The blog for all things Apochromatik.

Farther, Faster…

Career Lessons from a White House Internship: Alongside a Stalker

When someone sees my resume, the item I’m most likely to be asked about is my internship in the West Wing of the White House.  That is usually followed up by asking whether I know there’s a character named Amy Gardner on the “West Wing” TV show.  (Yes, I do, and I have a great – mostly true – story about how she really could be named after me.  And if you know any different, don’t tell me.  I like my version better.)  Until now, though, I haven’t publicly shared how I got that West Wing internship.  It wasn’t due to connections or networking and certainly not any special expertise.  Instead, I got my internship in the White House press office largely because of the lessons I learned from a stalker.  

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How is 2018 going for you?

If your check engine light comes on in your car do you go on YouTube, buy some self help books, check with friends, ignore it as long as you can, and eventually take it apart in the evening after work in your garage?  Or, do you call your mechanic or car dealership to run a diagnostic?  The vast majority of us don’t have the technical skill to troubleshoot modern cars...but do we have the technical skills to troubleshoot our career and personal goals?

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9 Ways to Go Beyond the Imposter Syndrome

We recently taught a webinar on the imposter syndrome for the American Bar Association.  (ABA members can access the webinar and earn CLE free of charge here.  Non-ABA members can access the webinar with a 15% discount by using the discount code FACMARK at checkout.)  

In conversation with the ABA and program moderator Lacy Durham in advance of the webinar, one of the issues identified was that many people who feel they are a fraud or imposter think they’re unusual or alone, which adds to their shame and difficulty understanding that these feelings are common and not related to qualifications or skill.  We’re prepared this blog post as part of an effort to normalize the feelings of imposterism and help lawyers and other professionals build awareness.  It’s based on the remarks we and Lacy made during the webinar and is intended, in a more cursory way, to provide some brief background and resources.  We encourage you to share it with colleagues and your network to spur more discussion of the imposter syndrome and, in so doing, help remove the stigma around it.  

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Make your Most Limited Resource Unlimited: Time Tracking

Do you have enough time in your day?  Your week?  Did you accomplish all of your goals last year?  Apochromatik has some exciting news that we will be announcing in the coming months related to this…but in the meantime, we want to briefly talk about how busy we all are.  And because you are busy, I’m going to make this post a really short 3 minute read.

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