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8 Things We Learned at Our First Nobody Cares Speaker Series Event
Erika, Amanda, and guest Lindsay Shookus on asking great questions, building trust, and finding work-life balance.
Last week nearly 100 people came to Food52’s HQ in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, not for cocktails, not for food—though we had plenty of both!—but to hear a trio of super-successful women talk candidly about the lessons they’ve learned during their careers. Food52 CEO Erika Ayers Badan sat down with Lindsay Shookus, the former Emmy-winning producer of Saturday Night Live and the creator of Women Work F#cking Hard, and Food52 founder Amanda Hesser, who needs no introduction here, for an unguarded chat at our first Nobody Cares Speaker Series event.
Each shared their unique perspective on meaningful work and navigating it as a woman, and I’ve compiled some of the most memorable takeaways below. Special thanks to Tossware, Transmitter Brewing, and Caroline’s Cakes for their contributions to the evening, which doubled as a celebration for Erika’s new book, Nobody Cares About Your Career. The next event is September 18 with hospitality expert Carlos Quirarte of Authentic Hospitality and Feed Me newsletter author Emily Sundberg—RSVP here!
1. Small Details Make a Huge Difference
At SNL, where Lindsay worked for 20 years, she learned the art of quickly getting to know someone. “A host would come in on Monday and I had 48 hours to make them my best friend.”
One way she forms lasting connections is to be truly present when she’s meeting someone. She later writes notes on her phone, all so she can remember really good details about a person.
“Think about when someone remembers your birthday or your kids' names or where you went on vacation last year, it hits you in the heart,” says Lindsay. “So I really try.”
2. Ask Great Questions
Another way that Linsday gets deep, quick, is to ask great questions.
“Instead of saying, ‘how are you?’ I say, ‘Hey, what's been the biggest highlight since the last time I saw you?’ You're getting something interesting and it creates better dialogue.”
3. Quickly Build Trust
Given the sliver of time she had with the guest hosts on SNL, Linsday sped up the trust-building process. “One of my favorite quotes is from a guy named Paul Zak who said, “The fastest way to build trust is to treat somebody like they're trustworthy.”
4. Nip Mansplaining in the Bud
Amanda relayed a story about getting mansplained to in a meeting. The experience for her (and for most women) was so common, she felt it was easier to ignore it—then learned that other men in the meeting would have preferred she spoke up. “I thought, I am being judged negatively because of a man's behavior toward me and me not responding in the right way.”
Erika agreed. “When something happens to you, not saying something about it in the moment can really hurt you.” Her tip was to nip it in the bud by being direct, with a simple, “Stop mansplaining me.” (And if someone interrupts, don’t hesitate to say “let me finish.”)
5. Learn to Underreact
Amanda still follows the advice she got from the COO of a company she admires: “He said to underreact, and it really hit me hard because I realized that I suffered many, many, many times in my career because I did not underreact.”
6. Don’t Ask for Permission (When Striking Out on Your Own)
All three women spoke about leaving well-known companies to forge a new path. Amanda shared a tip about pivoting that essentially comes down to: trust yourself. “We are often looking for approval, and…the only approval you need is your own.”
7. Be Yourself When PItching (You’ll Make it Easier for the Next Woman)
While preparing for a pitch meeting to raise capital, Amanda’s husband called her out for what she was wearing. “It was in this outfit that I thought made me look like I was official. And he's like, ‘You don't look very comfortable…you are not going to be yourself and you're not going to be telling your story clearly if you don't feel like yourself.’ And it just kind of sunk into me that you're not going to transform yourself into a man suddenly in the meeting. And so you just have to be who you are.”
Also key: “Let your passion shine through, and your knowledge.” As friendly, energetic moms with editorial backgrounds, she and Merrill were atypical founders seeking start-up funding. It may have taken more conversations than if they were men in tech, but they ultimately found the right investors—and “10 years from now, said Amanda, "hopefully it's going to suck less for women.”
8. Work-Life Balance: It’s Personal
A woman in the audience asked Erika, Amanda, and Lindsay to share their perspective on work-life balance—and got three wildly different answers.
Erika sees it as an unreasonable burden for women.
“I think work-life balance, the whole notion of it, puts so much pressure on women to…feel great about everything all the time…That's so much pressure to perform, and I think it's really debilitating.”
To her it’s about managing turbulence rather than achieving a perfect balance—and putting the oxygen mask on yourself first. “I think your journey is your own...So long as you can just stay calm and centered in chaos and do your best.”
For Amanda, doing what you love makes it easier to integrate your work with your personal life. “I happen to love working, but I also love what I'm doing, and I've been insistent on finding that throughout my career so that the fact that I do love working a lot doesn't feel like there's an imbalance.”
Lindsay spoke to the way that work-life balance evolves over time.
“I believe that it's hard to have it all at the same time. I think you're going to have spaces where you work harder and the rest of your life kind of has to go under for a little bit. There's [also] going to be times where you get to push that up and have work take the backseat.”
Written by: Nicole Davis
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2 Comments
It's been a long time since I've confronted mansplaining in a business setting (more on that in a minute). It would never have occurred to me to call someone out directly, but that's because this technique is much more productive: I look the guy in the eye for the entire time that he's mansplaining, with a gentle smile on my face, during which time I prepare my response, which is always to restate - concisely! - their two most important points, and then to add to it a third, more insightful and helpful point. Then, immediately pivot from there. This entirely takes the air out of the mansplaining while avoiding a confrontation that will make not just the mansplainer, but others there, uncomfortable.
Truly however the best way to deal with mansplaining is to make yourself so valuable to the team that no one would dare to do it. That's worked well for me.
Finally, may I respectfully observe that item #4 arguably directly contradicts item #5, which to my mind, is much the better option - and is captured in the alternate approach recommended above. ;o)
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