Strands of Genius: Tip of Your Tongue, What's in a Name, The Abandoned Spaces Online
plus, our thoughts on: working with spouses, and children explain the internet
WRITING FROM | London, UK
WORKING ON | finishing touches for the Twinings Marketing Excellence Festival!
LOOKING AHEAD
June 16-24 | London, UK
June 24-27 | New York, NY (Cristina & Ryan tie the knot!!)
June 27-July 12 | Wingdale, NY
:: WHAT’S NEW & WEEKLY GRATITUDE ::
We spent an entire week apart and y’all… I had so much fun in Italy, but 7 days felt like an eternity and I’m so thankful to be reunited with Faris! Also, Italy is famous for pizza and pasta but I cannot get behind EVOO as the sole seasoning. Give me chillies or give me death! Still, the entire trip was lovely in no small part thanks to my friend Cristina who tackled ALLLLLL of the planning. I think this was the first time in my life where I went on a trip that required no fore-thought from me. It was truly one of the best gifts! Also, shout out to Saatchi & Saatchi for bringing us together back in the day. She’ll never let me forget that I was the last one to pick her up from the intern orientation, but clearly she’s forgiven me ;)
This week, we’re especially thankful for:
Cristina, who planned all of our Italian excursions and translated for us every damn day, Rebecca (gah I love it when you meet people in your adult life who are new friends that you love) & Thea (so fun to get to reconnect with a former colleague and then client!), Jules & Catherine & Sophie & Allison for all the work they’ve put into the Twinings Marketing Excellence Festival, Abdullah for his generosity and hospitality and freshly grown figs, coronation chicken, & YOU.
:: THE LINKS ::
WHEN IT’S ON THE TIP OF YOUR TONGUE
Tip of my Tongue is a project from Chirag Mehta, designed to help you think of that word that’s been dancing around on the tip of your tongue. You can type in clues like letters it starts with, contains, or ends with. You can include letters it must have or can’t have, and you can even type in a minimum or maximum length or a “sounds like” clue. Faris is so good with words that he is usually this tool for me, but I can’t wait to not be able to think of a word so that I can try this out! (Chir.ag)
EXPLORING THE ABANDONED SPACES OF THE INTERNET
Preserving Worlds is a YouTube docuseries about platforms of the internet that once were. As Justine Smith writes, “Worlds Chat and many other such spaces are relics exemplifying the boundless imagination of an earlier era of the internet. Documenting these worlds does more than highlight history that could otherwise be lost; it preserves a time when users were creators and not products.” (Hyperallergic)
WHAT’S IN A NAME
Our friend Mike from Lumen told Faris that the same person coined the words linguistics and scientist, which set him off thinking about names, touching on postmodernisn, Shakespeare and of course the origin story of Accenture, Song. “There were a number of other high profile rebrands at the time, several of which traced their origin back to a once much lauded brand that has become synonymous for massive corporate fraud.” (WARC)
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:: WHAT WE’RE THINKING ABOUT: WORKING WITH SPOUSES ::
Between coming back from vacation and getting ready for a 3-day event with our clients, we haven’t had the headspace (time or energy) — but we got such great responses from so many of you on the below that we’re sharing it again :)
When Faris and I meet strangers and tell them that we are indeed married, and also yes, business partners, people are usually surprised but more often shocked. They pepper us with questions about our relationship inside and outside of work, and almost always embedded within is a comment along the lines of “I could never work with my spouse! How do you do it??” The truth is, it’s not always easy… but it’s easier more often than it is hard. Here are some of the reasons it works for us:
Faris is the right person for the job. If I had to write a job description for the partnership I’m looking for on the work front, I couldn’t find a better fit than Faris. I’m not training him to fit into our business; His expertise is already a fit. He’ll tell you the same thing about me — Our skills are complimentary.
We trust each other. It’s about a mutual understanding that we have each others backs — and that ultimately we want what is best for each other. In some ways, this is where being married comes in especially handy. Working in the big agency world there were plenty of people I trusted, but there were many I didn’t trust either. I know that when Faris presents a differing perspective, it’s not to spite me or stand out in front of a leader, it’s because he truly believes this is what is best for us, team awesome. (And team awesome will always take precedent over Genius Steals.)
We lead using our own strengths, and play to each other’s strengths. There are areas where he excels and areas where I excel, and (ahem, for the most part) we are pretty good at letting the other lead when it’s their area of expertise. There’s a danger zone here because it can be patronizing or condescending when you are the expert in an area and you want your spouse on your side, or to share the same perspective. We’ve found that approaching it from this way doesn't really help us — Often with different strengths come different perspectives. That’s kinda the whole point in a way. We accept that we won’t always agree on the specifics (and we certainly go to bed disagreeing on plenty of things) but again… we trust each other. And in some ways, it’s like a game of improv: We’re constantly looking for ways that we can lift each other up. (Faris is really, particularly good at this.)
Sequential collaboration works best for us. There are few times when we sit down at a table and brainstorm together. More often than not, we decide on the approach for any given project and then divide and tackle. I’ll start, and hand it off to Faris who will pick up the next piece. He’ll hand it back to me, and so on and so forth. Sometimes the lines are clear and we know who will do what when we begin, but more often than not we find it helpful to check-in with each stage and reiterate what it is we’re going to tackle. It also gives us time to talk through the output before it’s in a final stage.
We try not to give feedback unless it’s been specifically requested. This has gotten easier for me as I’ve gotten older — but at the ripe “old” age of 27 (ha) when we started this endeavor, I was keen to feedback on anything and everything. These days I really think about my desired outcome, and whether my feedback will help us get there. When I request feedback from Faris, I’m specific. Like, super-specific. “I don’t need you to weigh in on pricing/structure, but I’m sending this to a European client and feel like I might be coming on too strong in my email… Can you read this email and tell me what the tone sounds like to you?” Or “I’m struggling with slide design… Can you tell me your favorite of these three options rather than giving specific input on colors/design?” Requesting feedback is just as much of a skill as giving feedback! We’re constantly working on and nurturing these skills.
We make sure communication is at the forefront of all that we do, whether we’re navigating a difficult work challenge or a difficult life challenge. Our therapist once told us he’s never met another couple that talks about what’s going on inside our heads with each other as much as we do, and we both beamed with pride when he said this. (To be fair, I’m not sure it was meant as a compliment lol.) We talk about long term goals, short term goals, clients that we liked, clients that we felt like weren’t the best fit. We talk about what we’re thankful for and what we’re annoyed with. We talk about what we’ve learned from our families and friends, and what we’d do differently. From all this communication, we have a deep understanding of each other’s desires and fears and everything in between.
We know that partnerships are not tit for tat. There are some weeks when I have a heavier work load. There are others when Faris does. Sometimes Faris writes this newsletter three weeks in a row, and other times it’s me that’s tackling it. (Most times, one of us starts and the other finishes. Sequential Collaboration FTW, again!) We’ve found that it’s not about dividing up the work to be a 50-50 split (this just isn’t really possible in our world), but instead about supporting your partner when they’ve got more on their plate… This could mean making dinner, responding to the family text thread, or just reminding them how awesome (and ridiculously attractive) they are :)
We set boundaries. I’m thinking of one time when I had something I needed to finish up by the end of the day and Faris was trying to talk to me about minting an NFT. I could tell he was getting increasingly frustrated but it was also 8p at night and I wasn’t close to finishing what I was working on. I told him I really wanted to hear more about the NFT, but it was going to have to wait until tomorrow, when I finished this client deliverable. And then I reiterated it a few minutes later when he started talking about the dang NFT again ;) As for Faris, he really likes his evenings free and my brain runs 100mph all times of the day. Plus, work is exciting! But when I bring something up that’s work-related at 8p, it doesn’t feel exciting to Faris. It feels stressful. These days, we have a rule that we don’t talk about work after 5p. This is helpful especially helpful because it means we tackle any important conversations during the morning/midday when we both have more energy. But, we’re also flexible. We give each other as much of a heads up as possible when the rule isn’t going to work. (ie: “I know it’s important to you that we wrap up by 5, but unfortunately I’m not going to have this finished until 8p tonight and I’m going to need a second pair of eyes on it before we send it.”)
We take breaks. People assume that since we’re always traveling, we’re always working. (Or since we’re always traveling, we’re never working.) Whether we’re working 20 hour weeks or 50 hour weeks, we still need some time away from work entirely. Even though we’re always out of office, we still take vacations and set up auto responders letting people know when we’ll be offline. But beyond that, we carve out time for our relationship day-to-day. We read books and go for walks and cook together and visit art galleries and focus on all of our other shared interests.
We support each other in individual endeavors. This has been something we’ve really been working on over the past few years, and it’s tough! So much of our lives are wrapped up in each other. But it’s so so so important to retain your own identity and your sense of individuality. This means that sometimes Faris will do a podcast on his own, or I’ll tackle an interview on my own. And outside of work, you’ll find him playing video games and me doing handstands. Sometimes I’ll join him gaming, and sometimes he’ll join me on the yoga mat, but even when we’re not side by side, we’re supporting each other and our individual pursuits.
:: AND FINALLY… KIDS EXPLAIN THE INTERNET TO AN ADULT ::
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rockON,
faris & rosie & ashley | your friends over at geniussteals.co
@faris is always tweeting
@rosieyakob hangs out on instagram
@ashley also writes for deaf, tattooed & employed
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It's called Genius Steals because we believe ideas are new combinations and that nothing can come from nothing. But copying is lazy. We believe the best way to innovate is to look at the best of that which came before and combine those elements into new solutions.
Co-Founders Faris & Rosie are award-winning strategists and creative directors, writers, consultants and public speakers who have been living on the road/runway since March 2013, working with companies all over the world. Our Director of Operations is nomadic like us, our accounting team is based out of Washington, our company is registered in Tennessee, and our collaborators are all over the world. Being nomadic allows us to go wherever clients need us to be, and to be inspired by the world in between.
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