another takeaway here is how so much junior talent in think tanks gets wasted supporting dead weight senior scholars vs giving ppl the support and freedom to flourish as you have
For your point about tweeting, I'll see you and raise you: You should be on LinkedIn, actually. I have got, by far, the best responses and most interesting inbound from LinkedIn. Someone told me, "It is almost impossible to have the most interesting content of the day on Twitter. It is quite achievable to have the most interesting content of the day on LinkedIn." He's not wrong!
I'll also suggest: People prefer stories to proposals.
I still have a ton to learn on this one, but my limited experience would tell me that “if you build it they will come” is a big part of it. My team is now up to six, and all but one sent me a cold email asking for a job because they saw what we were doing and wanted in.
"Always have draft text. Also, always have a 1-pager. But if there's an idea that you want a staffer to take seriously, you should write it up as mock legislation."
the explainer that really needs to be written is how to go from idea to legtext
maybe we're six months from AI taking care of that for you but still a big market gap!
Absolutely agreed on the think tank echo chamber. I’ve been to countless China & MENA related events and sometimes I have a conspiracy that they all agree on a script on the and read from that during their speeches… 😆
another takeaway here is how so much junior talent in think tanks gets wasted supporting dead weight senior scholars vs giving ppl the support and freedom to flourish as you have
What. A. Year.
Hats off, Thomas Hochman.
For your point about tweeting, I'll see you and raise you: You should be on LinkedIn, actually. I have got, by far, the best responses and most interesting inbound from LinkedIn. Someone told me, "It is almost impossible to have the most interesting content of the day on Twitter. It is quite achievable to have the most interesting content of the day on LinkedIn." He's not wrong!
I'll also suggest: People prefer stories to proposals.
Ridiculous how much better you are at this than ppl with 10x the experience
I used to work for the policy/comms shop at Uber during the Kalanick days. These lessons ring true from those days.
Amazing wins, amazing insights. I’ll keep this list handy.
advice on how to replicate/hire for people like you？
I still have a ton to learn on this one, but my limited experience would tell me that “if you build it they will come” is a big part of it. My team is now up to six, and all but one sent me a cold email asking for a job because they saw what we were doing and wanted in.
Really fantastic post. A lot of this resonates with my experience as well.
"Always have draft text. Also, always have a 1-pager. But if there's an idea that you want a staffer to take seriously, you should write it up as mock legislation."
the explainer that really needs to be written is how to go from idea to legtext
maybe we're six months from AI taking care of that for you but still a big market gap!
I’ve been in DC for ~3 years and this is spot on
Absolutely agreed on the think tank echo chamber. I’ve been to countless China & MENA related events and sometimes I have a conspiracy that they all agree on a script on the and read from that during their speeches… 😆
Under the spell of the swamp !
Why do all Substack authors write in the 1st person
where they are the subject not us the reader ?