Video Interviews — Capture Your Flag

Problem Solving

Jason Anello on Parenting a Startup From Infancy To Adulthood

In Chapter 5 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, creative director and marketing agency co-founder Jason Anello answers "To What Do You Aspire and How Has This Changed If At All Over the Past Five Years?" Over five years interviewing with Capture Your Flag, Anello maintains an aspiration toward discovering the next and new. He shares how his co-founder work parenting his startup marketing agency out of infancy toward adulthood embodies this focus. He notes that work has him "in the weeds" nurturing and caring for the business he co-founded and has helped to build over five years.

Jason Anello is a founding partner and creative director at Manifold Partners, an award-winning marketing agency. Previously, Anello worked in creative leadership roles at Yahoo!, Ogilvy & Mather, and Digitas. Passionate about food, friendship and travel, Anello also runs the Forking Tasty food blog. He earned a BFA from University at Albany. 

Cathy Erway on Why to Question and Confront Status Quo Thinking

In Chapter 18 of 20 in her 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, author and food writer Cathy Erway answers "What Has Experience Taught You About How to Better Manage Confrontation?" Erway shares how confronting another person on a point of view is too often seen as a negative and should also be viewed as a positive. She shares why it is good to challenge and confront conventional thinking and how a resulting debate can be healthy. She shares an exaple of writing a blog about not eating out and challenging conventional thinking around dinners, dating, birthdays and weddings.

Cathy Erway is an author, food writer, freelance copywriter, radio show host and teacher focused on healthy food advocacy. Her second book, "The Food of Taiwan: Recipes From the Beautiful Island" is a cookbook featuring Taiwanese recipes ranging from homestyle dishes to street food favorites. Her first book, "The Art of Eating In" developed from her blog "Not Eating Out in New York".  Erway earned a BA in creative writing from Emerson College. 

Mike Germano on What It Means to Contribute at Work Each Day

In Chapter 14 of 23 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, VICE Media Chief Digital Officer Mike Germano answers "On a Daily Basis, What Does It Mean to Contribute in the Work That You Do?" Working in a fast-paced environment, Germano does everything he can to make sure the company is running smoothly. He finds himself doing a variety of tasks at work, from connecting people to solving office problems, that help get things built to satisfy client demands. At the end of the day, he notes how it all goes by so quickly and seems like a blur.

Mike Germano is Chief Digital Officer at VICE Media, a global youth media company based in Brooklyn, New York. Germano joined VICE Media via its 2013 acquisition of Carrot Creative, a social media agency he co-founded and led as CEO. 

Mike Germano on Deciding What Timeframe to Focus on at Work

In Chapter 15 of 23 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, VICE Media Chief Digital Officer Mike Germano answers "As a Business Owner, How Do You Decide What Time Horizon to Focus on in Your Work?" Germano finds his environment dictates how he chooses to focus his time. Managing quickly changing time demands, Germano finds getting out of the office is an effective way to work through longer-term strategic goals.

Mike Germano is Chief Digital Officer at VICE Media, a global youth media company based in Brooklyn, New York. Germano joined VICE Media via its 2013 acquisition of Carrot Creative, a social media agency he co-founded and led as CEO. 

Mike Germano on Knowing When to Concede and When to Confront

In Chapter 18 of 23 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, VICE Media Chief Digital Officer Mike Germano answers "What Has Experience Taught You About How to Better Manage Confrontation?" Germano shares how he is better at working through larger confrontations. He struggles with smaller confrontations, where he often gives in to appease the other side. Larger conflicts, however, motivate him to stand up for his team and work to win for his side. Mike Germano is Chief Digital Officer at VICE Media, a global youth media company based in Brooklyn, New York. Germano joined VICE Media via its 2013 acquisition of Carrot Creative, a social media agency he co-founded and led as CEO. 

Jullien Gordon on Committing to Longer-Term Customer Relationships

In Chapter 13 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, business coach and public speaker Jullien Gordon answers "How Are Progressively Longer-Term Relationships Changing the Way You Do Business?" Gordon shares how he focuses on fewer relationships with deeper impact where he can not just touch lives but transform them. Gordon references "1,000 True Fans", a book about building a loyal fan base, and how he uses that philosophy to develop his own core audience and serve their needs as a coach, consultant and speaker.

Jullien Gordon is a business coach and consultant to organizations, individuals and teams who want to increase performance, motivation, engagement and retention. Gordon is also a public speaker on career planning for colleges, conferences, and corporations. He earned a BA from UCLA and MBA and M. Ed degrees from Stanford University. 

Jullien Gordon: How to Cultivate an Entrepreneurial Mindset

In Chapter 18 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, business coach and public speaker Jullien Gordon answers "How Are You Helping Others Cultivate an Entrepreneurial Mindset?" Gordon rethinks what it means to have an MBA and repurposes a Masters of Business Administration into a Masters of Value Creation to teach entrepreneurial thinking. He creates a program, Side Hustle, to teach professionals entrepreneurship by starting businesses outside of work. He trains employees to think entrepreneurially about how they can be job creators and push outside of a job description.

Jullien Gordon is a business coach and consultant to organizations, individuals and teams who want to increase performance, motivation, engagement and retention. Gordon is also a public speaker on career planning for colleges, conferences, and corporations. He earned a BA from UCLA and MBA and M. Ed degrees from Stanford University. 

Hammans Stallings on Staying Passionate About a Fast-Changing Job

In Chapter 1 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "How Are You Learning to Use Your Passions in New Ways?" Stallings shares how working at frog design gives him new opportunities to learn all the time. Stallings finds the wide variety of projects and wicked problems that come with his work huge motivators to stay curious and embrace a passion for learning new things.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings on How to Use Pattern Recognition Teaching a Class

In Chapter 4 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "How Have You Learned to Distill Complex Concepts into Teachable Moments?" Stallings finds much of this has to do with recognizing learning patterns and waiting for the right conditions for a teachable moment to occur. To do this, Stallings looks for ways to create structures and parameters for students to get into a complex problem or topic, show interest, and be more receptive to that teachable moment when it occurs.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings on Improving Complex Problem Solving Skills

In Chapter 6 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "How Are You Improving How You Assess and Solve Complex Problems?" Stallings shares how dedicating himself to constantly practicing problem solving in his work is allowing him to progressively develop mastery-level skills. He notes how, over time, things slow down and he is more capable to see things clearly. Working with teams helps him evolve academic thinking into practical, personalized thinking around specific client problems.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings: What It Means to Contribute at Work Each Day

In Chapter 7 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "On a Daily Basis, What Does It Mean to Contribute in the Work That You Do?" Stallings shares how he makes a contribution at work by synthesizing what he has learned about solving difficult problems on past projects and repurposing them to solve current problems on his team. He finds it joyful and motivating to solve problems he is uniquely qualified to solve based on his job experience.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings on Building Storytelling Skills in a Strategy Job

In Chapter 8 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "What Skills Are You Using More as Your Career Advances?" Stallings finds that he currently is focusing more on storytelling skills and less on analytics in his strategist work at frog design. The storytelling helps him improve group-based critical thinking needed to visualize a client problem to formulate a strategy.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings on How to Handle Confrontation

In Chapter 11 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "What Has Experience Taught You About How to Better Manage Confrontation?" Stallings shares how handling confrontation is first about understanding the process is grey, not black and white. Second, it is about embracing the friction that comes with confrontation and using that to find a win-win outcome that makes the conflict worth addressing.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings on How to Use Philosophy in a Consulting Career

In Chapter 12 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "How Has Learning Consulting Been Useful in Your Management Consulting Work?" Stallings shares how reading philosophy and studying philosophers deepens his unerstadning of core arguments and ideas that have been debated for 1000s of years. He learns from the masters to bring these old ideas into present work solving problems working on consulting projects.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Hammans Stallings on How to Get Better at Performing Under Pressure

In Chapter 13 of 19 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, strategist and management consultant Hammans Stallings answers "What Does It Mean to Perform Under Pressure in the Work That You Do?" Stallings shares why grace is important with or without high pressure situations. By being building experience and being prepared, Stallings finds the challenge of high pressure work can be extremely motivating individually and useful bringing teams together collectively.

Hammans Stallings is a Principal Strategist at frog design. Previously Stallings worked in strategy at Dell and investment banking at Stephens. He earned an MBA from the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, a MS in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas and a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Matt Curtis on How to Help a City Plan Travel and Tourism Strategy

In Chapter 7 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, Matt Curtis answers "How Are You Finding New Ways to Stay Connected to Government in the Work That You Do?" Through volunteering, Curtis is able to get involved in city and local government economic development initiatives. He is able to add value as a travel and tourism professional to work with cities around the world as they plan economic development travel and tourism strategies. For Curtis, this means helping cities work through alternative transportation, from light rail to Car2Go car sharing to bike share programs.

Matt Curtis is the director of government relations at HomeAway Inc. Previously he was deputy to Austin mayors Lee Leffingwell and Will Wynn. He has represented the City of Austin at the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National League of Cities. In 2011, Curtis joined the Harvard Kennedy School Urban Policy Advisory Board to work on national best practices facing American cities. He earned his bachelor's degree in radio, television and film from the University of North Texas. 

Matt Curtis on How to Identify City Government Best Practices

In Chapter 8 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, Matt Curtis answers "How Are You Deepening Your Understanding of How City Government Works?" By working in city government and working with city government in his job at HomeAway, Curtis travels the world and finds ways for local governments to identify and implement best practices from other cities. He finds there is nearly always a case study of a city developing a program or implementing a solution that eliminates for any local government to "reinvent the wheel" on a project, on areas such as economic development and city infrastructure.

Matt Curtis is the director of government relations at HomeAway Inc. Previously he was deputy to Austin mayors Lee Leffingwell and Will Wynn. He has represented the City of Austin at the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National League of Cities. In 2011, Curtis joined the Harvard Kennedy School Urban Policy Advisory Board to work on national best practices facing American cities. He earned his bachelor's degree in radio, television and film from the University of North Texas. 

Matt Curtis on Making a Difference by Helping Clients Solve Problems

In Chapter 11 of 20 in his 2014 Capture Your Flag interview, Matt Curtis answers "On a Daily Basis, What Does It Mean to Contribute in the Work That You Do?" Curtis shares how each day his work is about helping clients around the world solve problems and preparing resources to help clients solve problems in the future. By constantly communicating with clients, he is able to address issues as they come up and gain insights on how to prepare strategies and case studies to assist them in the future.

Matt Curtis is the director of government relations at HomeAway Inc. Previously he was deputy to Austin mayors Lee Leffingwell and Will Wynn. He has represented the City of Austin at the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National League of Cities. In 2011, Curtis joined the Harvard Kennedy School Urban Policy Advisory Board to work on national best practices facing American cities. He earned his bachelor's degree in radio, television and film from the University of North Texas.