Soapbox Engage Blog

Last year was our building year at PICnet. That's putting it lightly actually. Growing nearly three times in size, with two new offices in New York and San Francisco, the company has morphed into a true bi-costal enterprise (I enjoy using words like "enterprise" liberally in business).

It's important to my business management methodology to follow my mantra of MBWA: managing by walking around. I want to be in each of our offices at least a few days each month, making sure PICnetters have face time with me while also spending time doing partner and business development meetings in our three cities.

I think it's great that other technology companies can have their entire teams working virtually. That's not the way we work at PICnet though, as I'm a true believer that water-cooler time is the place where new ideas are sparked, and that team building needs to happen both online and offline, daily.

After our client organizations, the next big benefactor of all this growth is JetBlue, to which seat 20A on flights 318 and 321 between IAD and OAK normally are forced to deal with my presence. As my friends and family know quite well, my bi-costal life is a bit taxing, but has both its benefits and drawbacks.

I'm currently living about two weeks a month in San Francisco, and two weeks a month in DC. Normally, I try to pick up New York on my way from west to east, kind of a multi-day layover if you may (not that I have anything against you, my PICnet NYC friends!). The travel keeps me on my toes, but also makes it difficult to be part of multi-week activities.

For example, I have a hankering for taking dance lessons to try to impress my girlfriend and friends at weddings. Of course, these lessons aren't compacted into a one week intensive routine. No, they expect you to live in the same city for two, sometimes four months in a row.

On the flip side, there's probably nothing more renewing then getting a chance to settle into a new city for a few weeks, and feeling like you get to start over from scratch. You start to yearn for those things in "the other city", like my burritos in the Mission, or a night in Adams Morgan. It definitely makes you enjoy and savor your time in each city, and take them for everything they've got.

If there's one piece of advice I can give to those trying to live a ridiculous bi-coastal life, it's the following: do whatever you can to have a wardrobe in each city. Nothing is more savoring than flying cross country with just a laptop!