We recently connected with Nader Safinya and have shared our conversation below.

Nader, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s talk legacy – what sort of legacy do you hope to build?

I want people to love their jobs. I want to build programs to create cool opportunities so everyone can leverage what they love and make a living doing it. I want people to say, “Nader Safinya is why the sayings ‘live to work, and work to live’ don’t exist anymore—life and work have harmonized.”

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

I’ve always been an astute observer. I grew up internationally moving around a lot and experiencing new cultures and languages every few years which quickly made me realize how much diversity exists in the world. I also grew up in a party—no really, my mother hosted parties every week until I went off to college. In fact, if my life flashed before my eyes it would probably begin with me staring at ankles, then knees, and end with me dancing. But I digress; what I noticed is that in all that diversity, at a party, everyone was the same. Their social status, their bank accounts, their jobs all went out the window and everyone was there for one reason only: to have fun and forget their problems for an evening. This realization revealed to me the interconnectedness of our mutual experiences.

I was also an artist growing up, and thinking about how to make money doing that (this was before social media), I decided on a graphic design major in college so I could get a job. I quickly realized that it also combines my observation skills, my love for process, and creative execution. Design is a very difficult term to define—I recently realized it’s simply strategic art.

After my undergrad I worked in the field as a graphic designer, moved up the ladder to creative director in 7 years during which I ran many programs surrounding digital and traditional marketing, brand strategy and management, creative direction, event planning, merchandising and so on. By 2016 I hit a growth barrier and after cosulting with my greatest mentor to date, we decided that it was best for me to go after a master’s degree.

I went to Munich and by 2018 I had my master’s in design management and had grown siginficantly as a designer and strategist. My work had grown so far past making things look good—it really became about the inner workings of solutions to problems. After freelancing for a year and driven by a passion for communication I launched Blackribbit and positioned it as a brand strategy consultancy helping stagnant organizations stuck on their growth path to self-reflect and become more attractive so that talent will crave to join them, and prospects will fight to do business with them, achieved by focusing on expressing company image, culture, and reputation. It’s important to note that we emphasize employing our “Inside-Outside-In™” model during which we draw a thread through an organization’s vision, their ideal customer profile and back to an ideal employee profile—creating a holistic and cohesive organization tailored for adaptable growth.

The most rewarding aspect of this work is creating absolute clarity and a sense of purpose for our clientele. The feeling of relief, understanding, and knowing in which direction they’re headed, why and how to get there is just an incomparable sight to behold. And we continue to lovingly do that today.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

I’ve made mistakes. Which led to my team making mistakes. Everyone will tell you that it’s okay to make mistakes… it’s not okay to make mistakes—especially when they impact others. But it is normal to make mistakes, and we must learn from them and improve if we want our mistakes to have any value. I suppose one particular story is when we missed our mark with a deliverable which blew up in our faces. I blamed myself for not being more diligent from the get-go when it came to overall planning. It was an experience that began with great optimism and ended with contention. To wrap up the process we conducted what’s called a fail report or post-mortem evaluation to analyze where we messed up and what could have been improved upon. This approach immediately helped us mitigate these types of scenarios moving forward and still proves to be a valuable lesson in setting expecations, sticking to a plan, ensuring that it’s flexible, and being abundantly clear all the time. While it was stressful in the moment, we emerged better and more together in the long run.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

Consistency. I am known for my honesty and reliability which I consistently deliver. At the very least I hold myself to very strict standards in making sure I don’t stray from these core values. These values are paired with compassion, guidance, and decisiveness which have osmosed into the Blackribbit company culture. I have been truly blessed to have these efforts validated through many interactions and relationships built over time, and I am grateful to anyone who knows me and is reading this.

Contact Info:

• Website: Blackribbit.com
• Instagram: @blackribbit
• Linkedin: LinkedIn.com/in/nadersafinya