Mark Graham on How Getting Promoted Evolves Career Aspirations

In Chapter 6 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham answers "How Are Your Aspirations Changing as Your Responsibilities Grow?"   Graham recalls why he joined VH1 and the creative opportunities the big company offered.  As a managing editor, Graham now gets to manage larger creative teams across different business areas. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are your aspirations changing as your responsibilities grow?

Mark Graham: My aspirations continue to be high. One of the reasons that I went to VH1 a couple of years ago is that I saw it as a place where—you know, obviously, VH1 is part of Viacom which is a massive organization and a place where I could really grow and learn new things and try new things out. And so, professionally, I still have lots of aspirations to grow and continue to basically learn, develop more skill sets, and to be able to grow  professionally, to continue to do more things, to be able to put more of a—more of a creative stamp on projects that I do. 

I feel like I’m in a really good place right now professionally. I recently was promoted and because of that I’ve gained some new responsibilities, and right now I feel like I’m still sort of feeling my way out in this and learning to deal with a larger team of people who I’m responsible for, making sure that they’re satisfied and they feel like they’re growing in their lives, professionally speaking. That’s been a new challenge for me, and something that I’ve really, really enjoyed, and, you know, candidly I need to continue to work on as well. So right now I feel like I’m in a place where I’d like to spend a little bit of time in this particular role, learning how to deal more with people on my team, building my way up through the organization, and continuing to grow in that sort of a facet.

Mark Graham on Getting Promoted to Managing Editor

In Chapter 7 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, digital media executive Mark Graham "What Has It Meant for You to Get Promoted to Managing Editor at VH1?"  Graham talks about his recent promotion from senior editor and how his new role at the network ties into executing the network's digital strategy.  His VH1 role revolves around three pillars: 1) support VH1 television shows with online content; 2) bring pop culture levity to celebrity culture; 3) build out the VH1 music community. 

Mark Graham is currently a managing editor at VH1, an MTV Networks company. Previously Graham worked in editing and writing roles at New York Magazine and Gawker Media.  He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English.  

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What has it meant for you to get promoted to managing editor at VH1?

Mark Graham: It’s been a real challenge because I’m not narrowly focused on one specific area of entertainment coverage, I’m sort of spread out over 3 and helping our writers and teams of people who manage each of those sites really sort of laser in on coverage, things that people are talking about, ways to present content that are fun and interesting and sharable to people. I’ve held the managing editor title in different capacities before. I was a managing editor at a website called defamer.com where multiple writers reported in to me and I helped sort of set the editorial tone and framework. 

The cool thing about my new role as managing editor at VH1 is that it’s not just one particular channel that we’re covering—and by channel, I mean the channel of coverage not a channel on your television set. We have 3 primary what we call verticals that we’re—that I’m in charge of managing, one being our shows, so all of our content that appears on linear which is television, all of our shows, we support those digitally, whether that be, you know, recapping episodes, pulling out great information that happens in those episodes through animated gifs or things of that nature, video compilations, really sort of delving into that and helping make our readers feel like they’re actively engaged and building a community of people who are interested in our shows and talking about them on a deeper level other than just sort of passively watching them on TV. That’s one area that’s really exciting for me. 

Another one that we deal in is the celebrity-sphere, which is a very crowded marketplace. And what we’re trying to do with celebrities is really sort of leverage VH1’s strengths in terms of list making and bringing a real sort of fun sense of popular culture to celebrity coverage which sometimes sort of a stale feel, there’s lots of people who are covering celebrities they don’t always necessarily do it in a very interesting way. So we’re trying to bring some levity and fun into the celebrity-sphere. 

And the 3rd sort of area that I’m responsible for is music coverage. VH1 has a rich history in music, be that through original shows like VH1 Storytellers or Unplugged, or helping to launch new emerging artists through a franchise we have called You Oughta Know. You know, really helping to sort of build out our relationship with people particularly in the social space and getting to—getting them to interact with VH1 as a place that they know and they trust and brings them good recommendations and as for people who don’t necessarily have a lot of time in their lives to discover new music, we wanna help be a place to, you know, really bring that sort of communal experience back to music that is not happening as much because of the way people consume music these days through their iPods. There—you know, Top 40 radio is shrinking in terms of its relevance importance, we wanna be a voice that helps people discover new music. That’s been a real—it’s been a great challenge and a lot of fun, something that’s wholly different than my other experiences in the past. 

Anatole Faykin on Founding and Selling an Internet Startup

In Chapter 6 of 12 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, entrepreneur Anatole Faykin answers "What Were the Main Learning Points From Starting and Selling a Company?"  He talks about the massive amount of uncertainty starting and growing a company and managing the adverse climate that comes with that.  He notes how Internet startups operate in a fluid, fast changing market that requires quick adaptation to changing market conditions.  Faykin shares how a fast changing environment requires short term, incremental goals along with being open-minded for change and new opportunities.  Anatole Faykin is an entrepreneur currently working on a new startup as part of the Startup Chile incubator program in Santiago, Chile.  Previously, Faykin founded Tuanpin, a Shanghai, China-based daily deals site he grew to 25 employees and sold in the fall of 2011. He has worked for British Telecom in London, Intel in Shanghai, American Express in New York, and Oracle in San Francisco as well as several startups. He holds an MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business and a BS in computer science and biology from the California Institute of Technology.

Conrad Doucette on Getting to Play With Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead

In Chapter 17 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, musician Conrad Doucette answers "What Did It Mean to You to Get Asked to Play With Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead?"  A longtime fan of the Grateful Dead and Bob Weir's rhythm guitar playing, Conrad sees a dream come true when asked to join The National and play Grateful Dead songs with Bob Weir for the Bridge Sessions in March 2012.  The preparation for the performance gives Doucette a first-hand view of watching a master, Weir, rehearse for a show and direct the band.  Conrad Doucette is a Brooklyn musician and the drummer for Takka Takka, which released its 3rd studio album, AM Landscapes, in late 2012.  He has performed with Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead, The National, Alina Simone, and many other leading acts.  When not performing music, Doucette is the communications and brand director at music licensing and publishing startup Jingle Punks.  Doucette earned a BA in History from the University of Michigan.

Matt Ruby on Taking Comedy Skills Beyond Just Being Funny

In Chapter 5 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, standup comedian Matt Ruby talks to Erik Michielsen about honing his comedy voice and improving his skills over time.  Ruby notes that he has more work to do being vulnerable on stage and giving himself greater stakes to make a difference to the audience on stage.  He notes that his work is becoming less about just trying to be funny all the time and instead taking charge of what he wants to talk about and then layer the humor in that work. 

Matt Ruby is a standup comedian and comedy writer based in New York City.  He produces a video comic strip at Vooza.com, co-produces the weekly show "Hot Soup", co-hosts the monthly show "We're All Friends Here", and writes a comedy blog "Sandpaper Suit".  Ruby graduated from Northwestern University. 

Stacie Bloom on Finding a New Job in Neuroscience Education

In Chapter 1 of 18 in her 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, Neuroscience Institute Executive Director Stacie Grossman Bloom answers "Since We Last Spoke, What Has Been the Most Exciting Thing to Happen in Your Life?"  Bloom details how she was presented an opportunity - in between her Year 1 and Year 2 Capture Your Flag interviews - to leave the New York Academy of Sciences (NYAS) for an executive position at NYU and why she accepted it. 

Stacie Grossman Bloom is Executive Director for the Neuroscience Institute at the NYU Langone Medical Center.  Previously, she was VP and Scientific Director at the New York Academy of Sciences (NYAS) and, before that, held editorial roles at the Journal of Clinical Investigation and Nature Medicine.  She earned her BA in chemistry and psychology from the University of Delaware, her PhD in Neurobiology and Cell Biology at Georgetown University and did post-doctoral training in Paul Greengard's Nobel Laboratory of Molecular & Cellular Neuroscience at Rockefeller University. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen:  Since we last spoke, what has been the most exciting thing to happen in your life?

Stacie Grossman Bloom:  I would say that I really got this amazing new job about one year ago. And I think it happened very shortly after I got the chance to interview for you the last time. This is not something that I was expecting to necessarily get or wasn’t really even looking for it at the time. I think I was ready in my last position to explore new possibilities but I hadn’t even really thought much about what those possibilities could be. And then this opportunity presented itself to me and it just really sounded like a great fit.

Erik Michielsen:  Could you tell me more about the opportunity?

Stacie Grossman Bloom:  Sure. So my new position is as executive director for the NYU Neuroscience Institute, which is a new entity that we’re currently in the process of building at NYU up at the medical center.

Erik Michielsen:  Now, is that part of the university or is it part of—How does that work within the context of the university and the medical center?

Stacie Grossman Bloom:  Yeah, NYU is interesting in terms of that relationship, so the main part of NYU—what people think of as NYU is all located around Washington Square. We call it Downtown. And the hospital and the medical center are in the 30’s and we call it Uptown. You know, obviously, they’re the same umbrella organization, although they have a slightly different governance structure and different tax identification numbers, making them a little bit fiscally independent, from what I understand.

Planning Hiring Strategy at a 100-Employee Firm - Richard Moross

In Chapter 17 of 17 in his 2012 interview, London entrepreneur and Moo.com CEO Richard Moross answers "What New Challenges Are You Facing as Your Company Grows?"  Moross notes his company has reached 100 employees and is now hiring a person a week.  He emphasizes 1) the importance of aligning new hires with the existing team; 2) telling the story of the company; 3) finding adaptable new hires and 4) ensuring he finds time to meet with an increasingly distributed and international team.  Moross is founder and CEO of Moo.com and a leader in the London startup scene.  Before starting Moo.com, an award-winning online print business, Moross was a strategist at Imagination, the world's largest independent design company.  He graduated from the University of Sussex, where he majored in philosophy and politics.

Joe Stump on How to Make Product Management Easier for Developers

In Chapter 14 of 14 in his 2012 interview, Internet entrepreneur Joe Stump answers "How Are You Learning to Improve the Product Management Process for Developers?"  Stump provides the background for what motivated him to co-found software company Sprint.ly to make product development easier.  Joe Stump is a serial entrepreneur based in Portland, OR. He is CEO and co-founder of Sprint.ly, a product management software company.  Previously he founded SimpleGeo, which was sold to Urban Airship in October 2011.  He advises several startups - including attachments.me and, through its acquisition, ngmoco:) - as well as VC firm Freestyle Capital.  He earned a BBA in Computer Information Systems (CIS) from Eastern Michigan University.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: How are you learning to improve the product management process for developers?

Joe Stump: I talk to a ton of developers and just listen to what they're doing. I do a little bit of consulting as well mostly around product management and team management, a little bit around product as well. I think product management spans a big area. It spans strategy, what should we build, when should we build it, why are we building it, all the way to asset allocation and whatnot.

So, basically I've been working in this space. I've been leading and managing teams for almost a decade now and I've kind of taken a lot of those lessons and what I find is every team behaves slightly differently and the thing that I’ve probably – the thing that’s stuck out most to me over the last kind of decade or so is that when you assemble teams, like each team is like a little snowflake and they all behave and look and act in a slightly different manner. And in software engineering, there’s like, there are all this process paradigms, agile, scrum, waterfall, kanban.

And what I found is teams generally will embrace parts of each of those. Very, very few teams will embrace those fully. And what I’ve done is – I mean every developer at some point in their career has been frustrated with one of their tools, and said, “One day I'm going to rewrite a better mousetrap and I'm going to make a better tool.” And I'm happy to say I'm realizing that dream finally.

I recently -- The first week of December, I launched my new product. It's called Sprint.ly. And Sprint.ly is really the manifestation of almost 15 years of frustration with the product management tool. These tools I found have generally fallen into a couple of different camps. One camp is they're built for product of business to manage resources. Developers hate those. They don’t really like using those. They don’t have a lot of things that developers want and for, to do their day to day stuff. So the features in those skew much towards really resource planning. And then you have bug trackers built by developers for developers.

So you have two completely different types of software that are trying to address the same problem for two different parties at the table, right? Really my approach with Sprint.ly has been I think a little bit different whereas in first of all, I'm trying to build a tool that unifies those two camps. I actually found more than a handful of customers when I was talking to them that the developers were literally using one tool and the project management people were using another tool and then they would copy and paste stuff back and forth, which I think is insane.

So, we've been building Sprint.ly in a way that I want to get everybody using the same tool. So that has forced us to decrease barriers. And we built a tool, a lot of the tools out that are in product management, certainly the bug trackers are very technical and very difficult to understand. So we've kind of done away with that. It looks a little bit more like a consumer product. And the other thing I wanted to do is I wanted to increase transparency. So I talked to – you talk to the developers and it's almost like companies in software – like software companies are two black boxes warring at each other.

You have the makers on one side and you have the business and manager people on the other side and they're like, “What are you doing?” and the other one is like, “What are you doing? Why are you doing that? Why are you doing that?” So really, I want to build Sprint.ly kind of into the UN of product management software where everybody comes to the table, everybody can see what everybody else is doing. I think sometimes my software development peers make things a little too complicated.

I guess over time, I’ve just learned that when you're building products and working with teams that you need to spend more time listening than talking because that’s when you'll realize what the problem is. There's a couple good quotes around product that I like that I think emphasize that, which is “don’t give the customer what they ask for, give them what they want.” And then there's a really great Henry Ford quote, which is, “If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”

How Startup Raises First Venture Capital Round - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 5 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "How Did Your Team Go About Raising Venture Capital?"  Rubin notes the importance of mission alignment and how this plays into goals, milestones, and responsibilities.  He details the transition from being a bootstrap financed startup to taking on convertible debt to deciding on venture financing to build out the team and user experience. 

Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: How does your team go about raising venture capital?

Slava Rubin: I think it’s really important that the core team be aligned on knowing what we’re trying to accomplish. What size of a company are we looking to build? How many employees do we wanna have? What kind of revenue are we looking to accomplish? Where do we wanna sit in the competitive landscape and what are we trying to accomplish as a vision? All those things need to be agreed to. Where you’re singing the same song and after that it’s making sure that you know who’s playing what role. You typically don’t wanna have too many people in the process of actually try to raise the money because that can be confusing in terms of coordination and managing the process. So, with us specifically I'm leading up the fundraising process with significant help from the core team.

Erik Michielsen: Was this your first time raising venture capital?

Slava Rubin: Yes. So, we launched in January 2008 and the three founders Eric Shell, Danae Ringelman and myself we boot strapped through 2008. We planned on raising money in the fall of 2008 but then the crash of 2008-2009 happened, which really slowed things down for us. We then raised a small convertible note and followed that with a venture capital round of 1.5 million in March of 2011.

Erik Michielsen: And you used that to build out the team and now are looking at next steps to scale further?

Slava Rubin: Exactly. So, we went from a team of 5 to now a team of 19 and we’re continuing to grow and always looking on how to improve the customer experience.

Courtney Spence on How Giving TED Talk Improves Public Speaking

In Chapter 1 of 19 in her 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, non-profit executive Courtney Spence answers "What Did Giving a TED Talk Teach You About More Effectively Telling Your Story?"  The preparation process for her TEDxPeachtree talk in Atlanta teaches Spence to separate her story from her organization and focus on identifying core values and believes.  Spence discusses how she then was able to create a narrative arc to more effectively tell her story in the TED Talk time constraints.  Courtney Spence returns to Capture Your Flag for her Year 3 interview.  As Founder and Executive Director, Spence leads non-profit Students of the World to empower college students to use film, photography, and journalism to tell stories of global issues and the organizations working to address them.  Spence graduated with a BA in History from Duke University.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: What did giving a TED talk teach you about more effectively telling your story?

Courtney Spence: I was honored to give a TED talk in Atlanta in November. And I had a few months to prepare for it. I think the great challenge was for me not using notes. As a public speaker, I tend to always speak with notes of some capacity, whether it’s the actual speech written out or just some sort of bullet points. So it really challenged me to come up with a very effective narrative arc that would make sense for me as I was actually giving the speech. So it wasn’t that I had notes to refer to but the story really kind of followed into a path that would make it easy for me to deliver it and easy for me to communicate it. I also had a very strict limit of time and wanted to really incorporate media elements as a part of my speech and so it was also challenging because the kind of, the number one rule was that you couldn’t talk about what you did. Like you couldn’t talk about your organization for more than just setting up what it was that you were going to be speaking about.

So, you know, I was talking about the transformative power of storytelling in areas that are going through recovery from massive situations whether it’s Haiti or New Orleans. These are experiences that I’ve had through my organization but haven’t – but wasn’t able to talk about Students of the World. So it was really – it was a really wonderful challenge because I recognized that when I often speak, I often speak about Students of the World, so this was really more about what do I believe in? What has Students of the World taught me? What do I think is a really important message that needs to be conveyed? And for me that I feel so passionate about places like New Orleans and Northern Uganda and Haiti, and the need for the continuous storytelling to come from these areas that have gone through earth-shattering, literally earth-shattering disasters, either man-made or environmentally made. So it was really – it was a nice opportunity to force me to really dig deep and figure out what I believe and how to communicate that effectively. And it was wonderful.

How Getting Married Changes Your Life

In Chapter 6 of 15 in her 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, entrepreneur Audrey Parker French answers "How Has Getting Married Change Your Life?"  She notes how marriage weaves together two people into one and represents a lifetime commitment.  She notes how the commitment to marriage stands above either she or her husband's individual desires and needs. 

Audrey Parker French returns to CYF for her Year 3 interview after a one-year sabbatical from work and getting married.  She co-founded CLEAResult, an energy management consulting firm.  In 2010, CLEAResult ranked #144 in the Inc. 500 list of fastest-growing private companies.  In late 2010, CLEAResult was sold to General Catalyst Partners.  She graduated from Wake Forest University. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How has getting married changed your life?

Audrey Parker French: Well, it’s not my life anymore. My life is now me and my husband. It’s a completely – I mean to the point where I – I could’ve thought that I could know what this would be like and yet until I’ve gone through it I really didn’t know what this was. It’s literally a weaving together of 2 people into one. And it’s a commitment that lasts a lifetime. And we both took that commitment and still take that commitment very, very seriously. And it means that on a day-to-day basis, it’s – you know – it’s a commitment that’s higher than ourselves, the commitment to the relationship that’s higher than what I wanna do in the morning or what I wanna do in a day or what he wants to do in the morning or do in a day, it’s – we’ve made a commitment to value our relationship above either one of our individual in the moment kind of needs.

I have done that before in the commitment level that I had to the company that I helped start. I know how to put something ahead of your own desires and we all do it every day. We just have to make sure that what we put ahead of our own desires, what we’re committed to above anything else is something really pure and really important, and really good that fulfills us. And that’s what marriage is for me. It’s been – it’s also been – it’s been really fun to find the person that really is my mirror, my equal, my match, you know, he’s the right shoe, I’m the left shoe. We’re a matching pair.

And life didn’t really make sense to either of us, we’ve laughed about it how we’ve gone out with plenty of people over the last, you know, 10 or 15 years as we’ve been learning and growing. And thinking, “Well, wow, that was a really good date, that person got me 60% of the way or 50% of the way.” But we have never experienced really getting another individual on such a deep level and really feeling that sacred spiritual precious pure feeling, and I – it’s just been life changing, really life altering and beautiful.

Matt Curtis on Losing 160 Pounds and Taking First International Trip

In Chapter 3 of 18 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, public affairs and communications strategist Matt Curtis answers "What Was it Like to Take Your First International Trip?" Curtis shares how he overcame embarrassment about his weight and fear of the unknown to take an overseas trip to Ireland in his late 30s. He talks about the times in his 20s and 30s when he was overweight and felt it was not even an option to travel long distances by plane.  Now 160 pounds lighter but still a big man, he shares how easy it turned out to be and how the experience has opened new doors to future international travel plans. Matt Curtis is the director of government relations at HomeAway Inc. Previously he was communications director for Austin mayors Lee Leffingwell and Will Wynn. In 2011, Curtis won "Austinite of the Year" in the Austin Under 40 Awards. He earned his bachelor's degree in radio, television and film from the University of North Texas.

How Turning 40 Years Old Changes Life Perspective - Matt Curtis

In Chapter 5 of 18 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, public affairs and communications strategist Matt Curtis answers "What is on Your Mind as You Turn 40 This Year?"  As Curtis prepared to turn 40, he focused on what he had not done and not achieved.  After speaking with his advisors, who are in their late 60s and early 70s, he finds turning 40 is an opportunity to reflect on the past and take charge of future plans.  With this perspective he regrets less and embraces opportunities more.  Matt Curtis is the director of government relations at HomeAway Inc. Previously he was communications director for Austin mayors Lee Leffingwell and Will Wynn.  In 2011, Curtis won "Austinite of the Year" in the Austin Under 40 Awards.  He earned his bachelor's degree in radio, television and film from the University of North Texas.

How to Live a Healthier Life at 40 - Matt Curtis

In Chapter 6 of 18 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, public affairs and communications strategist Matt Curtis answers "How Are Your Personal Priorities Changing As You Get Older?"  Curtis shares how he is getting more serious about his health, including what he eats, how he exercises, and when he sleeps.  As he turns 40, he finds he has more energy and, as a result, is more positive, outgoing, and happy.  Matt Curtis is the director of government relations at HomeAway Inc. Previously he was communications director for Austin mayors Lee Leffingwell and Will Wynn.  In 2011, Curtis won "Austinite of the Year" in the Austin Under 40 Awards.  He earned his bachelor's degree in radio, television and film from the University of North Texas.

How Student Government Influences Political Career Choice - Ken Biberaj

In Chapter 4 of 21 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, New York City Council candidate and public relations executive Ken Biberaj answers "How Did Your Student Government College Experience Shape Your Career Ambition?"  Biberaj shares his experience attending American University in Washington D.C. and his decision to run for student body president at the end of his sophomore year.  He talks about the election and running the campaign and what the student government experience taught him about politics.  Ken Biberaj is currently a 2013 Candidate for New York City Council for the West Side of Manhattan.  He is also a public relations executive for the Russian Tea Room restaurant at One Fifty Fifty Seven Corporation, a family business focused on real estate development, investment sales and retail leasing.  Previously he was Florida Research Director for the Kerry-Edwards for President Campaign. He holds a JD from New York Law School, a Masters in Public Policy (MPP) from Harvard University Kennedy School of Government, and a BA in Political Science from American University. 

How Marriage Relationship Guides Career Decisions - Ken Biberaj

In Chapter 17 of 21 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, New York City Council candidate and public relations executive Ken Biberaj answers "How Has Getting Married Changed Your Life?"  Biberaj shares how meeting his wife Valerie has been so impactful in his life.  He shares how the relationship has helped understand why he does what he does support him through the process of deciding to run for public office.  Ken Biberaj is currently a 2013 Candidate for New York City Council for the West Side of Manhattan.  He is also a public relations executive for the Russian Tea Room restaurant at One Fifty Fifty Seven Corporation, a family business focused on real estate development, investment sales and retail leasing.  Previously he was Florida Research Director for the Kerry-Edwards for President Campaign. He holds a JD from New York Law School, a Masters in Public Policy (MPP) from Harvard University Kennedy School of Government, and a BA in Political Science from American University. 

What Gets Easier and What Gets Harder - James McCormick

In Chapter 1 of 18 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, legal career advisor James McCormick answers "What is Getting Easier and What is Getting Harder in Your Life?"  McCormick shares the news of having a child since his Year 2 interview and the new challenges (and rewards) that come with being a parent.  Additionally, he notes his promotion to partner at his job and the positives that come with the challenges of transitioning from employee to owner at the firm.  James McCormick is a Partner at Empire Search Partners in New York City.  Previously, he practiced law as an employee benefits and executive compensation attorney for Proskauer Rose and Jones Day.  He earned a JD at Tulane Law School and a BA in History at the University of Michigan. 

What It Means to Make Partner - James McCormick

In Chapter 13 of 18 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, legal career advisor James McCormick answers "How Have Your Responsibilities Changed Since Becoming a Partner at Your Firm?"  McCormick shares how he gets an increased sense of what responsibility and obligation means across his role, the firm, and its founders.  James McCormick is a Partner at Empire Search Partners in New York City.  Previously, he practiced law as an employee benefits and executive compensation attorney for Proskauer Rose and Jones Day.  He earned a JD at Tulane Law School and a BA in History at the University of Michigan.