Erin’s Blog

Two years ago, I worked with a stylist. “Work with a stylist” had been on my wish list for a long time. We’re talking years. Rationals, excuses, and reasoning finally got forgotten when Nicole Otchy came into my world.  Not only am I MAD fashionable now 😉, but I...

Yesterday, as we were wrapping up an incredible week of learning and growth, I had a moment. An in-the-moment test of a lesson I’d learned years ago, and I almost flunked.  Eight years ago, after delivering a full-day program, a participant came up to me with a...

Back in the day, we’re talking the kindergarten day, I took ballet.  My ballet class was at Mrs. Gatsky’s house. No formal studio. No sequined costumes or hours-long recitals. She had a studio set up on her bottom floor, which opened up to her backyard. More often...

I don’t know if you ever forget the first time you got burned hard, by a colleague.  Memorial Day, 1998. I’d been managing Uncle Julios, the Tex-Mex restaurant we dubbed the million-dollar taco stand on the corner of North and Clybourn in Chicago. The management...

Yesterday, I got out of bed and immediately opened my computer to send an email to cancel a call for later that day. I was not in the mood.  I immediately got an email back saying it was too late to cancel..she could make an exception, but I didn’t want to be that...

This week’s thoughts are brought to you by The Blue Angels.  As I write, I feel like Air Boss Johnson in Top Gun having said, “The pattern is full…” only to have Maverick buzz the tower. In this case, the tower is our house!  The Jax Beach Air Show is this weekend,...

Second semester sophomore year at JMU I pledged a business fraternity. I went ALL IN. Put it this way, when my parents got my grades for the semester, their comment was, “We know we dropped you off on campus…did you actually stay and attend any classes?”  I had!...

The day I gave my first official Erin O’Malley keynote, my sister, brother, and SIL arranged a gift to be sent to my hotel. I opened the box to find a leather bracelet inscribed with, “She believed she could, so she did.” I was on the phone with a friend freaking...

We were towards the end of day one of a 2-day feedback and coaching workshop. It was practice time, and we were IN IT. John was mid-coaching conversation and tanking hard. The more he spoke, the more oxygen got sucked out of the room. Cringy looks, shuffling feet,...

I call it my Mystic Pizza summer. Except I was in Maine, not CT. I had no sordid love affairs. I did not drive a Vespa.  It was the summer I worked in Camden, ME, slinging lobsters at The Lobster Shack, coming home nightly drenched in lobster juice and drawn...