Author: Christa Avampato

The short of it: Writer. Health, education, and art advocate. Theater and film producer. Visual artist. Product geek. Proud alumnae of the University of Pennsylvania (BA) and the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia (MBA). Inspired by ancient wisdom & modern tech. Proliferator of goodness. Opener of doors. Friend to animals. Fan of creative work in all its wondrous forms. I use my business skills to create passion projects that build a better world. I’ve been called the happiest New Yorker, and I try hard to live up to that title every day. The long of it: My career has stretched across Capitol Hill, Broadway theatre, education, nonprofit fundraising, health and wellness, and Fortune 500 companies in retail, media, entertainment, technology, and financial services. I’ve been a product developer and product manager, theater manager, strategic consultant, marketer, voice over artist, , teacher, and fundraiser. I use my business and storytelling to support and sustain passion projects that build a better world. In every experience, I’ve used my sense of and respect for elegant design to develop meaningful products, services, programs, and events. While building a business career, I also built a strong portfolio as a journalist, novelist, freelance writer, interviewer, presenter, and public speaker. My writing has appeared in The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, PBS.org, Boston.com, Royal Media Partners publications, and The Motley Fool on a wide range of topics including business, technology, science, health, education, culture, and lifestyle. I have also been an invited speaker at SXSW, Teach for America, Avon headquarters, Games for Change, NYU, Columbia University, Hunter College, and the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America. The first book in my young adult book series, Emerson Page and Where the Light Enters, was acquired by a publisher and launched in November 2017. I’m currently working on the second book in the series. A recovering multi-tasker, I’m equally at home in front of my Mac, on my yoga mat, walking my rescue dog, Phineas, traveling with a purpose, or practicing the high-art of people watching. I also cut up small bits of paper and put them back together as a collage artist. My company: I’m bringing together all of my business and creative career paths as the Founder of Double or Nothing Media: • I craft products, programs, and projects that make a difference; • I build the business plans that make what I craft financially sustainable; • I tell the stories that matter about the people, places, and products that inspire me. Follow my adventures on Twitter at https://twitter.com/christanyc and Instagram at https://instagram.com/christarosenyc.
adventure, career, creative process, creativity, job, technology, youth

Is experience everything?

Christa Avampato
I have been thinking about experience on a regular basis lately. I notice that every time someone mentions wanting to do something new be it a hobby, a job function, or even related to travel or choosing a new city, one of the first questions people ask them is, “Do you have any experience with that?” or “Have you ever been there or done that before?” 
I got asked this question all the time about a year ago as I was interviewing for jobs post-MBA. It seemed that experience counted for far more than my education or my interests. I actually went to one interview in which an interviewer asked me what the hell I was doing there because I had never worked in the industry the the company was in. When I mentioned that the company, in desperate need of a turnaround, needed fresh eyes to look at old problems to find new solutions, the interviewer looked at me as if I had begun speaking in an unknown language. 
And in a manner of speaking, I guess it was a new language – the language of youth and energy and passion, three things the interviewer did not possess. And I don’t mean youth in terms of age, but rather in terms of attitude and thinking. The interviewer refused to believe that any problem could be solved using new methods. It was very much an “I’ve been there, done that” kind of deal. And then I considered the incredible success of Silicon Valley – it is an industry that was largely built by people who had no experience in the areas they were trying to master. They couldn’t have experience because they, and the world for that matter, were venturing into unknown territory. It was a great blessing that no one had the ability to say, “Well, when I was at X company, we did it this way.” With that attitude, we may have never been able to witness the www as we know it. 
I mentioned this concern about “old thinking” to my friend, Dan, recently, and he said that this may very much be a function of just getting older and more experienced. And that got me thinking, and then it got me worried. Am I destined to become one of those people who believes she has seen it all before, someone who will eventually discard the energy and fascination with newness that so many young people have?
No. I’ve decided that I just won’t be that way. I can’t be that way, for the sake of my own success if nothing else. So I keep challenging myself to go places and do things that I’ve never done before. I do things that scare me. Things that I believe are beyond the scope of my ability. And this is critical to retaining youth – because even if I fail at these new ventures, at least it will remind me that I don’t everything about anything. It will remind that there is always, always something new to learn. 
love, movie, New York, New York Ciy, relationships, Sex and the City, single

32 and single is okay

Christa Avampato

With the upcoming release of the Sex and the City movie, the idea of 30-something women in New York City pursuing successful careers, love, and happiness is being brought to the forefront of the minds of women like me. While I would never spend $1500 on a handbag or a pair of shoes, even if I had that kind of money to spend on such things, I certainly relate to some of the pursuits of the characters in that hit show. 

So it was with a little surprise that I went to a party last week and was told by another young woman that if a 32-year old found a man there’s no way she’d ever move to another city just to pursue a job opportunity, no matter how incredible the job. I was a tiny bit hurt (emphasis on the “tiny”), though was more disappointed with the person. For one thing, she knew I was a 32 year old single woman, and her characterization of women my age being desperate to find a man is completely off the mark. Would it be great to find love? Sure. Am I going to pass up incredible career opportunities in the hopes that a current boyfriend is the love of my life? No way. I wouldn’t want him to either, so why would I ask that of myself?

The other point that really gets me is that people who are in relationships often assume that the goal of all single people is to find a mate. It’s as if we must be sitting around hoping and praying that he’ll “find us”. Give me a break! I love my friends, my career, my family, my creative pursuits. They’re my focus. I’m not waiting for my true love to “rescue me” from my single life. Again, would it be great to meet a guy whom I connect with on a deep level whom I love and respect and admire? Yes, definitely. Does it consume my waking hours? No way – it’s a passing thought from time to time. And maybe somewhere down the line it happens, and maybe it doesn’t. And either way, it’s all okay.      

If there’s anything that Candace Bushnell’s characters have taught us it’s that love of self and friends and life is the greatest pursuit of all.

community, Fast Company, social media, technology

Creating your own social network

Christa Avampato

There’s lots of buzz flying around in traditional and new media channels about the proliferation of Facebook. Some people feel it’s not personal enough and that there are too many people registered. They want something more akin to a niche social network. But how do you find these niche sites and and more importantly, how do you find one specifically suited to your passion whether it’s hashing or Barry Manilow or Netflix? The answer: Ning.

The brainchild of Gina Bianchini and Marc Andreesen, two of those Silicon Valley smarties, Ning allows you to join any one of the many niche social networks registered on their site, or if you have an interest that doesn’t yet have a network, you can create one. With the way social networking is going, combined with Ning’s niche network feature and great design, there seems to be no end of Ning’s value. It’s one of those inventions whose value proposition is so simple, you wonder how no one thought of it sooner. But isn’t that the way with all good design?

Check out Ning at http://www.ning.com/.

diet, eating, health, New York Times, wellness

My love for sweets is in my genes

Christa Avampato

I could eat sweets morning, noon, and night and never get sick of them. My sweet of choice: Entenmann’s chocolate-covered donuts. I could easily scarf down a box of those in one sitting. I don’t (or haven’t recently anyway) but it’s within my capabilities. I know this isn’t good for me. I’ve tried every trick imaginable to banish my sweet tooth. I am envious of people who claim, “I’m just not that interested in sweets.” Until I consider how absolutely delicious sweets are, and then I am grateful that I can get more for myself if others don’t like them.

My grandfather was a candy maker and I have always jokingly attributed my love of sweets to my genes. As it turns out, my penchant for sweets is not entirely within my control. There is now scientific proof that my little joke, like most, also holds some truth. In today’s Health section of the New York Times, there is mention of a research studies about a gene variant that allows people to process sugar more quickly than those without the gene variant. When studied in two groups of people, those with the gene variant always ate more sugar, though there was no difference in the amount of starch, fat, or protein that was eaten.

All these years, I’ve been beating up on myself a little for my seemingly endless craving for anything sweet. In actuality, I just happen to have exceptionally gifted genes when it comes to processing sugar. What luck!

business, career, Fast Company, leader, leadership

Anatomy of a Leader

Christa Avampato

My boss and I had a conversation a few months ago about young, bright people who enter large corporations and often feel stifled. They move around in the early part of their career, making a different where they can, and eventually amassing enough experience to get them their own group to manage. In the process, they have accumulated a lot of frustration and an vow that they will never treat their team members as anything less than true partners. And despite their best intentions, they some times fall short and their own young team members begin to see them they way that they once saw their own over-bearing bosses. 


So what’s a young leader to do to uphold their promise to treat their new teams the way they always wanted to be treated when they were new to the world of work? Bill Taylor of Fast Company took on that challenge in a recent article in the Harvard Business Review. I don’t know how long the link to the article will work and the information in it is so critical for young leaders that I have pasted it below. A word to the wise: take notes on Taylor’s comments and when you get that big leadership job, post them up at your desk. Your team will thank you, and they’ll stick around.


I spend a lot of time thinking and writing about the challenges of talented young people frustrated with life inside big organizations—game-changers who spend much of their time questioning authority . In this post, I’d like to turn the tables and address talented young people who find themselves exercising authority: leading a project team, running a product-development group, starting a new business unit.

If you’re the new boss, how do you make sure that you don’t repeat the bad habits of the old bosses who drove you crazy? My advice is to develop solid answers to five make-or-break questions for aspiring leaders.

1. Why should great people want to work with you? The best leaders understand that the most talented performers aren’t motivated primarily by money or status. Great people want to work on exciting projects. Great people want to feel like impact players. Put simply, great people want to feel like they’re part of something greater than themselves.

Early on in their company’s history, Google’s founders made clear that they considered the talent issue a make-or-break strategic issue for the future. So they published a Top Ten list of why the world’s best researchers, software programmers, and marketers should work at the Googleplex—and never once did they mention stock options or bonuses. Reason #2: “Life is beautiful. Being part of something that matters and working on products in which you can believe is remarkably fulfilling.” Reason #9: “Boldly go where no one has gone before. There are hundreds of challenges yet to solve. Your creative ideas matter here and are worth exploring.”

What’s your version of Google’s Top Ten list? Have you set out the most compelling reasons for great people to work on your team, in your division, at your company?

2. Do you know a great person when you see one? It’s a lot easier to be the right kind of leader if you’re running a team or department filled with the right kind of people. Indeed, as I reflect on the best workplaces I’ve visited, I’ve come to appreciate how much time and energy leaders spend on who gets to be there. These workplaces may feel different, but the organizing principle is the same: When it comes to evaluating talent, character counts for as much as credentials. Do you know what makes your star performers tick—and how to find more performers who share those attributes?

3. Can you find great people who aren’t looking for you? It’s a common-sense insight that’s commonly forgotten: The most talented performers tend to be in jobs they like, working with people they enjoy, on projects that keep them challenged. So leaders who are content to fill their organizations with people actively looking for jobs risk attracting malcontents and mediocre performers. The trick is to win over so-called “passive” jobseekers. These people may be outside your company, or they may be in a different department from inside your company, but they won’t work for you unless you work hard to persuade them to join.

4. Are you great at teaching great people how your team or company works and wins? Even the most highly focused specialists (software programmers, graphic designers, marketing wizards) are at their best when they appreciate how the whole business operates. That’s partly a matter of sharing financial statements: Can every person learn how to think like a businessperson? But it’s mainly a matter of shared understanding: Can smart people work on making everyone else in the organization smarter about the business?

5. Are you as tough on yourself as you are on your people? There’s no question that talented and ambitious young people have high expectations—for themselves, for their team or company, for their colleagues. Which is why they can be so tough on their leaders.

The ultimate challenge for a new boss who is determined not to be the same as the old boss is to demonstrate those same lofty expectations—for their behavior as leaders. One of my favorite HR gurus, Professor John Sullivan of San Francisco State University, says it best: “Stars don’t work for idiots.”

So here’s hoping that your team or department is filled with stars—and that they never think of you as an idiot.

The above picture can be found at http://discussionleader.hbsp.com/taylor/2008/05/memo_to_a_young_leader_what_ki.html

business, career, corporation, education, success

How to Be Smarter

Christa Avampato

The definition of intelligence, its measurement, and the belief that it relies more heavily on nature or nurture are all up for debate. In discussions on intelligence, there does seem to be general agreement that there are steps any person can take to make the most of the intelligence they have. 

The New York Times ran an article this week detailing some of the methods of maximizing intelligence: exercise, a pursuit of lifelong learning, sufficient sleep, and challenging ourselves with riddles, puzzles, and mind-bending games. Though my favorite piece of the article involves its reference to the list Conde Nast released of the 73 top brains in business. And you’d think that list would be chocked full of Ivy-educated, fabulously wealthy finance types. And there are some of the those, though their number is surprisingly, and pleasantly, few.

The majority of Conde Nast’s list is dominated by people who go out of their way to think different, be individuals, people who recognize that differentiation, not assimilation, is the way forward in the world of business. The list includes a collection of people who don’t make headline news, but quietly, in their own way are simultaneously changing the world and building wildly successful companies. 

This list gives us some profound food for thought: our education focuses on test achievement, elite school acceptances, and hitting numerical thresholds. Do we need to have a metric in place in our education system that captures a sense of confidence, an ability to look at challenges with new eyes, and have the courage to forge ahead against adversity, naysayers, and others who wish we’d just “be like everyone else”? Current business successes would suggest that the idea is worthy of consideration. 

creativity, innovation, technology

Bulbstorm.com – a meeting space for innovators

Christa Avampato

You have a great idea for a product, or a service, or a business model, and you need some honest, credible feedback. And that doesn’t mean calling Aunt Sally or your best friend or chatting about it with your neighbor. They know you’re brilliant and innovative and achieve everything you set your mind to. But you have this nagging suspicion that you need to get advice from people who don’t know a thing about you, and self-identify as innovators. Your prayer to the innovation spirits has been answered and its name is http://www.bulbstorm.com.


Though still in beta, I suggest signing up to be kept up-to-date on its progress, and to possibly score a place in the beta test. Because everything is so well documented on Bulbstorm, with witnesses, your idea will not be stolen, and the service will connect you to investors and customers who are interested in working with you, along with fellow innovators who can give you feedback and inspiration. 


We’ve entered what I believe historians will regard as the Age of Design. And you might as well take your rightful place among the ranks of those who are advancing our society forward with creative thinking. I look forward to interacting with you on Bulbstorm, and sharing ideas! 

business, career, culture

Why a corporate culture matters and needs tending

Christa Avampato

No matter how much the culture of a company is discussed during recruiting events or in media, mainstream or otherwise, I am always amazed by how few companies actually actively measure it. I consider the quality of a company’s culture to be as critical, if not more so, that any other business metric. They track sales, margin, expense rate, and investment. I’ve even heard some executives say that those are the only four numbers that a CEO can actively manage. 


But what about culture? It increases retention time, which certainly lowers expense rate. Dollar for dollar,  investing in retaining top talent is the best investment a company can make. And I am a firm believer in the idea that if a company cares for its talent, its talent will care for its customers, increasing sales and margin. If looked at that way, a CEO could possibly focus a sizable chunk of attention on culture and do very well. If he or she takes care of the culture, the culture will take care of the talent, and the other numbers will fall into line.     


The Financial Post ran an interesting article on culture this past week, and it’s worth the short read. It discusses two companies, Maple Leaf and Starbucks Canada, who actively measure culture and adjust accordingly to preserve its integrity. Managing culture is no easy undertaking, though from the perspective of these two companies, the effort pays off handsomely. 


The picture above can be found at: http://grivina.ru/i/ill/049.jpg

child, children, family, happiness, kids

The wonder of toes

Christa Avampato

My niece, Lorelei, has recently discovered the wonder of her toes, timed just after she discovered the excitement of rolling over all on her own. It’s the little things. I was considering this during my slog to work this morning, inching along in the rain for an hour and 15 minutes. And I thought about Lorelei playing her little game of rolling over from side to side and then getting those tiny wiggling toes into her mouth. She is excited about the discovery of life. And that made me wiggle my toes a bit too, and smile for being able to do so.

That’s the wonder of children – everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, is an exciting adventure to them. The gift of fresh eyes. So whether we have kids of our own, or in our family, or have friends with kids, or volunteer with kids, or have a job that involves kids, it is a gift to be around them. They’re teaching us, at every moment, about happiness and contentment and the magic that is all around us.

business, corporation, design, marketing

The goal of all designers: create conversations

Christa Avampato

Tim Lebrecht at frogDesign wrote a post earlier this week about the earliest stage of ideation. In this age of user-generated design, he questions whether designers are really going about their work in the correct way. He challenges designers of all levels to consider that whatever the end product of their design, they should seek to create conversation.

I was a bit confused by this for a time until I considered an art exhibit I saw a few years ago at the Phillips Collection in DC. The exhibit featured works by Joan Miro and Alexander Calder. The created their art as a conversation; this is largely because they did not have a common fluent language. Miro would create a piece; Calder would answer it, and then add another idea for Miro to comment on. And so it went, for many, many years. Across decades, across oceans. They transcended language with design.

So what if companies like Coca Cola or Target took the design POV that they were creating conversations with their customers, rather than creating products? How much richer and more relevant could their designs be? How much loyalty to their brands could they generate?

Pictured above is Joan Miro’s “Garden”