Dear Daughter (XV)

Hope all is well and that you're hitting your stride - preferably without tripping!

Just checked my phone stats: I called you eight times last week, you called me once, and we talked twice. Clearly, I'm winning our little game of phone tag.

One of the great perks of studying abroad is getting to know different cultures and working with people from diverse backgrounds. Not understanding cultural nuances once cost me a bad review at BCG. There, you get reviewed after every project and rated on numerous dimensions—it's like the Olympics of consulting but without the medals. My reviews were generally good, but one day, a leading partner called me into his office to discuss a severe complaint.

"Please tell me about your recent trip to Moscow," he began. I had no idea where this was going and started detailing the trip and the work we did for a telecom client.

"Well, it sounds good to me, but the Moscow partner has complained about you. First, after you left the dinner with the client and the local partner in the black limo, you took the best front seat beside the driver." "Wait a minute," I stuttered. "Are you saying sitting next to the driver is the best seat? That's crazy—I took that seat because it's the worst!"

"The next complaint is that you shared your opinions a bit too freely, sometimes disagreeing with the partner in front of the client at dinner." My mind raced back to the dinner. I couldn't recall any specific episodes, besides me knowing more about telecom than a partner with a general background. "Well, I don't think my opinions were wrong," I replied. "That's not really the point. You have to respect the senior partner, especially in other countries." I left the office feeling frustrated and a bit wronged but realized I'd just received my first lesson in business culture.

I came across a few questions for dads and will force myself to answer:

What is your happiest memory of us? I have to answer this in phases. When you were a baby, you loved sleeping in our bed. Your mom was always worried I'd roll over and flatten you like a pancake. I never did, of course, and I actually loved being kicked by you a few times each night. Waking up with your tiny feet hitting my stomach reminded me how lucky I was. Then we had all these nice climbs to Norway's tallest mountains in everyday clothes. Who needs gear when you've got enthusiasm, right? And of course, I remember our trips abroad - especially our business trip to New York. We met with the lead buyers of MoMA, and you participated in the meeting at 12. You handled it like a seasoned pro. 

What were those first few days of fatherhood like? It was magical when I first saw you. It's impossible to explain how it feels to see your child for the first time. The happiest moment at the hospital was after a few hours when your mom was sleeping, and you were snoozing on my chest. I also remember a few days later and your first diapers - the black tar-like stuff in them was out of this world. NASA should've studied it! I regret only taking off 1 day after you were born (but I did not take off more time for your siblings either). I hope it didn't scar you - or at least not as much as your teenage music phase scarred me. 

What have you learned about love? It's rare, you have to deserve it, and in the end, it's all that matters. In my last moments, I won't be thinking about my art collection or stock portfolio; I'll want to see your face, your siblings, and other dear friends and family.

What do you wish most for your kids? Above all, I want you to find the balance between being happy in both the short and long term. I've noticed you sometimes prioritize long-term goals over immediate joy, so remember to enjoy the journey, not just the destination. I hope you'll have families and kids and maybe even help drive the progress of civilization.

When was the moment you felt most proud of me? There have been so many, but if I have to pick three, it would be your graduation day and when you knew the names of all the kids in your kindergarten - and their parents - at the age of three. And let's not forget your first year playing soccer when you were an 8 out of 10 on the aggression scale, playing against kids who were maybe a 2. You were like a tiny whirlwind on the field!

What's one thing you always want me to remember when I'm gone? "I did it my way."

Now back to business

Now it's time to select the platform for our webstore. Back in the day when I launched my first online store, it was a monumental decision. Building a store was expensive, there were few good suppliers, and the website had to be stored on local servers, and you needed experts for even small changes.

One of my most frustrating business moments is linked to websites. We created this cool but admittedly dorky commercial when I ran the retail business. The intro (first 5 seconds) featured gifts dancing around a Christmas tree. Now, this wasn't before animation (it's been around for over 100 years), but it wasn't as widespread as today, and we wanted a real, tangible look. So when filming, your dad was up on a ladder with a colleague, pulling fish strings to make gifts jump up and down while being filmed. The message was that our gifts were so excited to be opened, while all the other gifts rested sadly under the tree. The format was always the same, but with many different products: 5-second intro with dancing gifts and a voice-over saying we had the gifts looking forward to Christmas; then 5 seconds of product 1, 5 seconds of product 2, and a 5-second outro with more dancing gifts and where to buy them.

Anyway, before Christmas, I was running lots of TV commercials. The thing with TV is you're paying for the audience. So if your ad runs at 2 a.m., it might cost only 800 NOK, but if it's during the commercial break of Dancing with the Stars, the same spot might cost you 80,000 NOK. On some days before Christmas, we could spend 600,000 NOK on marketing. So here I am, having a family dinner on Friday while watching Norwegian Idol. You were probably about 7 years old. The commercial starts. I flip open my laptop and check the live tracking to see visitors in real-time: 25, 40, 70 - then the commercial finishes - 120, 250, 430, 670. Wow! At this point, I'm jumping up and down on the sofa. Then 1,250, 1,910, 2,300 - and suddenly, from one second to the next, it says 0.

"What?!" I shout. I type the website name into the browser, and nothing happens – the loading wheel just spins. The website crashed whenever we ran an expensive commercial that night and that weekend. It was extremely, extremely frustrating. It felt like throwing the biggest party in town and then the venue's doors are glued shut.

Things are easier these days with many great platforms. I've decided to go with Shopify. It offers solutions for both regular web shopping and subscriptions - just what I need. The platforms are now so user-friendly that you can do it yourself: move modules around and change text and images. I'll start building it very soon. We also need to make an explainer video to present the research and the product concisely. What do you think - should I reuse the jumping presents? "June, how would you go about finding someone to produce it?" I'll delve into that in the next letter.

 With all my love and support,

Dad 

P.S. In my previous letter, I mentioned ways to make an impact beyond just doing your job at the company. Here's another idea that's so genius you'll wonder why you didn't think of it. Does the company send out regular updates to everyone? If not, you've just found a way to spend one hour of your free time each week that's more productive than scrolling through memes. You should start an internal newsletter called "The Journey." Fill it with stories from work - wins, losses, funny moments, backgrounds of your colleagues, amusing tidbits from your life, and anything else your creative mind can whip up. Begin by sending it every Friday to your closest colleagues. Soon enough, more people will want in, and maybe, over time, the entire company will be eagerly awaiting your next edition. Think of it as a time investment of your free time that could turn you into an office legend. Worth considering?

P.P.S. You should read more biographies. Since you're interested in business, I recommend starting with "Titan" by Ron Chernow. It's the story of Rockefeller and it'll teach you valuable lessons on life and business while boosting your knowledge of American and global history. Plus, you'll have some impressive anecdotes to sprinkle into your new newsletter!