Sometimes when travelling you find a person who is exactly your kind of person. Then you have to go back home, to the other side of a big and giant ocean (in our case, the Atlantic) and it's hard to keep a connection like that going over such distances. And most of the time, even with the best of intentions, you probably only ever see each other on Instagram.
Luckily that wasn't the case for us, even though we've always been many timezones apart. We'd get the chance to meet up while travelling and every time we caught up we'd be having these long conversations about what it's like to work really far away from everyone on your team, and being ambitious, and wanting to live well; and one day at a picnic table outside a pub in London, we decided that these conversations should no longer just be ours.
"I’m still surprised people care, I’m still surprised that what recording a conversation with literally my best friend can mean so much, but above all else I’m so surprised that people in my actual normal life have started treating me differently, with more respect and giving me more authority and credit than I thought possible."
We went from being friends, to partners, to taking our connection that is so special to both of us – and inviting you to join us. And of course, when deciding to share such a big part of yourself with the world – it's impossible not to feel a little fear.
One of the fears we had with the podcast was if we needed “permission” to just talk into a microphone and publish whatever comes out, from friends, family, work, and our networks. And while we absolutely loved the process of making the podcast and creating the brand, we of course wondered what the reaction would be!
What would happen if no one would want to listen, we would be speaking into empty space. We recorded episodes, edited them, and debated about branding and episode topics for months before our launch in October of 2017. That day last year we were simply overwhelmed with the love and encouragement we got from friends, family, and strangers about our first three episodes.
With every new episode we release we are happily surprised and humbled at the kind response we get via email, and on Instagram and Twitter. We never could have dreamed that we’d be connected with a community of people we'd otherwise never get a chance to find, who are just as excited about processes, spreadsheets, to-do apps, and mental models as we are.
We’ve had tweets from a wonderful listener who blew off their Friday plans to implement something we talked about on the podcast. We’ve had threads filled with goat gifs sent to us on Twitter and pinned to someone’s profile. There's an immense sense of awe when people listen and the feedback is “thank you so much for clarifying” or “I’ve never thought about this in that way before and you’ve really opened my eyes!” which makes it all worthwhile.
We share our connection now with a group of so many incredibly kind and smart and thoughtful people who not only care enough to listen, but who keep the conversations we’d be having anyway going and going and going.
And for that, we are simply blown away entirely. So, as genuinely as we can convey this over text: we are so thankful that you’re listening. We're so glad it resonates. You’ve changed our lives, forever and in the best way possible.
Neither of us could have predicted the level of personal growth we would each experience in creating this podcast, each in our own ways.
And now, one year, nine episodes, all of your listens, a plethora of social media posts, and an avalanche of Slack messages, we wanted to share our reflections with all of you.
We are so excited to continue making the MakeWorkWork podcast and can only hope this time next year there will be even more to celebrate. Thank you for listening.