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2018 Company Meeting: Glorious 2 Greatness |
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I'm not sure why whenever I get over here...I never want to do anything xp
I'm in Philly now. It's the first weekend after company meeting, my first for this job and sentiment has been pretty consistent across the board. This was the best company meeting yet!
Pre-Company Meeting
As soon as they dropped booking information for the company meeting, Justin hit me up right away and let me know that we'd be roommates and that we should book our flights using the intranet as soon as possible. I asked him if we should make it an extended trip and maybe invite the others but I'm pretty sure he declined (if we were to do that, we would have had to book flights through Tripeasy and secure alternative accommodations for the additional dates that I think the company would've covered. Plus, you could only book group flights on the intranet). At the end of the day, it didn't matter that much to me. I didn't know anyone in New Orleans and it wasn't one of those cities that I was dying to explore or spend time in so keeping it easy and booking on the intranet and just staying for the Mon-Wed just seemed easier.
On Sunday before company meeting, Justin suggested that I stay at his house that night and we go to the airport together the next day. That Sunday was also Mother's Day. He happened to be in Waldorf (where his mother lives) and volunteered to pick me up. We stopped at Harris Teeter, got a bottle of wine and watched Dear White People while he cleaned up Bella's destructive messes. Afterward I jumped in his bed and went to sleep!
Two things:
1) Normally, I would've slept on his couch. I remember, before the New Year, commenting on how large and comfortable his couch was. But since he's taken ownership of Bella, his big a** dog, she has been pissing and slobbering all over the couch which subsequently smells like dog...which is disgusting. I wasn't sleeping on that.
2) I felt that it all was just...weird. Justin is pretty standoffish and sometime-y when it comes to us as a whole so for him to be so forthcoming with wanting to be around me and even going as far as inviting me to spend the night with him the night before our flight was a surprise, a pleasant surprise, but a surprise nonetheless. I was totally okay taking an uber from Dad's house and expensing it. I've gone on two work trips before this (to Durham and Denver) and it wasn't a problem but it's all good. It was refreshing to see him acting like a real friend. heart
Monday
We woke up, showered and left Justin's Navy Yard apartment around 10:30am for our 12:20pm Southwest flight to New Orleans. The uber ride was like...15 minutes and the check-in process was super easy (they pre-printed our boarding passes). We hung out, ate at the airport and encountered other 2Utes until our flight started boarding and then we were off!
The ground transportation and hotel check-in processes were pretty easy too. We got to baggage claim, boarded one of the buses that took us to the hotel and we were pre-reg/pre-keyed which made it rather seamless. Justin and I got to our room and freshened up before I went to the first-timer session at 4pm (which was a lowkey waste lol). It was very interesting to find out that it was the first company meeting for over 600 employees, meaning that 2U has hired over 600 people within the past year...increasing their workforce by over 60%. Talk about hypergrowth.
Anyway, Justin and I met back up afterward, went to the lobby bar for a drink and then boarded the bus to the evening event for the day. It was located at some club/lounge in NOLA that had food, beer and wine. Drew Brees of the Saints also showed up. It was there I saw my work friends for the first time at the conference. We hung out for the night, there was some type of drama with Ebony and Justin but they ended up squashing it.
After the event we went out somewhere else (I need to start keeping track of these places). Things got a little crazy. Beza was super drunk. Ricky was there and kept touching my a**...it was all just weird. Afterward, we got back to the hotel after midnight. Justin went to go be a hoe with another 2Ute, and I passed out without setting an alarm.
Tuesday
Tuesday, I woke up to Justin screaming (telling me) at me to wake up or I was going to be late. That's what friends are for stare Anyway, I got up and got ready to start our sessions for the day, all leading up our keynote discussion with the legendary, Michelle Obama.
Most of the sessions were pretty forgettable. Harsha (CMO) and Courtney (VP of Creative & PR) did a joint presentation on "The Art & Science of Marketing". Since I work in Marketing, I feel like I've heard the presentation a billion times before rofl . James Kenningburg (CTO) did I little presentation on the tech and production teams, which I thought was awesome and eye-opening. They're definitely doing a lot of cool stuff up there in NY and at the Arlington studios that clearly take a ton of work.
The CEO of Netflix did a presentation on Hypergrowth, which was completely relevant to the current state of 2U. I mean, with over 600 new hires within the past year and scaling the company to accommodate 8, 10, 14+ launches per year (roughly) in 2016, 2017 and 2018 when previously 2U was launching just 1-3 per year...hypergrowth is a bit of an understatement. But that really speaks to the company in a good way. Chip always talks about the importance of focus as a CEO and making sure your company can do it's core guidelines very well a) to scale adequately without too many hiccups and b) before we start branching out into other things. His presentation was super relevant but the delivery was lost. A lot of people, me included, started falling asleep on his part.
Then we got into a Chip Chat with Adam Neuman, CEO of Netflix. He honestly didn't talk a lot about WeWork or his journey to being a CEO or his background rofl He talked a lot about his wife and how she grounded him, his kids, his ideals about human nature and giving back, how to treat people and overall how to be good human beings. He was very candid, off-script and a bit of a lose cannon. There was a point where he asked Chip why every employee doesn't have stock in the company (this was one of many small digs he took at Chip and 2U), this was especially funny seeing as how 2U is now publicly traded and WeWork is not...yet. Adam went on to suggest that the board approves giving stock to every person and that he would cover the rest of the cost of what the board doesn't approve. Chip was very uncomfortable during the whole exchange, it was pretty ******** funny. That and all the shade he threw ("maybe one day you can host your company meeting at MSG (with a host of celebrity guests)", "You need some Isreali seasoning on this company meeting" "I'll buy everyone stock in this company" etc etc etc). Alas, this chat was both refreshing and energizing and a great way to show that CEOs come with different personality types and strengths. Like Chip and Adam, I'd be a CEO with a ton of feelings that would most likely lead from the heart...there's hope for me yet crying
After Adam, we had a good one-hour break before Michelle took the stage, so we vacated the General Session room so the secret service could clear the place and returned about an hour later.
And then the time came...Mrs. Michelle Obama. She was poised, confident, articulate, intelligent and a presence. Everything I could expect from MY first lady. Everyone was elated to see her. She talked about her upbringing, how unenthused she was when her husband got into politics and the importance of being your most authentic self and truly believing you can accomplish anything you want. She also stressed how important it is to connect with people and find commonalities despite the superficial differences we see on the daily. She plugged her memoir titled "Becoming", in stores this October, and Chip committed to buying us all a copy. Another hour of great material courtesy of the first lady. Shoutout to Kayla and Beza for saving Jusin and I good seats. She was so close to us and I had the perfect view of her wavy hombre bangs, perfectly manicured toes and patterned flowy dress. She's everything.
After Michelle, we had another one-hour break until we had to meet in the lobby for our evening event. The only planning flub from the event team this whole trip. It seemed like all 1,200 of us at the company meeting were packed into the lobby and mezz area just waiting for like...almost an hour. It was overwhelming for many of us and I know it was overwhelming for the staff who still had the responsibility of operating a hotel with guests who were not apart of our conference. All of a sudden we hear a big band with Chip dressed as the bandmaster coming down the stairs and leading us outside to tons of parade floats! So festive!
We boarded the parade floats armed with beer, wine and beads and led a Mardi Gras procession downtown to Mardi Gras World where we had dinner, more drinks, and a live band. All of this was truly grandiose, over the top and a ton of fun. Afterward, we boarded a bus back to the hotel where we were met with ANOTHER party with beer, wine and LIQUOR. A bit of dancing and a bit of drinking ensued before we departed.
Justin and I had a little heart to heart before he went to go hoe and I went to sleep. He expressed how hurt he has been over the past year dealing with Kelly and TJ's betrayal and his close cousins dying and started crying. I went over to hug him, ya'll know I hate tears. We wrapped up our conversation and Justin left to go hoe...part of me wanted to go out and explore but by that time, I feel like it was pushing 2am and I was beat. I passed out shortly afterward.
Wednesday
The next morning, I woke up on time - Just arrived to our room a little late - and we got down to the general session room for the day's panels. Most of it had a lot to do with diversity in the workplace with one woman, an author/writer, plugging her book on providing opportunities for first time leaders. She actually had a lot of great things to say and it makes me want to do more research into her. Following that, there was sitdown discussion with a graduate from the Education at USC program (2014 or 2016) and she walked us through her life and career in accounting/business and how that led to her getting a master's in education and using that to start her own nonprofit. I mean, her story was moving, impactful and it had a lot of parallels to Michelle Obama and many black women that I know, including my mom. She even talked about how she was diagnosed with breast cancer and how her father died from lung cancer. It was rough, I teared up, but I loved hearing her story. After that was a panel with representatives from Google, Facebook and somewhere else which was also pretty cool. Overall, it was a great half-day of hearing people's experience when it comes to diversity in the workplace and really making a difference.
Not much happened after that. Our sessions were done, we found out the location for next year's company meeting (Las Vegas xp ), we did a grab and go lunch and got ready to checkout.
I ate that lunch quickly (I was hungry as hell) checked my baggage and went for a walk around New Orleans. I walked down Canal Street, Bourbon Street, over to the Louis Armstrong park...sat there in the shade by the little river there and talked to Rob for a while and then headed back towards the hotel and sat at the bar where Justin joined me. Not too long after that we boarded the bus back to the airport and before you know it, we landed back at DCA at around 11:15pm. I chilled at Justin's for a while, since it was raining and Uber was surging like crazy, and waited until the surging stopped - then I ubered home (2U will only pay for the base fare for Uber rides).
And that was company meeting!! It's currently May 22, 1:11pm and I can't believe it took me like 3+ days to write this. Don't get me wrong, company meeting was great and totally worth writing about but I just wasn't excited to detail it here. I'm almost thinking I wish I would've just summarized it and said I didn't feel like doing in depth about it...but there were quite a few moments that were worth mentioning.
I'll probably go back through this and fill in some things I was too lazy to add initially, after that this will be finished!
One Love.
Ryo
Mood: Decent smile Music: "Glorious" - Macklemore Feat. Skylar Grey from Gemini
Ryonosuke · Sat May 19, 2018 @ 11:15pm · 0 Comments |
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