During my twenties I played in beach volleyball tournaments with Olympic contenders all the time. You’d think this would mean that I love watching beach volleyball in the Olympics. But actually, watching makes me sad. After college, I moved to Los Angeles, determined to play on the professional beach volleyball tour. People thought I had […]
Today’s news: Marissa Mayer was just appointed CEO at Yahoo. She is a very early employee at Google, Silicon Valley icon, and she’s six months pregnant. She has announced she’ll take only two weeks maternity leave. My reaction: I’m so sick of people saying that women like Marissa Mayer are trailblazers when they take on huge corporate […]
I have a new book out today. It’s called The New American Dream: A Blueprint for a New Path to Success. You will notice that the link goes to Hyperink. They are an independent publisher. I sold this same book, two years ago, to a mainstream publisher. I have been reporting on research about on […]
It was a big decision whether we should do reality TV. Since mostly only people with crazy, falling-apart lives do reality TV, I realized that to feel good about doing the show, I’d have to think about it as a job. Otherwise I couldn’t justify spending so much time on it. So I evaluated the […]
Every once in a while a high-profile woman will divulge the dirty underbelly of trying to be a woman in the work world. I remember the first time I saw it. It was when Brenda Barnes stepped down from a huge career at Pepsi to be with her kids. And she announced that she felt […]
Most of the time management advice that’s out there sucks. It’s all written by men who write about time management while their wives are at home taking care of their kids, or by men who don’t have anything to do except write about time management. We need time management advice for people who have a […]
I think I am finally going to have a reality TV show. I have had maybe ten production companies tell me they want to do some kind of TV show with me. And all ten have backed out at various stages of making the show. So I have learned that dealing with TV people is like dealing with rich bankers who can buy any woman they want. I know it will probably be a one-night stand when they […]
One of the things I love most about the advice-to-grads motif is that you learn a lot about the advice giver from the advice. When you force yourself to give short, smart advice, you end up focusing on the stuff that matters most to you. Sheryl Sandberg, for example, gives amazing graduation speeches, but she […]
High performers work for free. The difference between working for free because you’re a loser and working for free because you’re a high performer is what you get from the deal. People often ask me how to become a writer. The answer is to write for free. You won’t get paid for years. I wrote […]
We are in a drought. Not a metaphorical drought. That’s for city people. We are in a drought that is crop failure. I’ve read a lot about the Dust Bowl during the Depression. My favorite book is a children’s book. And, let me just say that I mostly read children’s books. It makes sense, because […]