figured, let’s procrastinate a bit more by writing this blog on cutting yourself some slack.

Here is how you survive this Monday disguised as a Tuesday.

• Drink at least a gallon of coffee before you even think of looking at those emails…I promise you’ll be so highly caffeinated you will be too worried about your skyrocketing heart rate to even flinch at the hundreds of unread emails.
• Reschedule those damn meetings. After the holiday weekend you is smarter than before the holiday weekend you. I don’t care what excuses you come up with, they don’t even have to be good…it’s worth it to retain whatever sanity you have left after a 4-day weekend.
• Review all the overdue tasks you were supposed to get done before the 4-day holiday weekend then breath into a paper bag. Once you’ve concluded with your anxiety attack, write down the 3 things you absolutely have to get done today.
• Start drinking some water, your liver will thank you.
• Pet a dog.
• Take to social media and Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Tweet your stress of this Monday disguised as a Tuesday. The camaraderie will do you good, and you’ll realize you are not alone.
• Read blogs similar to this about surviving a 4-day weekend. Be sure to share this one, this stellar advice will really help them.
• Be sure to phone a friend to also talk about how overwhelmed you are.

Finally, once you are done procrastinating, it should be around 5:00 p.m. and you’ve successfully postponed the inevitable until the following day.

Many of you reading this know I have this saying tattooed on my arm, it is my reminder that growth is never easy and requires all of us to push ourselves out of our comfort zone. My father worked at GM as a pipefitter for 30 or so years, he was great at his job, but he certainly didn’t love it. I get my stubbornness and work ethic from him and my drive to constantly try new things. He knew his job would stay relatively the same so he sought out leadership in other ways, he became a committeeman for the UAW which allowed him to put his negotiation and people skills to the test. I know it stressed him out, but I also know he found fulfillment in the role more so than he did his day-to-day job.

He taught me to never settle and to constantly seek out opportunities that may be scary but ultimately provided growth (he is also where I got my “f*ck this attitude”). This mindset is what pushed me to start my own business, I was no longer challenged in my current job. That job was secure, comfortable and there was no risk…it was also boring the hell out of me. I went back to “find comfort in the uncomfortable,” and made the leap to 8THIRTYFOUR and I crashed and burned splendidly.

I had a good 9 months or so and then my personal life went to absolute hell in a handbasket and I sought out the security and comfort I thought I needed to survive. I stayed in this comfort zone for a good 10 months or so and it sucked the life out of me and beat me down. Everything I prided myself on – tenacity, grit, outspokenness, self-confidence was stripped away. By the time I came to my senses, I would spend years building all of those traits back up again.

Seeking out uncomfortable whether it is for the sake of growth or for standing up for what you believe in often goes hand in hand with criticism, failure, and a lot of self-reflection. You have to give up being “liked” and settle for being true to yourself. Is it worth it? You’ll need to decide that for yourself, I can only tell you that I have made a lot of missteps but I’ve also grown considerably in how I lead and do.

At the end of the day, you need to believe in yourself and realize anything worth achieving comes with sacrifice.

This blog probably won’t earn me a lot of friends in academia or in the parenting world, but hell it needs to be said. No matter what profession you are in, employers are obsessed with a candidate having a 4-year college degree, and in some ways it makes sense. Now, if you ask me, a 4-year degree nowadays (such an old-timey word), is not what it used to be.

The best professors I had in college were adjuncts, meaning they had a day job but also taught on the side. These individuals were fully entrenched in their careers but also had a passion for preparing the next generation for entering the workforce. Now, take a tenured professor who has been out of the profession for 10, 15, 30 years and put them in charge of teaching public relations in the digital age, and well…you’ll have a lot of unprepared soon-to-be young professionals. To be clear, this is not true for all educators, I know plenty doing things very, very differently but they are in the minority and often get their hands slapped because of it.

This isn’t just my opinion, a recent Harvard Business Review article points out the U.S. education system is not held accountable for ensuring students are properly equipped with the skills and capabilities to prepare for a career where they can obtain financial stability. Additionally, employers continue to rely on a traditional four-year degree requirement as a primary means of determining job candidate employability. The disconnect here is obvious, and the result is nearly 15 million un- or under-employed individuals.

I’m not trying to discourage anyone from pursuing an education. My point is, employers, need employees who can problem-solve, lead a meeting, be organized, hold themselves accountable and take initiative. We do not have time to hold hands or teach you the skills college or your parents should’ve taught you. A recent Cengage survey (publication forthcoming) of Americans who graduated from a two-year/community or four-year college in the past five years found that nearly one in five (19%) reported that their college education experience did not provide them with the skills needed to perform their first post-degree job.

We seldom hire first-year grads at 8THIRTYFOUR, because they have a hard time grasping full-time job responsibilities, handling pressure, and problem-solving. We have a very unique culture, one we have spent years creating and cultivating and I watched it take hit after hit due to a lack of perspective and understanding of what it takes to work in the communication field. Everyone wants to work at an agency, I mean it’s fast-paced, fulfilling, exciting and fun. Sure it is all of those things, but it’s also exhausting, frustrating, time-intensive, and hard. Colleges and parents need to prep grads not just on skills but on the industries or job settings they could go into.

Universities need to marry job skills with soft skills and realize tenure, in most cases, rewards someone for being book smart without the ongoing experience.

At 8THIRTYFOUR, we are throwing out the requirement to have a 4-year degree. If you have experience, tenacity, confidence, and the right skill set; you’ll be given an interview.

I’m also committed to launching the 8THIRTYFOUR PRep School for those about to graduate or already graduated with a degree in communications. More coming on this.

I’m well aware when change is needed, you can’t sit around and wait for someone to come up with the solution.

My most hated phrase of all time is, “hey do you have a second to chat?” There is never ANY good news that comes with that question. If you ask any business owner what is the hardest part of owning a business, they will without a doubt say, employees. Whether that is attracting, retaining or growing them – it is really flipping hard. And without a doubt, they will leave at some point, believing otherwise is only going to leave you scrambling when it happens.

8THIRTYFOUR’s talent has always been relatively young, some first year grads or those with maybe a year under their belt. When we began operating on EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System) we took a hard look at how we were hiring, the experience we needed and the growth we anticipated in the next 3 to 5 years. We brag about our culture a lot and it is pretty great, however, to really value it, an employee needs to have perspective. What I mean by this, is they have to have worked someplace else for them to truly appreciate what makes 8THIRTYFOUR different. When they truly see the difference, we can retain them longer and show them how they can continue to grow in their role.

As we continue to grow our team, there are valuable lessons to learn from employees when they leave. Here is my advice for when an employee leaves, I’d like to say I’ve always handled it like this but the truth is you tend to take things very personal as a business owner and it’s hard to step back and see the big picture sometimes.

Listen & Learn:

We hold exit interviews when our employees leave, and we ask them to be brutally honest. We ask questions like 1) What did you like about your role? 2) What were the hurdles you faced? 3) What could leadership do better? 4) What would you change about the role?

Be sure to customize the questions based on the position and who they report to. We have gotten really great feedback from former employees during the exit interview, which has resulted in changes company wide. The best thing you can do, is learn, analyze and adapt.

Analyze & Adapt:

Feedback is useless if you don’t do anything with it. It isn’t always easy to hear where you’ve stumbled or failed, but it’s absolutely necessary. Reflect on the positive, embrace the negative and change it. Think how awesome it is get honest feedback you can then put into practice.

Follow-up

Just cause their leaving doesn’t mean you’ll never see them again. Maintain the connection, check in periodically and follow their career progress.

Growth is hard and with it comes staff changes. It’s all part of the joy of business ownership.

It was time to update this blog, the original was written in 2018 and was recently trolled by someone who pointed out several spelling and grammatical errors (oops)…so I figured it was the universe telling me to bring it into the current year.

Plus we’re currently hiring for several positions, and Zoom interviews are a real thing and they’re uber awkward.

• Know your shit. If you’re interviewing for a company and genuinely want to work there, research. Follow them on social, review their website, and read the latest blogs. Nothing impresses a future employer like a candidate having insight into their company. It shows you are taking the interview process seriously.
• Feng Shui it. Now that we live in the age of Zoom, it’s important you give some thought to the area you’re conducting the interview. Make sure you have adequate lighting, a clean and tidy background with a bit of color, and double-check you have nothing embarrassing behind you…like dirty socks or a dildo.
• Relax. I know this is easier said than done, but take a deep breath and answer each question succinctly and if possible, tie back to the company. Be prepared to answer the go-to interview questions – 1. What is your greatest strength and weakness? 2. What’s one time in your career where you faced adversity? How did you overcome it? If you’re interviewing with 8THIRTYFOUR, we’re going to ask you for 3 words that best describe you. Have some fun with this question.
• Ask questions. Honestly, I find it super impressive when a candidate asks intuitive questions about 8THIRTYFOUR. If they’ve done any research they’ll know “culture” is a bit of a buzzword at our office, along with EOS. If they ask “What makes 8THIRTYFOUR’s culture unique?” or just ask about my dogs and you’re already winning.
• Follow-up. Even though most everyone is working from home, you can still send a handwritten note. People gotta pick up the mail at some point. You can also get really creative and write a note, take a pic of it and send it via email. We had a candidate do that and I thought it was quite clever.

Interviewing is always stressful. The best piece of advice I can give you is to connect with the interviewers on a personal level and to be brief, be memorable, and be gone.

Public relation professionals are required to abide by a code of ethics. You can read the entire code here, but for the purpose of this blog, I want to highlight the section that references honesty.

We adhere to the highest standards of accuracy and truth in advancing the interests of those we represent and in communicating with the public.

I read an article today on the Trump Administration staffers looking for their next career move, as the past 4 years come to an end (thank God). The article headline was Forbes editor warns companies that might hire Trump press secretaries: Magazine will assume everything they say is a lie. I laughed out loud. Apparently, a recruiter took on six publicists who were looking for jobs and they were unable to line up a single interview, not one. Good.

Most of us would think “well obviously, you spent the last 4 years lying about everything,” but I am sure these six individuals were just so surprised. As PR professionals, the PRSA Code of Ethics charges us with maintaining the integrity of relationships with the media, government officials, and the public.

Not a single staff member of the Trump Administration PR team can claim honesty or integrity. The mere fact that after the January 6th attacks on our Capitol they wallowed in self-pity worrying about future careers, tells you everything you need to know.

A Politico article quoted one administration official saying of Wednesday’s events, “this will hurt us in trying to get jobs.” Others in Trump-world spent the day itching to take their Trump White House experience off their resume entirely.

“You go to the White House to work there because you want to serve your country in literally the most amazing building and the most powerful place in the world with the best of intentions and then shit like this happens and you feel embarrassed by it, naturally,” said one of the former White House officials.

Every single PR practitioner commits to uphold the PRSA Code of Ethics, it helps ensure our profession is above reproach. Allowing individuals such as Spicer, Hicks, Conway and McEnany to continue to be employed in our industry is unacceptable. They chose their lies and we must choose truth.

PR seems like a sexy field, am I right? If your older like me, then you think of Samantha from Sex in the City and her high rolling lifestyle. She got into all the best parties and represented the coolest people. Maybe you’re thinking more along the lines of Olivia Pope, she was a wizard at getting her clients out of sticky situations – not to mention her wardrobe. If these were my only examples of publicists, I would pursue a career in public relations as well.

Let me introduce to you, Harried Harriet, a true representation of a PR pro. She was nice enough to spend a bit of time answering our questions.

Time you wake up:

I don’t sleep

Amount of hours on Twitter stalking reporters:

I stopped tracking at 10

Pitches sent during the week:

Is this even a legit question? Like there is a set amount.

Emails sent per day:

1,000 – is that a lot?

Media lists in Muck Rack:

55…for one client.

Last time you showered:

Luckily hygiene doesn’t impact my effectiveness.

Who is a realistic representation of publicists? Olivia Pope or Samantha Jones?

Hahahahahahahahahahahahah

How often do you have to explain how PR works to clients?

Every single day of my life. Get 2 pieces of coverage, they want 4. It’s never good enough, and they don’t seem to understand the time that goes into building a media list, researching reporters, reading past articles, engaging on social media and creating individual pitches for EVERY single reporter you reach out to. If you sent 50 emails in one day, how long would that take you? Now imagine having to customize every single email, track it and plan for follow-up.

What is one thing you want people to know about working in PR?

It’s hard, like really hard. This isn’t a new number but less than 2% of pitches are picked up and the current media landscape is COVID, election and politics, so it’s even harder now.

How do you stand out?

You hustle harder than anyone else. Is it hard as hell? Yes, is it rewarding? Hell yeah. If you are drawn to a 9 to 5 job, this ain’t the right field for you.

What is the current industry like?

Journalists have fewer resources to do their jobs and are pulled in multiple directions. PR pros are often not viewed in a favorable light and instead of treating us with respect, as we do them, responses are often argumentative, combative and rude. You need to have tough skin to work in this industry.

What are you reading?

I follow Gini Dietrich, Michael Smart and every major news source to stay up-to-date.

Any other words of wisdom?

Don’t give up, it can be frustrating at times but perseverance is key.

Still want to be in the PR field?

We have a saying at our office, “keep the monkey.” Yeah, it’s weird, but here is the point. You’ve heard people say, “I have a monkey on my back.” They’re referring to a problem or issue they can’t resolve that is hanging over their head. Human nature is to pass the monkey off to someone else so you get it off your back and move on. The issue is, the monkey is now the next person’s problem.

It’s also really f*cking lazy and kind of a dick move to just “pass the buck” or monkey, if you will. Basically you didn’t feel like solving it so you made it someone else’s problem. It drives me INSANE. For example, you ask, “hey so and so, where is the file for this?” Instead of looking where you know the file is, you are asking someone else to do it for you, cause it was easier to make them do it then to find the answer yourself. Stop it.

I was actually just chatting with some of my staff today about this! Someone reached out to us with a question, something they could’ve easily resolved themselves. In fact, they asked the exact same question the month before…let me repeat…exact same question. What do we do? We drop everything to respond and find the answer for them. Here’s the issue with that.

• Productivity for the day was thrown off to be reactive to another person’s “question.”
• Multiple team members also jumped into assist…cause that’s how we do at 8THIRTYFOUR. Now several people are working on this person’s issue ahem question.
• Now we’re all frustrated and venting to each other, so there’s that.
• And now I’m writing this blog cause I’m annoyed.

This is not an uncommon occurrence within companies, in fact, we’ve addressed it multiple times as a team. You might be asking yourself, “what’s the big deal, just find the answer and move on.” Sure, sure – fair enough. What if you receive 15 emails, chats, or calls like this every day? Suddenly you’re spending half your day “putting out fires.” Other people’s fires.

Here’s what you do.

• Don’t respond immediately.
• Set aside time in your schedule/calendar to dig into the issue.
• Respond to said lazy person with “I’ll check into this sometime this week and circle back (throw some passive-aggressiveness in there) once I’ve had a chance to look into.”
• Then wait…9 times out of 10, the person will solve their issue before you even have to do anything.
• If that doesn’t work, push back. Do it respectfully (that’s where don’t respond immediately comes in), give it a breather, and then deal with it.

The best thing you can do is to not respond right away, you have to set boundaries or you’ll continue to be derailed by these damn monkeys and before you know it, you’re running a f*cking zoo (and writing blogs about it).

So, 2020 has been a bit of a challenge. I believe the word tossed around frequently is “unprecedented.”

I’ve been talking to my small biz friends and we are all feeling a bit overwhelmed, now this isn’t a new feeling for any of us, but we are in uncharted waters and making decisions we thought we would never be presented with.

I talked about how I pivoted the business to ensure there was a business, but no one could have anticipated that 6 months later we would still be dealing with this and the mental health toll it is taking on all of us.

I’ve all but given up on sleeping since all I do is dream (more like a nightmare) about everything we’re dealing with. Here is just a sampling of what small business owners are dealing with.

• Work from home fatigue
• Going back to work safely
• Understanding liability around COVID-19
• Keeping employees protected
• Ensuring employees are happy
• Ensuring employees have all the resources to do their job whether remote or in the office
• Maintaining positivity at all times (until you can finish off a bottle or two of wine on the weekend)
• Supporting and listening
• Financial woes
• Unreliability of the USPS
• Business development
• Talent attraction and retention

That is by no means a complete list, but it’s what I could name off the top of my head.

The amount of crushing pressure business owners are under right now is ridiculous. We have had to become master EO interpreters, therapists, cleaning supply procurement specialists, negotiators, hypemen, half glass full people, mindreaders, master problem solvers, solution providers, Zoom prodigies…and the list goes on.

I guess what I want you to take away from this blog, we’re feeling really f*cking alone right now and quite frankly we feel singlehandedly responsible for keeping our doors open and our employees happy and it’s really, really exhausting.

Reach out to a business owner, or if you are employed by a business owner – maybe tell them you appreciate them because they’re doing the best they can.

I know we’re all sick of the word pivot, but I gotta finish the blog series so just hold on through this last part. If you’re new to this riveting blog series, read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

Let’s wrap this sucker up and discuss the painful steps I had to take as a business owner to ensure my company survived and continues to survive this damn pandemic.

Step 3: Planning

Our office manager and I spent a lot of time on this phase, we sat through countless calls and webinars with the Grand Rapids Chamber and the Small Business Association of Michigan determining how to implement what we had learned in the education phase.

The key to our success, thus far, is absolutely the people and companies we surrounded ourselves with. Always hire people smarter than you and retain companies that possess the expertise you don’t.

The first thing we did was map out our priorities and the steps we needed to take:

• Finances: We knew we had to layoff staff immediately, apply for funds available through grants and the federal government, and cut expenses. We determined what grants we would go after, identified the information we would need to apply, and then reached out to our accountants at Hungerford Nichols to pick their brains on other options.
• Layoff: I pride myself on being very transparent and honest with my staff. Once we made the difficult decision to layoff two staff members, we set a date and asked other staff to work from home that morning to respect the privacy of our two employees. Our office manager sat down with each of them and assisted them in applying for unemployment as well as providing them the information they needed from 8THIRTYFOUR. We also checked in with them weekly to see if we could offer any other assistance.
• Staff conversation: We spoke with staff immediately and let them know the tough decision we made. We answered any questions they had and talked about next steps. I honestly thought they would think I failed them, I certainly felt like I did. They were amazing, I honestly could not ask for a better team, they were understanding, complimentary, and appreciative. It was an incredible relief the way they handled it.
• Work from home: I know of multiple companies that struggled with their employees working from home. It was definitely a transition for us. We wrote up a policy, purchased Zoom to stay connected, and adhered to our same hours…although I had to step in when staff was working too much. It’s one of the reasons we wrote the blog on working from home guilt. I was concerned they would become burned out.
• Staff morale: Our team thrives on togetherness, we all really like each other, and being a small team we are pretty tightknit, not to mention very social. To keep spirits up, I sent packages bi-weekly to their homes. I sent a journal with notecards, an inspirational book, and a coloring book and markers. It was as much for me as for them, I wanted them to know how much I appreciated them.
• Worst case scenario: My leadership team and I mapped out our worst-case scenarios to help us plan our steps to recover. We outlined milestones that if we hit we would take the next step in the plan. For example, if we lost another client, we would cut staff salaries or we would negotiate our office rent.

Step 4: Action

I’m not going to map out every action we took, but below is what we were absolutely consistent on which I truly believe set us up for success.

• Daily internal check-ins
• SBAM daily briefings, including the weekend
• Calls and emails with our banker, accountant, and lawyer
• Research, research, and more research. We read every piece of information out there – PPP, EOs, and every other acronym.

We also worked around the clock, we had calls on the weekend and were in constant contact. Well, things have started to settle down, we know returning to work is our next big priority.

We lost revenue, employees, and a lot of peace of mind…but we survived. Years from now I will reread these blogs to give myself some much-needed perspective when things seem dire for a completely different reason.