What’s next on your bucket list professionally? Do you ever think of starting your own business or joining a startup? Working for a new enterprise can be exhilarating, especially when you prepare yourself. How do you do that? By surrendering to the fact that growth requires change, so nothing stays the same, and recognizing opportunities to be better, even if you have to quickly override your own decisions. When a business starts at ground zero, initial growth is exponential, requiring resilience and constant adaptation to the demands of it. Before doing it, I recommend a hard-nosed, clear-eyed assessment of your life and whether or not it’s a good time to jump in as well as an evaluation of the potential benefits.
In 2008, I joined the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records (OOR), a brand-new commonwealth agency created to implement and enforce the new Right-to-Know law. The OOR was a start-up agency with nothing in place except a new law that would take years to solidify through the appellate process. We had no time to spare in creating a full-fledged agency, statutorily required to set policy, receive and docket appeals, hire appeals officers to decide cases, and create systems for docketing and maintaining appeal files. Oh, and we also needed permanent office space, furniture, supplies, and equipment.
