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After graduating from college with a degree in English, Natalie Sportelli took on a series of internships—most notably at Forbes, where she later accepted a full-time position as an editor (and the first under the age of 30). She found herself especially inspired by founders and startups, and got to work more directly with them when she moved from journalism to venture capital. Through multiple career pivots, she has had to re-establish her personal brand with her expertise in each new space. Follow along as Natalie recounts her professional life and how her internship experience ultimately informed her career.
Everyone's career path is different, built by pivotal moments and choices. We're on a mission to amplify those stories and examine how our decisions shape our careers.
Nonlinear is hosted by Dave Fano, Founder & CEO of Teal—a genuinely consumer-first platform designed to help people grow and manage their careers. Our goal is to empower people to land jobs they love with free tools that guide and automate the process. Learn more at tealhq.com.
Natalie Sportelli - Nonlinear
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Natalie Sportelli: [00:00:00] 'cause I've pivoted my career changed or done different things. I've had to reestablish the narrative about what I'm good at and like what I should be talking about each time. Um, so I think writing on the internet is so powerful. People can gain tons of followers, you know, take off on Twitter. You know, one really amazing Twitter thread can open a million doors for.
David Fano: Thanks for joining today. We're with Natalie Sportelli, who I've had the pleasure of knowing for a bit. Uh, I remember I can vividly remember our first phone call when I was pacing around lower Manhattan and, uh, she was giving me advice, uh, the same advice that I have now transferred everyone. Else's no be strategic about when you do your funding announcement.
Um, And so I've had, uh, Natalie's helped me a ton. Uh, we've also built a great rapport on Twitter, but, uh, best to hear directly from her. Uh, Natalie, Louie, tell us a bit about yourself. Hi
Natalie Sportelli: Dave. Thank you so much for having me. It's really exciting to reconnect in [00:01:00] this way and to join you today. So I'm currently head of content at think testing, which is a seed stage startup backed by four runner.
And I previously had careers in journalism at Forbes, and then in venture capital at Lear HIPAA, which is where we met.
David Fano: When did. Like first start to think about like, this is what I want to do. Right. Uh, you know, another way of framing that is, you know, when did you start to think about your career? Maybe a little bit more deliberately.
Uh, but when do you feel like that was for you and kind of what was the.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So I think that realizing that you can create content for a living, and that is an option for a career path started awhile ago. This was pre creators in the sense that we know today and pre influencers and, you know, pre people, making videos on YouTube and everything.
And I think it all started with writing in high school. I was contributing to the local newspaper through our teen voices. Which was really fun. And I wrote an article about, uh, life lessons you learned during lunch period, and it kind of kicked off a lot of [00:02:00] exploring. I had a great photo of me and braces that was in local newspapers, horrifyingly embarrassing.
Um, so. That kind of kicked off a lot of learning round writing and how writing powers careers. And that kind of took me to college where I decided to be an English major. And I think realizing that you can convey writing in so many different ways and the power of it and storytelling and communication for companies and also sharing your own narrative as a person was kind of the initial thinking around how can I frame a career around writing and what are all of the, you know, power sources that come with.
David Fano: So now that you kind of honed in on a craft that excited you, um, you got to do a bunch of different, fun things with it. How did you then start to think about how you'd kind of instantiate that into, to work or.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So I think, um, you know, I'm the biggest advocate for internships. I think you'll ever find, um, that article and the work that I did through the local newspaper.
Uh, [00:03:00] actually I had outreach from the communications office at Colgate, which is where I went to school. And that was my first internship. So I had a four year internship with the communications office, which opens so many doors for me. And, um, I then got an internship at CNBC and then at Forbes and they joined Forbes after.
Graduation. And I think it was all about the exploring exploration process of learning, like where writing can take you and where it could lead into a career. And so something that I started doing kind of as a hobby and my mom liked to say that I was ready for the newspaper, um, grew into these internships, which really unlocked a lot of learning for me around, you know, we're concur careers, um, in content creation take you like, what does that look like in a modern day sense?
Um, so yeah, I think I started seeing it as like, Uh, route for work through internship, like how can I take social writing, um, content creation, like in, in a work context and the original thought process was journalism. So that's where I started.
David Fano: So I think there's an important thing here for folks. Cause they, they often thinks about thinking [00:04:00] about skills in a very specific context, right?
So like writing author books or publications, or, you know, like starving journalists, You know, and then that's when you get like advice, it's like, you can't do that. That doesn't make money. At least that's what my parents said to me. But I feel like what you did, which is really awesome is that you were able to kind of like test different contexts for these skills.
And I'm sure it was some balance of like what's fulfilling. What has like monetary value? Like, how are you thinking about that?
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So I think once you hone in on something that you really love to do, um, you can kind of experiment and test out different ways to utilize it. So for example, like in my case, I really enjoyed reading.
I enjoyed writing and I enjoy kind of the feeling it felt to publish something. Um, and so thinking about, you know, turning in English papers, cause I was an English major, creative writing minor in history. My second minor on that. Um, so I've just. [00:05:00] Decided to pursue like every possible writing, heavy major, um, at my school.
And so I think what you can learn from that and be able to apply it to is saying here's a skill set that I enjoy and that I want to master. And like, what are different ways that, that can build out into a career? Can you be in charge of social media? Could you be in charge of content writing everyone sends emails, any kind of communication facing interaction with other people involves.
Good clear communication. What point are you trying to get across? And so I think that as people kind of explore skills and things that they love to do, there's always some kind of tie back to modern day and where that might manifest and work. And so you can kind of say, I really enjoy, you know, speaking or like podcasting or something.
Like you can become a public speaker, you can go moderate conferences, you can do so many different things with kind of a really basic skillset or something that you really want to grow in. So with something like writing, it turns into social, it turns into, um, [00:06:00] you know, writing articles or scripts or Instagram captions or anything that our brand extensions of, um, you know, any way that you want to communicate.
So I think that as you're exploring skills at any stage of your career, deciding what can I do next that capitalizes or grows that more is something that I've tried to identify like at each stage of where I'm at.
David Fano: All right. So you do an internship at Forbes. And then you end up working there after school.
So talk to me a little bit about that, that process. Cause I also use you couldn't be a bigger fan for internships and I think a lot of people go and end up working at the place that they intern. So can you tell us a little bit about that process and then what'd you do when you got.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So, uh, the internship process is really interesting because going into my, uh, the summer before senior year was it felt high stakes.
Okay. So if I really like it, wherever I go, then, uh, maybe I'll get a job after graduation. That would be, make me happy. And my family happy and you know, everything like that. [00:07:00] Actually it was weighing an offer from Dateline. I wonder how different my life would've been. If I worked for Dateline instead of forums, um, Yeah, that process.
Uh, I think like my advice to anyone kind of pursuing internships, at least right now, especially now, if you're applying for the summer is like, try to have ownership and take something from point a to point like data Z really can you have full ownership over a project and walk away with saying I built and grew and launched something.
And I think this is super true for startups, which I always advocate try to intern at a startup because you're going to learn so much more than, you know, a bigger company. But what I learned through Forbes was. All its different ways that. Creating content manifests. So when you're building out a franchise, like at the time I was actually working for top colleges, so I have a lot of like weird trivia about a lot of different colleges.
Um, the way you can think about that is, you know, there are articles and there's photography and there are slideshows and they're social, and there's like the entire package around how things are [00:08:00] presented and working on lists during that internship was really interesting because it exposed me to all this multimedia.
Developed a love for, and then I was able to work on videos of a later context with that experience. So, you know, just getting your hands in to so many different things and seeing what the possibilities are is something that today I really like to have my hands in a lot of different types of content creation and it definitely stemmed from that ability to do that at an interim.
David Fano: So then you do the internship. I would imagine you build some relationships, you completed some projects and what was like that, did you already know you wanted to go work there or did you kind of like run a process? How how'd you land that first job? Yeah.
Natalie Sportelli: So, uh, one thing that was really fun during that internship was I devised like this social media campaign that ended up being really successful around the launch.
And it was all about how, um, Our top, my top college being different than like our top college list. So why is your top college the best? And it created, you know, it [00:09:00] was just really successful. And I saw the opportunity there to kind of get involved with. And like readers and like building audiences and kind of creating franchises.
And brand-building was like, that was the initial first stuff. I think that got me really excited about building a brand and, you know, in that sense, so deciding to join there, it was pretty obvious because I had such an amazing experience. The team was great. I was learning. And I felt like I had a lot of ownership over what I was doing and just seemed really cool to join a magazine.
Um, you know, and I had a job offer in October, senior year and everyone was jealous, so
David Fano: yeah, that's pretty awesome. That's definitely a lot less stressed. Um, all right. So you, you got to Forbes and what was what'd you do when you were there? Right? Cause people might just assume you're a writer, but there's so many different activities that happen within companies of all shapes and sizes.
Like w what'd you take on.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So I started working on lists. So that was again like the packaging. You know, billionaires and what, what does that look like [00:10:00] from a production standpoint? There's so many things that go into, you know, the metadata, the, where the photos go, where, how did the slideshows put together and, uh, working on that was fascinating.
Cause again, launching things list. You know, franchise building, brand building, you know, resonating with audiences. There's so many different stakeholders and things like that. And then I moved over to the entrepreneurs channel and I worked with all these people who are writing about startups and it became really clear to me as you know, the under 30 franchise at Forbes was really taking off and we needed someone to work on that full-time.
And so, um, I was the first, like under 30. Editor at Forbes, which was really exciting. And that was kind of a perfect, um, culmination of, you know, content creation. Brand-building working on a list, tons of stakeholders, and then translating the entrepreneurship experience I had from the last place. Like last vertical I was working in.
These are young entrepreneurs, founding startups, doing really incredible things. And I admire them so much. And I learned so much from them that it was [00:11:00] exciting to be writing stories around, you know, people who are just a little older than me in most cases, doing incredible things and raising a ton of money.
And, you know, all of these game changing ideas was really cool.
David Fano: So how, how did that moment happen? Cause I feel like a lot of times when we talk about these things, we just like, oh, that just happened and we kind of gloss over it, but I'm sure at the time. There was a lot of thought processes that you were going after it, or as it was presented to you, it was kind of a change.
And we ended up talking to like all the. Process, but that's the like juror talking to people on the phone. Should I take this? How do I get it? We review like, so how, how did that come about and then how you kind of seize that opportunity. Yeah.
Natalie Sportelli: So it kind of, you know, it, it became clear that it was becoming really important to Forbes.
And so it was really exciting to be able to say that, you know, I raised my hand for doing that. Um, and I honestly don't remember if who approached who or exactly what happened, but I just remember. Yeah. You know, it was really exciting to kind of define what that looks like. Um, so early on I was hiring writers who were [00:12:00] covering all things, millennial, um, and anything that might be relevant for, you know, people in the age group, people who are under 30 and that was really exciting.
And then it grew into, you know, what. What to magazine print stories look like under, with, uh, under thirties at the focus I flew out to Utah and wrote about one under 30 company, which was exciting and, um, you know, building the list and the package became an international franchise. And so it was really exciting to be able to full time.
Determine, like what does the branch look like? You know, working at the summits and doing social media for, you know, this brand that's like, so well-known now like, um, I feel like everyone talks about under 30. Um, and it's really exciting to kind of have fun there in the early days of that. So I left feeling like I had meaningfully contributed to that brand.
David Fano: Something that I think a lot of people struggle with in their career is doing something they had never done before. And it's kind of inherent in growth. Right. Cause if we just did the [00:13:00] same thing and given that that was your first job, I'm going to assume you hadn't done that before. How did you think about.
As like a moment in your career and jumping into something, you know, obviously there's, you could fail at it because you'd never done it. But again, if you don't no pain, no gain sort of using the gym metaphor. So how'd you think about that at the time?
Natalie Sportelli: I think I, if you just get really excited about the opportunities and the things that you're going to learn about a role, it kind of makes you less afraid.
I was thinking about it the other day and I was wondering why, you know, I don't really feel like I've ever had like imposter syndrome. And I know people tweet about this all the time and it's a big discussion and I almost feel like it's. It's about believing that you're capable of doing something, even though you might feel like the universe would say this isn't for you, but it's more about kind of believing that you have the capability to complete something.
And I felt like I had the skills and the knowledge to do it, you know? And I think in each step of my career, I [00:14:00] was able to kind of say, I might not know what I'm getting myself into. I might not know this field or this specific job, but I think I can figure it out. And I think that's kind of false.
Defining characteristic of people who decide to like jump into something totally new. Um, so yeah, I think it was just kind of about being excited, seeing it as a growth opportunity, then kind of believing that you have the skill set to figure it out.
David Fano: And I think part of it is right. Failure is this thing it's like, it's fine.
Oh, I failed. It's done. But the truth is I think most career. Situations are ones that you can build on. And if it didn't work, you can kind of get up and try again and iterate and make it better and fix it. Obviously, some people make some really bad decisions, lose their job. That's really unfortunate, but I don't feel like the majority are that way, but I feel like we apply that kind of pressure to almost all of them.
So it doesn't seem like you were too, you know, that's part of, I think being able to make those leaps is not being too, too stressed about that. [00:15:00] Cause like, Hey, I'll, you know, I'll do the next thing. Or, you know, maybe that's like inherent in writing and just like, oh, it's the next draft. Of course it's part of the process.
It's never like done, you know,
Natalie Sportelli: I love that analogy. I think that's really smart because you kind of put out your original idea and then you get feedback on it and then you iterate on it and you know, startups know that feeling so much. So. So, you know, in each shop I had after Forbes, it was always about how do I get closer to the things that I like spending the most time with?
And so through, you know, what I was doing at Forbes with under 30, I learned that I was incredibly inspired by founders, putting yourself who got kind of go out and pursue these huge ideas and, you know, go change the world. And, um, that's why venture capitalist seemed like an obvious place for me, even though content for venture capital.
Wasn't something that I would have been on my radar. I also as a general thought, like don't really think about careers in five or 10 year time periods. I think about it as how do I take what I'm doing now and do more of what I like doing in this role, in the next role. [00:16:00] Um, and that's the opportunity I had when I switched from journalism to VC content, which was, I was focused a lot on content, doing a lot of writing and all the same stuff I was doing.
I was working even more closely and supporting founders through content at Forbes. I was mostly writing about founders who had. Um, and thought were newsworthy. So it was almost like, you know, covering founders that I found really inspiring to working directly, to help support founders through content, through, you know, brand-building Atler hippo.
And that was a really exciting next step because I was getting closer to entrepreneurship and doing more content.
David Fano: So, so how'd that come about you? Like, how can I get closer to startups? Right? Cause at that point you could have gone into this. I'm sure there was, you know, content roles, social media management roles, direct and social media within startups, or this idea where you got to kind of got to touch a lot of startups and help them.
How how'd you think about that? I mean, I mean, I would imagine in, uh, in college you might not [00:17:00] even been aware of what venture capital was. You could tell me, you know, I, I definitely was not. Um, but you know, through these experiences, you were able to become more aware of, of these various forms of distribution.
So how, how how'd that.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah, same. I wouldn't have said that, you know, a lot about VC back at school. Um, but I learned a lot about it through writing about startups. And so I spoke with investors and I got a better sense of, you know, firms, um, and. The good ones and you know, which ones were based in New York.
And, you know, I reached out to, um, someone who graduated from my college and I was asking you mostly about startup roles. You know, do you know, are there startups in your hip was portfolio that are looking for content people, um, and you know, Lira hippo had a content role open. So the timing was really amazing because I think they posted it that week.
So that was just really like luck and timing. I think luck and timing is also extremely. Not something that you can gain, but it's, it's, it's in like every person's [00:18:00] career is timing and luck being a matter of how you switched jobs when you do. Honestly, I don't think I was ready to join a startup, leaving Forbes.
I don't think I would've known what I wanted. Um, like what type of startup to focus on, you know, uh, The goal would be didn't know, there wasn't a founder who like really stood out from what I was covering at Forbes to say, I want to join them. So I think that what I did at Lerer Hippeau exposed me to what are startups, like, what do they do?
Um, you know, how do they operate a little bit? And that was like the stuff I needed before I joined a startup. I don't think I could have gone from Forbes to a startup. Um, at that point with the information that I had, um, I just needed to explore a little bit more.
David Fano: I love the intentionality of that. It's like, I want to be closer to startups, but I'm not ready to be in one being on the publication side is a little too far.
I love it. I can build on that. And there's this intermediary. With at the time, probably very few firms having that role. I think now platform teams are much more [00:19:00] common, you know, having comms and marketing, you know, support from the firms is much more common. Um, but then it's only the last few years that I feel like that's really taken off.
Um, so I feel like that was super strategic and deliberate on your part to kind of find that way, but like have that kind of career clarity was all.
Natalie Sportelli: It was like from that conversation though, I think like my biggest advice to anyone who's looking to switch careers or jobs is you need to talk to a million people because in 2022, you don't even know what jobs are available.
Like there might be some things that are completely brand new that you don't even know are an option. And that was VC content for me. So learning that, that was even an option really unlocked that like next time.
David Fano: I love that you bring that up because I feel like that is what a lot of people are struggling with.
They have these ideas of what they want to do, but frankly, they lack awareness of all the possible occupations. There's so many. And to your point today, every hour, like a new job is showing up, you know, a new combination of skills and new contexts. And [00:20:00] I just love that advice so much to talk to a lot of people.
And how'd you go about doing that? I mean, you know, People really benefit from quite tactical advice. So like what, what was your approach?
Natalie Sportelli: I've always started with people who are into my college alumni. No. I probably talk to maybe, I don't know, two students a month, um, through my college because I didn't want to be helpful to them because I've had so much help through the alumni network.
That was how I had, um, you know, the access to the internship at CBC. I sent a cold note. Hey, you know, I see you work here. I'm applying for the internship. Had a conversation, same thing with Forbes, um, Lear hippo, same thing. And, uh, I think testing's my first job that doesn't have anyone else from Colgate and that, um, so I think that if you're looking for somewhere to start with learning about career options and where jobs exist, like your alumni network, um, you know, if you went and got an MBA, anyone who would, you know, pay it forward to you and give you the time and availability to do
David Fano: that.
One thing that I, at least from the [00:21:00] outside, I feel like you've done really well is build. Uh, personal audience or, you know, like you're on your own. If we think about it, like owned and earned, you have your own owned audience. Um, and you know, as a comms professional, there's lots of folks that don't do that.
Actually, they sort of happier to do it for the brands, but personally, they kind of stay in the background. How have you thought about building your personal brand and, you know, and kind of what you put out to the world and, um, and how that kind of has, has helped you build your.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. You know, that's so interesting because, because I've pivoted my career changed or done different things, I've had to reestablish a narrative about what I'm good at and like what I should be talking about each time.
Um, so I think writing on the internet is so powerful. People can gain tons of followers, you know, take off on Twitter. You know, one really amazing Twitter thread can open a million doors for someone. Um, whether that's speaking opportunities being quoted and things, building your profile. Yeah. [00:22:00] Totally all goes back to you kind of putting in the effort a little bit first.
So. Building a personal brand in each step is looked different because, you know, building it as a journalist, building it as a platform person, focused on content at a time where there weren't as many roles doing that. Now there are a ton more people doing it. So at that point with Lear hippo, it was pretty easy just to say, I want to write about this and I want to talk about it.
And, um, I'm going to try to build a brand around best practices and what I've learned through the role. And that opened a ton of doors for me. And it was really amazing because I met incredible people who I look up to too. And that function. Now I'm doing something totally different out a startup that's focused on e-commerce, um, you know, collecting reviews from people and now I'm kind of in D to C world.
And so I've had to kind of re-establish my personal brand and what my expertise is each, each space. And it's been a little bit. Tough to do that. Cause, um, you know, I've been trying to figure out who are my people, where's my network in each role. And it's amazing to stay in touch with [00:23:00] people in other roles.
But now I'm kind of still looking for, you know, who are the people who I can DM saying, Hey, what, what do you think about this idea? Um, so if that's you shoot media,
David Fano: so, you know, careers, I think go through these cycles of kindness. Transitioning developing, and then that's kind of the cycle. And we, we, we tend to hit these plateaus, which is when we start to search again.
Right. And that might be within the company, external to the company. Um, you know, given that you are in the context of like venture capital on a platform team, you know, the, you know, and that tends to be a little smaller. I'm sure the plateau there was like, okay, what could I possibly do here? I'm not sure.
I don't think I want to be a VC, which is kind of the track given that I love my craft. How did you start to think about that moment? Where you're like, oh, Might want to start to switch things up.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So I think you should always be thinking about, you know, what's the next level of growth for you wherever you are.
So, um, at Forbes at Lear hippo at thing [00:24:00] testing now, it looks really different. And I think for me, uh, the ability to grow a team around me was something that I knew I wanted to do in my career. And so being able to manage people is something that I've thought about for a really long time. And so I think you always want.
You know, think about career changes along the lines of these are things I want to do more. These are things that I want to do less, and these are the growth opportunities that I want to have and the new role. So I'm really excited to be able to have, you know, interns and work with freelancers and think of other ways to kind of scale up, um, what I'm doing and anyone who's in content roles specifically, if you're the only marketing person or the only content person at a startup, you do a lot of.
A ton of stuff. And eventually you think, all right, how can I do more stuff? There's only one me and, um, then you're growing a team. So I think that was kind of where I felt I wanted to do more of and the opportunity I have now, which is really exciting.
David Fano: I love that though. What I want to do more of what I want to do less of, I would [00:25:00] imagine that that then makes.
What some would think to be like tough conversations actually far less personal, because it's like quite practical. It's like, look, it has nothing to do with what I'm doing today. I actually like it, but I want to do more of this. And unfortunately like that opportunity is not here. You can be pleasantly surprised and they can say, Hey, it is here, you know?
But I think framing a conversation in that way seems like it could be really productive. Um, sort of like pushing you to have what I think holds a lot of people back. Some of these tough concepts.
Natalie Sportelli: I think growth opportunities is always important to me. And, um, I just also thought having the perspective of someone who worked in journalism and the new VC, and then at a startup, we're just like, whoa, like what can I, what can I learn?
And like what kind of perspective would I have covering startups, supporting startups, and then working at a startup it's really, really, really fascinating. And so I feel lucky that. In addition to career growth, I'm kind of learning all these different angles that go into like at tech companies and startups in a way [00:26:00] that's like extremely fascinating.
And I feel like I could write a hundred Twitter threads on like lessons from it. I haven't gotten to those yet though.
David Fano: I like this sort of methodology that you have around what's next, because I think a lot of people will get hung up on the career of like, what's that C title I'm going to have, or what's that thing five to 10 years out in the truth.
Life's far too complicated to really have a sense. And that actually might hold you back sometimes because you might miss out on opportunities. But if you're thinking about what do I want to do more of what's next, it really creates this nice additive cycle for career.
Natalie Sportelli: I always think about this. And I do this to my friends too.
I think I just, them that concern kind of like a life slash career coach for them in like a super informal sense, but it's always like, what's your next job? I don't think in 2022 things move so quickly. And so many new jobs are available every day that you don't even know about the planning, like three jobs out, maybe it's helpful and aspirational and like, how do I [00:27:00] want to get there?
Planning for like, what do you want to do in your next role is like obvious to me. Like I would not have. You know, one year until Lira post said, I'm going to work for, you know, a startup focused on e-commerce is like employee number five. But that's where I am now. Because during where you are currently in your career on your day to day, you learn about what you like and what you don't like and what you want to do next.
I can't say that I know what I want to do in 10 years, but I'm sure that the jobs I have between now and then will tell me, uh, and I'll report back to you.
David Fano: How do you think about. What I want to do more of and what I want to do less of, because I'd be like a lot of people, my conversations with teal members is that they struggle with that.
Um, you know, I think that there's the sense of a little bit of guilt as I quit. Yeah. I get to do what I want or that I'm pursuing what I want to do more of. It's like, that's not people don't get to do that. You just got to do your job and you know, like what kind of. Self-awareness [00:28:00] have you built to, or like what kind of tools do you use for self?
Hey, actually I enjoy doing this stuff, this stuff, not so much.
Natalie Sportelli: I think it's exactly that. So how you feel about it? So I think if you get really excited about something or you feel really happy to be producing that, then that's something you probably want to do more of. But if you're looking at your inbox and see this email and you're like, I'm going to just be so anxious about this email all day.
It's that unlocked something that you don't want to do more of, or you want to do less of than like take that learning. So if you can go to your job everyday and be really excited about what you're doing, then you probably have like a really great job. Um, but it takes a long time to figure out, you know, what, you're good at, what you like and then how to do more of that.
And like how to find a role that, um, like gives you the ability to do that. So I think it's just like, what do you wake up excited to do at work every day? And then how do you optimize your career to do that all the time?
David Fano: I think he did something that a lot of people could learn from, even though you were in what would be like junior role, first job.[00:29:00]
Um, and you didn't have direct reports, you still got to manage. And I think a lot of people struggle with career growth in that companies want you to have certain experiences, but like, until you have the experience, you can't get the job that asked for the experience. So you have this weird chicken and egg thing.
Um, but you got to do it and you know, maybe it, maybe it was. Again, it's like very simple understanding of management, but you're managing freelancers. You know, someone could hire folks on like Fiverr today or Upwork if they wanted to manage, to get cause really the point is your ability to assist and manage others to get more work done.
Right. That's kind of like where the leverage is that. So how would you think about that at the time as you were doing it and you know, it was, you know, in kind of, how did you hone in on like enjoying.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah, I think that, honestly, just the idea of creation was really fun. So, you know, hearing different pitches, workshopping ideas, and being able to help someone really hone in on something that was going to do well.
I [00:30:00] mean, I think one of the stories that I worked on with this one, like a star contributor got like 3 million views or something totally nuts. And I just, like, I knew when she was going to post them, like this is going to do really well. And like, I really thought for that feeling. So anyone who's looking for kind of more manager type experience without like a formal system, I would consider freelancers.
I reconsider interns. I would think about how can you build those skills in a more informal way. So someone's not reporting to you, but you're helping other people get work done. Uh, and any way that you're like scaling up your individual abilities and bringing on support. You know, managing them and you're kind of being in charge of helping them do good work that is supporting what you're doing on your team.
So I think it was a really good intermediary step between, you know, learning how to do that a little bit at Forbes, being able to work on that a little bit later, hippo. And then now just thinking like moving forward, what kind of, you know, a vendor's team of content people would, I want, um, I think testing, which would help [00:31:00] us achieve our goals with content.
Exciting, but yeah, I mean, I think there are ways to do it without like a formal system.
David Fano: So now, knowing more about your career than I did before, um, I feel like something you've done. I don't know if you were intentional about it, but you've, you've managed a really nice balance of like process and outcomes, like enjoying the process.
And not over-indexing too much the outcomes, but also having some intentionality around outcomes. So this is a great example of like, I want to produce more content. You know, one approach has me working a hundred hours a week, but that's not really sustainable, so that's going to lead me towards managing.
So now I need those skills so that I can produce more content now that I'm producing more content like, and it, and it's this really nice additive, uh, Um, so I want to call that out because I just don't. I think people become very singular around those things and they struggle, um, to kind of understand that that both are possible, but this focus on the process and enjoying the [00:32:00] journey, I think is really important.
And it goes to this, you know, focusing on what's next versus the destination. And I mean, have you always been that way? Is that something you learned?
Natalie Sportelli: I think the job process is so scary to people and they just like, do really don't have, you know, thankfully like companies like tool, like the tools, shield, like, like teal giving the tools to help people like figure out how to go through the process.
I think, you know, I've a couple of friends who've still been in their first jobs since college they've stayed with the company the whole time. And they're, they're like, I don't even know where, where do I start? Like where do I think that. What I want to do next. And so once you kind of have a sense of the breakdown of what you want to do more of, like, what do you want to do us?
Where did the growth opportunities, then you just got to talk to a lot of people. I think that in terms of my process, like at each stage, it was like someone who was in my network or a little outside my network, that I was able to access to learn more about what was going on. And then they had an opportunity for me.
And building those [00:33:00] relationships over time. So right now, a thing testing, I was a fan and follower of, you know, our founders, uh, Instagram account, Jenny Highlander was, uh, independently reviewing brands on her Instagram as a side project. And then the account blew up. And then, you know, now we're a seed stage company and I had been a follower and fan.
And so when the opportunity presented itself that she was looking for content for something like, well, I'm obsessed with your content. Like, yeah, you don't have to sell me on what you're doing because I would love to come here. Help you with that, it was just kind of maintaining the relationship and talking to people and staying in touch and just seeing how things progressed.
I think the process part of it is just staying open and listening and learning kind of as you go. I think if someone sat down and said, I'm starting the job process, now I'm going to start applying to jobs. You should always kind of be in a job. Um, cause you just never know when things will present themselves.
And like when new jobs will kind of speak to you. Um, so always having your ears open, I think is just smart. [00:34:00]
David Fano: So as a startup aficionados, uh, what would advice would you have for folks who are thinking about joining startups? I think sometimes what wanted me to, we can even, we can talk about how we codify startups.
Um, I think a lot of people get anxious about joining startups and, you know, they'd rather have something like more stable, big companies, big companies are not really necessarily any more or less stable, but what would you say are the, the big perks or pros to joining a startup?
Natalie Sportelli: How hands-on the experiences and being able to create and launch things I think is really exciting.
I having that ability to do that during my internships was so. Intuitive when it came to eventually working at a startup. Um, you know, I think that when I talk to people about careers that say, do you want to be part of like a conveyor belt of things for you're contributing to a larger outcome? Or do you want to just like put the car together yourself?
And I, you know, it's like a bigger system, but it's the process of. [00:35:00] Being able to do something and have ownership over it. I think startups are just like install many ways around ownership. Like what you're building, what you're building together, how in charge of your role you are, um, what you produce and everything.
I think that people get a little scared of startups for no reason, and that there are a lot, actually more stable than people think. Actually it was overhearing a conversation last night where someone was awaiting a startup opportunity versus like a consulting job. Right. Well, it said something. I was like, thanks.
Let's start off Trump. Cause you're going to like learn a ton and you'll know so much more about yourself leaving a startup than if you work somewhere else. I just feel like the self-awareness that you gain around what type of worker you are. And what you like to do at startups is so much clearer than big companies, because you're just exposed to so much more.
David Fano: That's awesome. Well, with that, I think we can wrap up the conversation. Uh, Natalie, where can folks follow along to all your awesome hot takes? Uh, I enjoy them [00:36:00] on Twitter. Um, but what are the ways that folks can follow along with what you're doing and, uh, stay, stay in touch with you and your.
Natalie Sportelli: Yeah. So, um, you can follow me on Twitter at an underscore Sportelli, which is super annoying and Heath underscore.
Um, and I'm going to find the other, Natalie's have a conversation,
David Fano: please reach out to us,
Natalie Sportelli: please. And then I think testing. You know, I'd love to hear any feedback on our content. Definitely subscribe to our newsletter comes out on Thursdays has trends in comp in e-commerce new brand spotted like really fun.
If you're like a brand nerd love, e-commerce like online shopping it's for you. I'm really proud of it. So, yeah, follow along. I'd love to hear what you thought too, of this episode. Huge fan of Dave. I thank you so much for having me on Telus. Awesome.
David Fano: Thank you so so much and thanks for all your help over the years and all your.
And thanks for raising your hand on Twitter. When I say, Hey, anyone want to come on this new podcast I'm doing so thank you so so [00:37:00] much. And we'll link in the show notes to all the cool ways you can follow along with Natalie. Thanks Natalie. AAnd that's it for this episode of Non Linear. If you enjoyed today's conversation, make sure to subscribe, share, and rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can learn more about Teal in our website tealhq.com, or follow us on social media @teal_hq. Thanks again, and please join us again to keep hearing about how we make decisions that shape our careers.