Nice Work: Sometimes you gotta break a few plates

Hey there,

This spring, as my life as a full-time content strategist started coming to a close, I looked at my team from a distance and found my thoughts drifting between joy and despair. 

On one hand, I felt such admiration for the group. Here was a team that grew from 5 people to 25 in less than two years. Everyone arrived from very different industries and backgrounds, and yet shared the desire to be in community together: helping each other learn new skills, lending an ear in stressful moments, celebrating all the large and small wins in their work lives—and personal lives too. They shipped innovative products, consolidated millions of website pages, and helped so many clients make better choices about their content.

The despair arrived in anxious waves. Was the community’s care strong enough to be a shield against poorly scoped projects, last-minute requests, and feeling like second-class citizens compared to UX? What about much deeper, darker things: the lingering fallout of the pandemic, a brutal war devastating our colleagues in Ukraine, and the reality that no one’s jobs feel safe, whatever your managers say.

It’s a tension I’m hearing from so many leaders I talk to: they’re proud of what they’ve accomplished, yet exhausted by how much effort it takes.

It came through loud and clear at the Lead with Tempo conference for content leaders last month. Certainly, there was frustration and worry about the pressures being dumped on our heads. But I also spotted a feeling I want to call defiant hopefulness—that whatever we’re facing, we’re going to get through it together, and make things better for everyone.

But to do so, there’s some work to be done that’s pretty uncomfortable, especially for the people-pleasers among us. So I keep going back to a theme repeated by Tempo attendees:

Let the plates stop spinning and break!

That was a direct quote from Aladrian Goods. And it was echoed in a number of other talking points and chats. My takeaway is this: We can’t hold the entire world on our shoulders. If we don’t let some things fall, we’re never going to have space or time to help ourselves. There will always be a screen that needs love, or a string that needs editing, or a slide that needs polishing. And we’ll default to solving those problems instead of the ones we care about: like using content to bring clearer, easier, and more inclusive experiences to the world.

Natalie Dunbar, another speaker, typed something in the conference chat that I’m putting on a post-it note: Protect your purpose = protect your PEACE.

So how do we bring that concept to life? We have some ideas—and they’re all in our July 13 workshop, Leading Content Without Losing Yourself. (Or, as I keep mistyping, “without losing your soul.”) 

It’s an opportunity to reflect on what’s draining you as a manager or team lead—and boost your confidence in making big changes to how you approach your work and your practice moving forward. We’ll help you build a content leadership model that supports you where it matters most.

I think of this workshop as a love letter to content folks out there. We know you’re working so hard to hold things together—but you also deserve a chance to reconnect with the parts of the work that bring you joy and satisfaction. 

As I continue to love and miss my former content team, the gift I wish for them most of all is to be bold with their desires and brave in how they make them happen—even if it requires breaking down a few walls or dropping a few plates.

Does that sound like what you and your team need? Learn more about the workshop here.

And while this workshop is designed for content people, I want this so much for all of you—designers, researchers, and engineers are feeling all the same pressures. I see you spinning those plates, too.

What would it take to let them fall?

Yours in defiant hopefulness,

–Jen

Upcoming events

“I love what I do, but I’m spread way too thin”

What we learned from the 2023 Content Design and UX Writing Community Survey

Free event | June 29 from 12-1:30pm ET

Earlier this year, Jane Ruffino launched a survey for people working in UX content. Her goal: to understand how responsibilities, titles, team structures, and more have shifted over the past few years—and what’s keeping people up at night right now. More than 240 people responded—and now we have the results! Join us for this free event to learn more about what's happening across the field—and what it means for the humans who work with content.

Leading Content without Losing Yourself

Workshop | July 13 from 12-2:30pm ET

It’s been a hard year for content teams—from layoffs and reorgs to demands to “prove your value” and “do more with less.” Learn to find new calm and focus—for yourself and your team—in this workshop.

EPISODE 5

I have a job. These layoffs still feel rough.

You don’t have to be unemployed to have a whole lot of big layoff feelings. Let’s make some space for ‘em.