3 Career Lessons the Most Successful People Can't Teach You

1. 3 Career Lessons the Most Successful People Can't Teach You By: Vacancies.ae

2. Lesson 1: Perfect Your Pitch • In the first episode, there’s a squirm-worthy pitch meeting between Alex Blumberg, the CEO, and Chris Sacca, a Silicon Valley billionaire. It’s uncomfortable because Blumberg has no clue how to pitch: He stutters, uses jargon, rambles, and basically makes investing in his company sound really unattractive. • If you’re an entrepreneur, you should definitely know how to sell your idea to investors. However, the rest of us need to master pitching, too. We’re always selling something, whether that’s our services, an idea, a product, or even ourselves (cough, job interview!). • Not sure you’re nailing your elevator speech? Check out: “3 Smart Ways to Upgrade Your Elevator Pitch,” “The Secret to Giving the Perfect Pitch,” and “Secrets for Nailing the Pitch from 7 Female Founders.”

3. Lesson 2: Don’t Cover Up Your Mistakes • Episode nine was a little painful to listen to as well, because Blumberg’s team really, really screwed up. Long story short, they unintentionally made a mom believe her son was going to be featured on This American Life (a famous radio segment from NPR), but really he was used in a Squarespace ad. The mom was mad, the media was mad, and—I assume—Squarespacewas mad. • I wouldn’t know any of this if Blumberg and his employees hadn’t been completely open about what happened. Not only did they reach out to the mom, but they broadcast their mistake to the whole world via podcast. And guess what? That was the best thing they could’ve done to get everyone to calm down and move on. It’s hard to stay angry when the people you’re angry at have acknowledged their mistake humbly and without qualifying it.

4. Lesson 3: Don’t Be Afraid to Open Up • For 13 episodes, Blumberg has let his audience in on, well, just about everything. We hear his struggle to decide how much equity to give his partner. We hear his employees talk about how they’re at their breaking points. We even hear his plans to eventually take his company from purely content to content and technology. • You’d think sharing so much info would harm Blumberg, but it’s had the opposite effect. During his last round of funding, he actually had too manywannabe investors. Prestigious organizations (like Google Ventures!) volunteer to help him so they can be on the podcast. Most importantly, Blumberg’s decision to be transparent means he isn’t focused on beating his competition—he’s just focused on making a great product.

5. References • https://www.themuse.com/advice/3-career- lessons-the-most-successful-people-cant- teach-you • https://www.vacancies.ae/jobs/jobs-in-dubai • https://www.vacancies.ae/jobs/jobs-in- abudhabi • https://www.vacancies.ae/jobs/jobs-in- sharjah • https://www.vacancies.ae/jobs/jobs-in-ajman