Five or six years ago, I really started down this road of authenticity and understanding what are my unique gifts. One of the exercises I did was to ask 5 people who knew me, from different areas of my life, to answer a few questions about me. The responses to the questions were surprising similar from people who knew me in a social setting and people who knew me professionally. However the one question was “What profession would you see me doing if I were doing something com

Growing up, I had a strong desire to be “cool” as do most kids. In school, I am not even sure I could define it, but it was clear who had it. Those were the kids who wore the right clothes, said witty things, and never looked too ruffled... and that was definitely not me. It was not until much later in life that someone pointed out the meaning of cool when used in this context: lacking in interest or enthusiasm. It was like a lightbulb went on for me. These were also the kids

When a prospect agreed to start working with me a couple of years ago, I was pretty excited. They were really nice people and would be my third largest client by monthly billings. The problem was that it was the wrong kind of work for me. When I started my business in 2008, I was a marketing gun for hire. I was up for just about any type of marketing help a business needed. However, as my business has developed over the past 10 years, it has become clearer where I can really

In middle school, I was friends with a boy whose parents were divorced and he lived with just his mom, who worked evenings. He invited me for a sleepover one Friday night with a bigger plan to hang out with some girls across town without his mom’s knowledge. Planning for the event seemed exciting. To be honest, I followed the rules most of the time, and this seemed intriguing. So, I went along with it. However, once we actually started off to the girl’s house, it started feel

When I was in college, my maternal grandfather passed away. While he was not great with kids, I did spend quite a bit of time with him. As one family friend put it, I was “7 going on 35.” So, he found me to mature enough to have around. He taught me to play chess, and it was a jubilant day when I was finally able to beat him once (after hundreds of games). He would tell occasional stories and introduced me to tonic water, when I asked him what it was (blah!). After my grandmo

In 2004, I was decided to close down my web design business. It had been a failure, and at the time, it really felt like the end. The end of my business career and the end of my self-respect. You see, I thought I was pretty darn smart. After graduating valedictorian of my small high school, going to an Ivy League school and graduating cum laude, I went on to work at a couple of different firms. Regularly, I seemed to get in over my head in new areas of marketing and always fi

Most evenings, my family spends time reading together. We started the practice nearly 10 years ago, and it is an important collective family experience. As the boys are getting older, we have missed more nights of reading, but we still read as often as possible. One of the books we read several months ago had a bigger impact on me than most. It is called Out of My Mind and tells the story of 10-year-old Melody who has cerebral palsy. While she has a brilliant mind, no one rea

My boys are involved in quite a few activities, and I am the principal driver since my schedule is more flexible than my wife’s. That means I spend quite a bit of time in the car with the boys. The one thing you can count on is that the radio is on. My oldest son, who is very into music, does not allow an advertisement on for even 3 seconds before changing the station. He does not even listen to the DJs. My younger son is not so quick to change the station, so we occasionally

Growing up, everyone in my neighborhood had regular jobs. My parents were teachers. The neighbors were a steel worker, a postal carrier, and other people with “regular” jobs. That is why it was such a shock to us when a new family moved in two doors down. The dad did not have regular job! However, they seemed to be making a decent living. He often had a couple of cars for sale in the front yard, and was working on different opportunities. He seemed to work as a salesman on o

In second grade, I can remember the race to get through all of the SRAs. These were reading comprehension texts about all kinds of subjects. They were two pages long, then you needed to answer questions about the text. Once you got enough of the answers right, you moved onto the next one. It was cool to be doing well with the SRAs. There were 4 or 5 of us who were competing to see who could complete the most before the end of school. It was cool, or at least socially acceptab

Growing up, we had a lot of animals in our house. At one point, we had one cat, two dogs, two gerbils, and five birds. The most mellow creature in our house was Tim, the cat. He spent much of his day lounging about the house. As night descended, he would join me watching TV and eating potato chips (he really loved potato chips). Not much phased Tim. One day, our African Grey parrot jumped from his cage and actually landed on the cat. Tim looked up to see what had happened and

It was May of 2003, and I was projecting a $9500 month for my web design business -- a good month at the time. As the end of the month came closer, I reached out to a couple of prospective clients to see if they would be starting their project in May: “No.” “Not yet.” “We are going to put our efforts elsewhere for now.” I started to stress about the lack of revenue for the month. As the month ended, I only closed $2500 of the projected revenue. Ughh! Unfortunately, th

Growing up in the Coleman household, we were expected to pitch in. When we got up from dinner, everyone helped clean up until everything was put away and the dishes washed. The same was true when we canned food. You were expected to help out until the last jar was filled and sealed. The value of pitching in is something I really value and is a part of me. I have not done a great job of conveying it to my children, but I am trying. On the other hand, there was a real value to

In seventh grade, we had a semi-formal winter dance at New Brighton Middle School. And while you could theoretically go without a date, it was a rare person that went without one. As the time to ask got closer, I knew exactly who I wanted to ask. I kept waiting for the perfect time... which of course never came. As the dance got closer, I realized that I could not wait any longer. With my heart palpitating, I worked up the courage to ask her when I next saw her in the hall. T

The smell of garlic and onions sautéing in olive oil often brings back memories of being in Grandma Leo’s kitchen. She was actually my uncle’s mother who lived in the same town as we did. My dad and I would often stop over and help out around the house, as my uncle and aunt lived an hour away. There was always something cooking in Grandma Leo’s kitchen and it always smelled so good. Her way of thanking us was to feed us. As a growing boy, I rarely turned down food, at least n

As graduation drew closer in college, we had a lot companies come to campus to recruit and do interviews. (That is one of the big advantages of being at a well-known business school.) From Proctor & Gamble to McKinsey Consulting, lots of big, well-known companies were there. And I applied to any relevant positions just like most of my classmates. Every day, I checked the interview boards. Getting one of those jobs was the goal of nearly everyone who went to Wharton. My heart

Shortly after moving to San Diego and starting my web design business in 2002, I went to meet with my first prospect. It was a referral from a customer from the business I had worked with in my past job. She had liked working with me enough that she was willing to refer me to a friend even though I was new to web design. I had bought a web design franchise, so I had lots of marketing materials to share for that initial meeting. The franchise training had convinced us of how v

Starting tomorrow, I am doing a 21-day writing challenge and I am going to focus on authenticity. With social media, people are sharing more about their lives than ever. While it is a great way to share family photos and causes you care about, there is so much posturing and virtual shouting at each other. What would mean for us to have more authentic conversations with each other? And this is not just about social media. In business school, we were taught to use “corporate sp