Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Karen Garcia. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Karen, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today The more we talk about good leadership the more we think good leadership practices will spread and so we’d love for you to tell us a story about the best boss you’ve had and what they were like or what they did that was so great?

The best boss I have ever had is my current boss. In addition to running our small business with my husband, we both have full-time jobs that take up the bulk of our time during the week. My boss hired me nine years ago, and she took somewhat of a risk, since I was a journalist previously and the world of advertising is a completely different style of writing. She took me under her wing and trained me. Since then, she has given me the trust and freedom to work independently, and has consistently been available to support me when needed. I have thrived in this environment of mutual respect and trust, and I owe it to her to be able to continue in this field with creative freedom and empowerment. My boss is an empathetic, powerful leader, and that has allowed me to create my best work during the week at my full-time job and in my off time in running my small business.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

When we first moved to Smyrna, we were talking with a neighbor one day and he mentioned there was no swag for living in our area. That day, Smyrna Swag™ was born. I didn’t know anything about screen printing or even if there was a market for our product, but we came up with a few design ideas and hit the ground running. It was a lot of trial and error, and one thing we did not want to compromise on was the quality of the shirts and screen printing. We have a local printer who does the best, high-quality work. Shirts he printed for us five years ago are still not cracking or fading, and the shirts are the softest we could find. We focus only on Smyrna, we love our little city and enjoy getting to know our neighbors through markets and festivals. We also get a lot of feedback from our customers and use their likes and dislikes to inform the next run of shirts, so it feels very collaborative and local.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

My career has taken many twists and turns. From a young age, I was passionate about reading and writing, but was told that I couldn’t survive and make a living on creative writing alone. I spent some time going down a path in the medical field, and then took some time off school when I realized that wasn’t right for me. I needed to get back to my passion.

Eventually, I was searching “how to get paid to write” and journalism came up as an option. A degree in media studies later, I found myself producing live newscasts in local markets, and eventually on the national level. After more than a decade in working as a news producer, a mass layoff forced me to once again look up, “how to get paid to write” and advertising/copywriting was the result.

I found a boss who took a chance on a producer who was accustomed to writing about bad news, and she helped me find a voice to write about retail products. I was able to use my writing skills in a different way, and didn’t let go of my passion for writing and storytelling, though the content now rests much more easily on my mind. There will surely be more pivots and changes in my writing career, but now I am confident that I am able to make a living doing what I love the most.

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

I firmly believe the success of any leader is directly related to the team they support. I treat my team with respect and give them the “why” when I am explaining my feedback to them. It’s a creative environment, and I have learned through research that the more creative and complicated a job, the more safe the people doing that job need to feel.

Dopamine is a factor as well, meaning our brains aren’t as capable of being creative when we aren’t feeling happy, basically. I try to treat each person on my team as they want to be treated, and that means spending extra time getting to know them, how they best receive feedback, and the best method to convey that feedback to them. I also ask them simply if they are happy, and if they are not, what I can do to support them. One of the main elements of the culture of my team is to make sure I understand what obstacles are in their way, and then I work with them to pave those out of their way, so they can shine and write their best work.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: jonquilsmyrnaswag

Image Credits
Alex Luidens