The Best Worst Advice

Have there been certain pivotal moments in your life where a mentor or adviser shared a tip that was just the right pearl of wisdom at the right time and it really changed your trajectory?

Well, I have to tell you, it started in college. I had a visiting professor at Purdue that was so blown away by my take in his consumer psychology class that he said, look, what do you want to do? And I said, I want to go into packaged goods. He said, absolutely, that's what you should be doing. And he said, what companies? I'll help you. And he literally called Clorox and put in a good word for me as an undergraduate.

That's how you got your first job?

Well, that's how I got out the interview scheduled with them because they weren't interviewing undergraduates, so I would say, yes, that's how I got my first job. And that set me on a trajectory that was awesome. Then I had one piece of advice when I was leaving Clorox, which I couldn't that I didn't follow. Those are also good. You know, you can't just think like that because everyone's advice is if it's free, it's worth what you pay for. So the general manager said to me, if you leave Clorox, because I had a job down in the tech industry, he said if you leave Clorox, you will never work with smart people again. So I remember mulling that around and thinking because I wasn't going to say anything against him because he was bigger than me, it was intimidating. And they literally, when I was there, had one of those doors that had no handles like he controlled it under the desk and had to press the button. So I couldn't leave anyway. And I was just sitting there going, what was I like, 24 or so, because I started young, 24 going on 25 and I said OK and I walked out, I'm like, how is that possible, how is it possible that Clorox has the smartest people in the world? So I just thought I would ignore that. What I did know, at least at that time, none of these quote unquote smartest people in the world were women above me. So that I did know, which is also another thing you should always look at. If you don't see yourself above when you look up, you're probably not going to be going up there yourself unless there's radical changes. And I remember after Pets figuring out what I wanted to do. And I was doing some consulting work and I was saying to my youngest sister, I don't know, maybe I don't have it anymore. And I was really sort of beating myself up. And she just took a step back. She said, you're awesome. Stop it. You're one of the most amazing people I've ever met. And you just feel bad. So I'm not gonna listen to that. And it was like, wow, that really touched me. And I thought, wow, OK, maybe am OK.