AI, From A to Z

If you work in the field of professional services, then sometimes it seems as though you can’t swing a keyboard without hearing about artificial intelligence (AI). The promise! The perils! The profits!

And yet, if we’re honest with one another, doesn’t it feel as though AI is a little bit like a classic book — something everyone talks about, but no one has actually read/used first-hand?

To help clear things up, I’m in the process of creating an A-to-Z guide on everything you wanted to know, but were too embarrassed to ask, about this game-changing branch of computer science.

Which Headline Is Best?

The Secret to Landing a Job and Lifting 300 Pounds

The article below was written by Katelynn Barbosa, the director of talent engagement at Talent Market. I’m reprinting it with her permission.

When I was 27, I started powerlifting for the first time (too lazy for cardio) and quickly became besotted with the idea of deadlifting 300 pounds. So, I eagerly approached my coach and asked, “What’s the secret to lifting 300 pounds?”

“The secret?”

“Yeah, I have seen women lift 300 pounds and it looks awesome! I would love to be able to do that. What do they do? Is it those gummy bears they eat in the middle of a training session?”

“What?”

“Oh, I know. I bet they visualize themselves successfully completing the lift... I have heard visualization really works!”

After recovering from laughing, my coach replied, “There is no secret to lifting 300 pounds.”

“So they’re just genetically gifted?”

“No. No one just comes in and lifts 300 pounds. Any woman who can do that has lifted consistently day in and day out every single week for years. It’s just about consistency, repetition, failure, and putting the work in. In fact, pretty much all of life works like that. There is no secret to anything.”

Oh man, I had really hoped it was the gummy bears.

So I took my coach’s advice and never missed a training session. And about four years later, I stood up holding 300 pounds in my hands.

It was a proud moment for this decidedly mediocre athlete but the bigger takeaway was my wise coach’s greater message, which I have found transcends well beyond lifting weights: “There is no secret to anything.”

Because this is a Talent Market article: What is the getting a job equivalent to my coach’s amazing advice? Here are my four takeaways:

1. Show Up
I showed up to the gym consistently three times a week for four years, even and especially when I didn’t feel like it, before I was able to reach my 300-pound goal.

For the job search, showing up means crafting a great application and officially applying.

The desire to find a shortcut instead of putting forth the effort to craft a strong application is real. I understand why. (Oh, if only the gummy bears did the trick!) Tailoring your résumé and writing a strong cover letter takes time. It’s much easier to just reach out to someone you know at the organization to circumvent the application process and get an interview or submit the same generic application that you submitted to five other jobs in the last month. Resist the pull of those shortcuts and put all of that effort into crafting the best application materials you can.

2. If You Know Something Is Off, Address It
About 20% of the time, a lifting session feels terrible for no reason. The moment I pick up the barbell, it’s clear that I just have nothing in the tank. But, more often than not, there is a reason and I know exactly what it is. I slept five hours the night before, I have opted for pizza over healthy protein a little too frequently lately, or I slammed Old Fashioneds last night like I was single-handedly trying to keep the whiskey industry afloat.

I always feel embarrassed when I lift poorly because of my own bad decisions and a big part of me wants to hide it from my coach. But I never do because I know the only way she can help me train appropriately is if I am honest upfront.

This is also true in the job search! If you ever decline to mention something in your cover letter because you worry it will make you look bad or raise questions, that probably means you desperately need to address the elephant in the room head-on!

What are some examples of elephants in the room that need addressing?

If you are applying for a job that is on the surface unrelated to your current line of work. For instance, if you have never fundraised a day in your life but you are applying for a fundraising job, you better say why! I once had a candidate apply for a fundraising job who didn’t have a lick of development experience. His cover letter didn’t even mention the large, gray pachyderm we all saw. The hiring manager was very confused, and even though she was open to hiring someone without direct experience, the lack of an explanation for such a transition left her uneasy.

Well, it turns out the candidate had been extremely thoughtful about the transition, reading every fundraising book under the sun and talking to tons of fundraisers to get their advice and expertise. But for some reason he didn’t put any of this in his cover letter! The same goes for any big career transition. Address it upfront!

If you were only with your previous employer for a short period, the hiring manager is going to wonder why. If you address the reason in your cover letter, you are putting that question to rest immediately. There are tons of perfectly benign reasons why jobs don’t work out. Maybe you liked the work but it wasn’t a good culture fit. Or maybe the employer went through a round of layoffs. If you state the reason upfront, the hiring manager won’t be left to worry that you got canned for insubordination or binge-watching Netflix during working hours.

3. Do Exactly What Is Asked of You
Sometimes a lifting session feels unnaturally great for no reason. On these days, there is a strong temptation to ignore what my coach told me to do and try to max out. Why lift 250 pounds when I know I can hit 275, baby? Because, odds are, the next day isn’t going to be a superman day and I will feel fatigued and ruin my training for the week.

My coach is an expert and she told me exactly what to lift. So I just stick to that.

With job searching, just do what the employer tells you to do. If they want a résumé and cover letter, submit a résumé and cover letter. Don’t send writing samples, letters of recommendation, the article you got published in the Wall Street Journal, a headshot, or a screenshot proving that you actually scored Taylor Swift tickets.

An employer knows what they want to see from candidates and they do not hide it. So just give them what they want!

4. Expect to Fail
In lifting and in job searching, failure happens frequently. In fact, if I go months without failing a lift, then it is a fact that I am simply not training hard enough. Failure is a prerequisite for success.

Most of the time, when you apply for a job, you will not get it. Even if you have every single qualification listed in the job description, are close friends with tons of people who work there, and love freedom so much that fireworks spontaneously burst forth from your fingertips every Fourth of July, there are a million reasons why you might not land the job. Don’t let it get you down.

Pick up that barbell… er job application… and keep trying.

What Winston Churchill and Warren Buffet Can Teach Us About Public Speaking

Ask anyone to name the greatest orators of all time, and Winston Churchill will be on every list, if not at the top. We think of Britain’s Prime Minister leading his fellow Englishmen through the darkest days of World War II, rallying them with calls to “fight on the beaches” and to offer their “blood, toil, tears, and sweat” to defeat the enemy. We think of him standing before the House of Commons, praising the Royal Air Force’s “finest hour” and declaring, in that gravelly British voice, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”

Churchill’s talent for public speaking seems extraordinary. And yet, his place in the pantheon of presenters was far from fated. As a boy, young Winston stuttered and stammered. In fact, he spoke with a lisp.

Even as he entered politics, Churchill continued to struggle. According to one prophet, “Mr. Churchill and oratory are not neighbors yet. Nor do I think it likely they ever will be.”

Never in the field of human evaluation was such a declaration proved to be so dumb.

While we may not be asked to address parliament, we’ll all face speaking opportunities throughout our lives. Whether it’s summarizing a report to colleagues, standing up at a city-council meeting, or delivering a eulogy, the ability to present makes you more persuasive and more powerful. As the great man himself put it, “Of all the talents bestowed upon men, none is so precious as the gift of oratory. He who enjoys it wields a power more durable than that of a great king. He is an independent force in the world.”

Equally famous, yet largely unknown for any public-speaking prowess, is Warren Buffet, widely considered to be the best investor in history. Up until the age of 20, Buffet lived in fear of public speaking. “Just the thought of it made me physically ill,” he says. “I would literally throw up.”

Indeed, as a college student, the future chairman of Berkshire Hathaway selected courses based largely on one criterion: He avoided those that required him to talk. He orchestrated his life so that he’d never have to address a crowd.

After college, Buffet enrolled in business school. It was here that he saw an ad in the newspaper for a public-speaking course. So he made his way to Midtown Manhattan, wrote a check, and signed-up.

On the way home, however, fear crippled his enthusiasm, and he stopped payment. “I just couldn’t do it,” he recalled. “I was that terrified.”

A few years later, Buffet saw the ad again. This time, he not only signed-up; he also plunked down 100 bucks in cash, so as to thwart a repeat second-guessing.

Buffet says the skills he learned changed his life: “It’s incalculable how much value I got from that hundred dollars.” Indeed, 70 years later, hanging in his office is not a traditional diploma, but a certificate for public speaking. (It’s next to the Presidential Medal of Freedom.)

So why does public speaking matter? Because this skill is not optional — not if you want to thrive in business. Whether you’re speaking with a client at a conference table or roaming the room while keynoting a confab, you’ll find that addressing an audience is one of the most profitable talents you can hone.

5 Easy Ways to Make Bad Technical Writing Good

How Much Should You Give Away in a Proposal?

Q: In writing a proposal for a prospective client, where do I draw the line between giving away my ideas and protecting my intellectual property?

A: I always err on the side of giving away.

1. When you’re competing against others, demonstrating your expertise is a surefire way to stand out. Understanding the problem and outlining your credentials are table stakes; to win the work, you usually need to strut your stuff.

2. Knowledge is different from execution; just because you know how to do something does not in any way guarantee that you’ll be able to do it. Indeed, no matter how many times I watch YouTube videos about repairing appliances around my house, I’ll never be handy enough to fix a running toilet. Nor do I want to be; I’d prefer to hire a plumber.

A Company You’re Interviewing With Stole Your Ideas. Now What?

Q: As part of the interview process for a job, you deliver an unpaid assignment. You don’t get hired, and to make matters worse, you later learn that the employer stole your ideas. Thoughts?

A: Short answer: There’s no solution. And as a friend reminds me, if there’s no solution, there’s no problem.

Long answer: If a potential employer steals your ideas without hiring or paying you, you really no have recourse. Sure, you can inform your network. You can write about your experience on Glassdoor and/or LinkedIn. You can even notify the company’s C.E.O. or head of H.R.

But, ultimately, there’s no way (which I know of) for a potential employee to safeguard his intellectual property when interviewing. Instead, you have to know, going into the interview, how widely you’re willing to open your kimono.

Addendum (11/5/2022): It turns out there is a solution! As columnist Allison Green points out, “If you’re concerned about how an employer might use the work you’re doing, you can ask, ‘Can you tell me how you’ll use the work I produce? Is it for evaluation purposes only?’”

Sales After Covid: How to Sell in a Post-Pandemic World

Is the Hot New Story About Ghostwriters Too Good to Fact Check?

Earlier this week, Insider profiled a ghostwriter who says he works 5 hours a week and makes $200K. What’s his niche? Writing tweets for venture capitalists.

Also, this is his side hustle; at his main job, he has dozens of employees.

Before you say, “How do I get one of these gigs?” let’s apply a little journalistic skepticism to these boasts.

The reporter says he saw screenshots of bank statements and wire transfers.

1️⃣ You don’t need Photoshop to manipulate a screenshot.

2️⃣ What about seeing some *invoices*? I’d be curious to see if those documents simply say “ghostwriting” or “social media,” or if they include details (like 10 tweets/month)? Also, do the invoices include other services, or is the $200K solely and specifically for ghostwriting tweets?

3️⃣ The writer says he sends his messages to clients via Trello. Well, did the reporter see the Trello boards? Did he compare the tweets submitted with the tweets published?

4️⃣ The writer says he “made about $200K” last year. What does “about” mean? $170K? $195K? This is still big money, but why didn’t the reporter press for an exact amount?

5️⃣ Why didn’t the reporter talk to any of the writer’s clients? Or at least contact them, so he could say they declined to comment? This is journalism 101.

6️⃣ The writer says he charged $100K for a threaded tweet. He later says, “Threads don’t work.” Does this blanket statement include his own $100K payday? A reputable publication shouldn’t let this kind of discrepancy stand unacknowledged.

If Willy Loman Were Alive, Here Are the Desperate Follow-Up Emails He’d Send

I just spent a few minutes digging through my spam folder. Behold these cries of desperation:

❌ I know you're busy, wanted to make sure this message didn't get forgotten.

❌ I'll hang it up after this but I thought I'd try one last time.

❌ I’m still super interested in collaborating with you, and wondered if you had the chance to check out my article?

❌ It's unfortunate I didn't hear back, but I completely understand! I am sure you are a very busy person.

❌ I know email inboxes can be a busy place so I just wanted to nudge this one more time for you.

❌ I know timing wasn't great a few months ago, but figured I'd reach back out given everything going on.

3 Tips to Introduce a New C.E.O.

I’ve helped roll out leadership transitions for management consultancies, federal agencies, and universities. Here are a few tips:

1. Make sure the new boss makes himself available first to his employees. They shouldn’t read about him in the press; they should hear from him directly.

2. Communication from him should take multiple forms spread out over at least a month: Emails, Q&As (large and small), a taped video.

3. It’s important to humanize leaders: These communications shouldn’t be too formal. Instead, a little levity goes a long way.

How to Write a Letter of Complaint

A recent article in the Washington Post drew the following comment from a reader:

---

After recent stays in mid-level to upscale chain hotels, and finding issues in all rooms (such as a room door that required excess force to open or close), I am now committed to sending follow-up emails to the managers of the specific hotels noting the issues (most of which could easily be fixed with minor effort). The text of the messages will go something like this:

“I know you are committed to a pleasant, high-quality experience for all your guests. I recently stayed at your hotel [room #], and there were a few items that could be easily remedied in order to make their stay even-more satisfying and to maintain your hotel’s reputation as a first-class business:

“[Bullet points of issues, with photos if appropriate.]

“I know that you will want to fix these things as soon as possible. Again, I enjoyed my stay at your hotel.

---

This is an excellent example of how to file a formal complaint:

1. Put a positive spin on the issue; give the vendor the benefit of the doubt.

2. Provide specifics. Pics are always best.

3. Try to resolve the issue privately before taking things public.

Nobody Knows Anything

Commenting on the business of making movies, screenwriter William Goldman made a now-famous declaration: “Nobody knows anything.”

He explained that this was less a blanket criticism of management and more a recognition of how hard it is to predict the success of individual movies.

If You Want to Hire a Writer, Make Sure Your Job Description Is Written As Well As This One

Lyft is looking for freelance writers for a new project about the future of transportation.

Our mission is to improve people’s lives with the world’s best transportation. It’s an ambitious goal that includes autonomous vehicles, bike- and scooter-share, fully-electric fleets, integrated transit systems, and cities designed around people rather than cars. We are launching a series of articles, videos, and social posts to show how that vision becomes reality, including — but not exclusively — through Lyft’s own efforts.

To that end, we are seeking experienced general-interest transportation writers who can inject a lively voice into a sometimes dry topic, write in almost any format, and develop surprising, unique, and compelling pitches. Time commitment and workload will depend on the candidate.

Addendum (12/20/2022): Here’s another one, from Parisleaf:

About You

You’re a gifted writer with a penchant for research. Psychology fascinates you. You’re an experienced copywriter, and while you’re adept at writing clever headlines that inspire action, you’re a poet at heart. You thrive on helping brands discover their essence and put their purpose into brief, memorable, magnetic words. You like writing words that are useful and believe that form and function should be besties.

Mission, vision, purpose statement, big idea, manifesto, purple cow — it seems every branding agency has its own terminology for the first half of branding. Whatever you like to call these word-bundles, you understand that it’s all for naught if brands cannot clearly describe why they exist, what sets them apart, and why people should care.

You’ve helped clients develop everything from competitive analysis to core positioning statements, voice and tone, content strategy, taglines, and marketing copy from websites to print collateral.

You’ve worked closely with designers and appreciate the interplay between words, letters, and images.

You’ve spent years studying how people read and hear online, in print, and across time – and you know how strong brand identity can tie it all together.

You are proactive, self-motivated, and organized. You’re comfortable presenting work to clients and listening to what they’re not saying. You can defend your decisions with confidence and professionalism. You are curious, empathetic, and — most importantly — willing to set your ego aside for the greater good of clients and teammates.

The Role

The Brand Writer will work closely with our creative, project management, business development, and leadership teams to help service the company and our partners’ needs. Typical tasks include:

• Researching partner materials and competitive landscapes to summarize highlights and opportunities.
• Facilitating stakeholder interviews with problem-finding in mind.
• Writing key discernment summaries to capture research insights and analysis.
• Working with teammates and helping to facilitate collaborative workshops with clients.
• Establishing the who, what, and why it matters of brand messaging guidelines.
• Developing strategic recommendations for naming, messaging, and identity design.
• Facilitating transitions from verbal to visual milestones with designer(s).
• Collaborating with design to establish core and directional ideas.
• Sharing keen observations, opinionated viewpoints, and objective feedback with teammates to ensure our solutions are world-class.
• Writing taglines, headlines, and content for various deliverables from print to web.
• Working with our partners navigating conflict, staying on target, developing relationships, and building partnerships
• Assist with internal writing and editing needs such as case studies, articles, social posts, and more.
• Establishing good self-editing, time management, budgeting, and scoping skills.
• Communicating well in both written and spoken forms.

Though you will spend many hours writing in sweet solitude, this position is collaborative and client-facing. We are looking for someone who enjoys developing ideas with clients and colleagues and can then hunker down and write powerful copy that meets our partners’ needs, tell their truth, and exceed their expectations.

P.S. We’re an Oxford comma shop. No need to apply if you disagree. ;-)

The 5-Point Guidance I Give to Clients Who Want a Slide Deck

1. Headers
Ditch the headlines, or headers, on each slide. This format reduces the space you have to work with, thus making your slides cramped.

2. Visuals
Make your visuals bigger — much bigger. (And make sure to use only hi-res pics.)

3. Transition Slides
Use transition, or chapter, slides. This has the added benefit of giving your audience more time to process what you’re saying.

4. One Point Per Slide
Perhaps most important — and I can’t say this enough — limit each slide to one point. Not one point with multiple subpoints. One single solitary takeaway per slide.

5. Bullet Points
If you feel compelled to use bullet points, find a more visually interesting way to display them than a boring list.

I realize this is a big departure from what you’re used to. It also entails a lot of work. But I fear that your current slides don’t do justice to your content.

Your Client Wants You to Use Google Docs? Then You Absolutely Must Give Them This Heads-Up

Collaborating in Google Docs is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it’s a dramatic improvement upon emailing a Word doc back and forth. On the other hand, it makes collaboration too easy: People can see your changes in real time — and they often respond before you’re done.

The same principle holds when you’re waiting on someone for their edits. Do you assume that the email Google automatically sends when changes are made means the doc is now yours? Or do you wait until your collaborator formally notifies you that they’re passing the baton?

Opportunities for miscommunication abound: Either instructions get ignored, or expectations get misaligned.

So what’s the solution? Josh Bernoff tells clients, “Don’t watch me edit.” Kat Boogaard tells clients, “Please send me an email when edits are ready. I don’t monitor Google Doc notifications.”

Here’s the message I use:

As I work, Google may send you notifications that I have questions. Unfortunately, there’s no way to turn these notifications off. Please ignore them.

Similarly, if you check the doc yourself, you may see questions I’ve left for you that you’re tempted to reply to now. Please resist that temptation.

I tend to work in batches. For example, in the morning I’ll pick the low-hanging fruit. In the afternoon, I’ll take on the more substantive issues. In the evening, or even the next day, I’ll review everything with fresh eyes.

If you pop in between these periods, you’ll be looking not at a document that’s ready for your review, but at the sausage being made. (If you’re interested, this Wall Street Journal article delves into detail about the perils of premature editing.)

The bottom line: Kindly wait for me to email you that I’m done. Trust me: We’ll both be happier that way.

Which Headline Is Best?

1. Should Freelancers Make Our Prices Public?

2. Should We Freelancers Make Our Prices Public?

3. Should Freelancers Make Their Prices Public?

4. Should Freelancers Make Their Prices Public?

5. Should You Make Your Price Sheet Public?

6. Should You Make Your Rate Sheet Public?

7. Do You Make Your Prices Public?

8. When Should You Make Your Prices Public?

9. Should Your Website List Your Prices?

10. Should You Publish Your Rates on Your Website?

11. Should You Share Your Price Sheet With Potential Clients?

12. Don’t Be Afraid to Share Your Prices. Here’s Why

13. Don’t Be Afraid to Share Your Prices

14. Why You Should Make Your Prices Public

15. Marcus Sheridan Makes His Prices Public

16. Why Don’t More Freelancers Share Their Price Publicly?

17. The Freelancer’s Dilemma: Should You Make Your Prices Public?

18. The Pros and Cons of Making Your Price Sheet Public

And the winner is...

What Happens After You Make an Email Error?

I’m reprinting the below story from Dan Oshinsky’s current newsletter:

---

In January, Oakland University, a public university just outside of Detroit, emailed 5,500 incoming students, and told them that they’d won a massive scholarship. As Eduardo Medina of the New York Times reported:

Carnell Poindexter looked at the subject line of the email — “Congratulations!” — and opened it immediately while in a debate class at his high school in West Bloomfield, Mich.

Mr. Poindexter, an 18-year-old senior with a 3.8 grade point average, thought that perhaps this was the scholarship he had hoped for from Oakland University. “You worked hard and it paid off!” read the Jan. 4 email, informing him that he had won a $48,000 academic scholarship over four years. Mr. Poindexter, who wants to be a lawyer, and his parents were elated.

But then, more than two hours later, came another email with a subject line that read, “CORRECTION.”

If you send enough email, you’re going to make mistakes. Sometimes, there’s a typo in an email, or a broken link, or placeholder text that doesn’t get replaced, or you schedule an email out for the wrong time of day.

But as I thought more about this email error from Oakland University, I kept coming back to two things I wish they’d done — one before hitting send, one after:

1. Create a checklist of things to do before you hit send. What are the steps you need to take before sending out that email? A few suggestions: Make sure your sent-from name, subject line, and preheader text are correct. Make sure you’re sending to the right audience. (In 2021, Oakland University admitted 1,300 students to their freshman class — the idea of more than 5,000 students getting an email about a scholarship should have been a red flag.) If your E.S.P. offers a link checking tool, use it to make sure the links are correct. And make sure someone else has edited the email and signed off on it before you hit send.

2. If you truly screw up, apologize, and make it personal and sincere. Imagine that you’re hosting a webinar, and you send an email to your readers about the event. The email says it’ll start at 12 p.m. Eastern time, but the webinar is actually at 12 p.m. Pacific time. In that case, “Correction” might be a good subject line for a follow-up email about the proper time. Sure, you made a mistake in your first message, but it was a fairly innocent oversight.

But when you make a major mistake, as in the case of Oakland University, your apology email needs to come from a person. (Their name should be the name that you see before you open the email.) It needs to explain what went wrong, and it needs to offer a heartfelt apology — in the first sentence, and then again later in the message. It needs to explain how you plan on righting this wrong. And it needs to include personal contact information for your organization so that those affected can get in touch with an actual person if they so choose. Those students deserved much more than “CORRECTION.”

Remember: Email is a 1-to-1 channel. It doesn’t matter if you’re sending 100 emails or 100,000 — if you make a mistake, you’re making a mistake to each and every one of the people who received that message. Own your mistake and do your best to make it right.

The Best Job Description Ever

Description
Basecamp is hiring a Content Marketing Manager to organize, edit, and write content for our website, social media, and other channels.

About the Work
At Basecamp, we value the written word. Maybe we’re old school, but we think that especially in today’s world of bullet points and tweets, there’s a lot of skill and art in communicating well.

We’re looking for a content manager and writer who has a flair for translating ideas into everyday language and compelling storylines.

In this role you will:

* Oversee content production and develop a web content strategy that syncs with our brand marketing and demand generation goals.

* Create, edit, and manage content for a variety of mediums that could include: email, newsletters, blogs, white papers/guides, thought leadership articles, customer case studies, website pages, webinar slide decks, sales collateral, event collateral, and video scripts.

* Utilize SEO tactics to help improve domain authority and natural search results by incorporating high value keywords into new articles, optimizing target keywords in existing articles, and securing backlinks.

* Maintain the master content calendar that schedules all aspects of the creation and delivery of content throughout the year.

* Stay up-to-date with current best practices in the industry for tactics that might apply to us.

* Collaborate with the team on content for social media posts.

* Help maintain a consistent voice and tone for the brand across multiple channels.

About You
* You have 5+ years experience writing and editing (in English) for multiple channels, and can articulate the differences in how you approach them.

* You’re a stickler for style, grammar and finding the words and phrases that best capture an idea or feeling.

* You have deep experience with SEO and keyword strategy. You're familiar with tools such as AHREFS or SEMRush to monitor competitive positioning and identify new opportunities.

* You have some technical proficiency with CMS tools such as WordPress.

* You’ve managed freelance writers, and may even have a short list that you’ve worked with before.

* You’re equally comfortable and motivated by working “high level,” developing a strategy and plan, or being ”hands-on” writing and editing.

* The Basecamp “voice” and tone resonates with you, and is easy for you to adopt.

* You’re comfortable as a manager of one.

* You approach your work with a spirit of partnership and collaboration, not exclusion or rigidness. You're a resourceful problem solver; you can feel for gaps in what you're working on, pitch solutions and implement them.

This is a fully remote position. Since we're a remote company, you'll find that the bulk of everyone's work is written, whether that's long form posts or chats with your co-workers. We value people who can take a stand yet commit when they disagree. We subject ideas to rigorous debate, but all remember that we're here for the same purpose: to do good work together. Charging the trust battery is part of that work.

We encourage applicants from all backgrounds and identities to apply for a job where you can do the best work of your career. Basecamp is committed to remaining a calm company where we don't regularly work longer than 40 hours per week and take proper vacations.

What to Expect
You can expect a mindful onboarding process with structured ramp-up time. You can expect a team that listens. You can expect to be counted on and the freedom to do your best work. We build our apps, our teams, and our company for the long haul, so you can build your career here if you choose to.

We respect everyone's right to participate in political expression and activism, but avoid having political debates on our internal communication systems. Basecamp as a company also does not weigh in on politics publicly, outside of topics directly related to our business. You should be at peace with both of these stances.

Pay and Benefits
Basecamp pays in the top 10% of the industry, for the matched role and experience, based on San Francisco rates. The salary for this role is $126,250. No matter where you live. Plus, with two years under your belt, you’ll participate in our profit-sharing program.

Our benefits support a life well-lived away from work. Ample time off and all the resources you need to support you in doing the best work of your career. Here's more on the benefits we offer.

Applicants from outside the US will be offered a contractor role with comparable terms and at the same rate of pay as our US-based employees.

How to Apply
Please send an application tailored to this position that speaks to us. Introduce yourself to us as a colleague. Within your cover letter, give us some examples of some of your best written work, how it was used and to what effect. We would like to see a resume, but forget that generic resume. Show us what really sets you apart!

Go for It!
We are accepting applications for this position until Friday, March 4, 2022, at 5:00PM US-Central time.

You should not expect to hear for a few weeks, while we review all applications. Please note that we’re unable to offer individual feedback during the screening process. We usually see hundreds of applications for roles, and our small hiring team simply doesn’t have the bandwidth to offer personalized feedback before the interview stage.

Interviews will take place in March. Expect 2-3 interviews over the course of a few weeks. Our interviews are conversations held with future colleagues — no tests, no surprises. After that, we'll ask the final candidates to complete an at-home written exercise. We hope to extend an offer in April, with a flexible start date later that month.

We look forward to hearing from you!

How Much Do You Charge?

Sometimes, potential clients ask me in their first email, “What’s your price?" Here’s the message I plan to send back:

Thanks for your question. I totally understand the need to get a sense of what something will cost upfront. Allow me to explain why I take a different approach.

Over the years, I’ve learned that it’s counterproductive to provide a price without first having a conversation. There are several reasons for this:

1. You may be contacting several people, and I want to demonstrate my value.

2. We may be using a word or phrase to mean different things. (I wrote about this scenario for P.R. Daily.)

3. If possible, I prefer not to bill by the hour or use a rate sheet. Instead, after learning about the given project, I offer a customized fee.

The bottom line: If price is your only consideration, then I’m probably not the right person. On the other hand, if you value excellence, if you want someone who’s reliable and responsive, if you’d prefer to work one on one with the business owner (that’s me) rather than a junior account executive, then I’d welcome the opportunity to schedule a brief call.

Thanks again for contacting me. I hope we’ll get the chance to chat.