Laura Gassner Otting 
Teachers have had a hell of a couple of years. They were thrown like cannon fodder onto the front lines. Parents, desperate to alleviate the burden of unplanned and untrained homeschooling, were torn between normalcy for their kids, battling within between economic stability of being able to actually work, and paralyzing anxiety about safety for … Read more
I put on a pair of pantyhose twenty years ago. It was nineteen years before I’d wear another pair. When my last company was about five years old, I got the call of most entrepreneurs’ dreams. “Laura, we’ve been watching you, and we like what you are doing, and we’d like to know if you’d … Read more
My business tanked because of COVID-19. But it wasn’t COVID-19’s fault. For the past two months, I’ve complained, whined, and cried to anyone who would listen that COVID-19 is the problem. COVID-19 is stopping me from running my business.COVID-19 is not letting me get on planes and stages.COVID-19 is getting in between me and the … Read more
I make my living center stage, but if I’m being totally honest, I’d much rather be stage left. Stage left is where it’s at. In March, the business I spent the past four years building vanished into a germ cloud of coronavirus. This doesn’t make me special. It happened to a lot of us, in … Read more
We’re all feeling a little lost right now, aren’t we? But Cher is never lost. Last night I was thinking about all the travel I’m not going to get to do this year, and about all the travel that I loved doing last year. One trip, in particular, stood out for me: a family trip … Read more
Confidence, power, brilliance. I could look at Janelle Monae all dae in her limitless yellow. “Embrace what makes you unique, even if it makes others uncomfortable. I didn’t have to become perfect because I’ve learned throughout my journey that perfection is the enemy of greatness.”— Janelle Monae How many times have you stopped … Read more
If you believe Black Lives Matter: Hire them. Pay them. Promote them. And have the hard conversations about why they might turn down your offer. Are you recruiting them simply for the color of their skin, to check a box, or because you are interested and actually making space for their point of view? And … Read more
Memorial Day is here and it’s gotten me thinking about patriotism lately. “We should get an American flag for our house,” I woke up yesterday morning and turned to my husband and said. “Why? Why now all of a sudden?” he replied. I had a hard time putting it into words, but I am feeling … Read more
Crisis brings out the worst in people. But it also brings out the best in people. What if it brought out the best in you, your team, your company? What if you could get to the other side of this crisis knowing that in the greatest hour of need of those who rely upon you, … Read more
The world needs your message. It’s been eight weeks of quarantine, eight weeks of completely re-branding and re-inventing myself professionally, eight weeks of being smacked in the face on a daily basis with my complete and utter incompetence. Every day a new lesson. Every day a new discovery. Every day a new failure. Every day … Read more