You’re scrolling Threads with your morning coffee when you see it:
That designer you compare yourself to just sold out her logo-less branding offer.
5 spots claimed.
Booked out ‘til Q2.
Immediately, your stomach clenches as you do the mental math.
How the fuck was she able to call in $20K in, like, three days, when you’ve been selling a similar offer for months with nothing but a few ghosted proposals to show for it?!
You place your coffee down beside you, the rough clang of the porcelain on the table putting your nerves further on edge.
Closing your eyes, you breathe:
Deep inhale. 1-2-3.
Hold. 1-2-3.
Deep exhale. 1-2-3.
You open one eye, her celebratory post still staring back at you.
Fuck mindfulness.
You’re pissed.
Inside, your likeability thing is being activated — that part of you that felt rejected by the mean girl in grade school, cheated on by that asshole in college, passed over for that promotion in your first “real” job.
What should just be a neutral collection of words on a screen about a peer celebrating their win turns into a spiral of questioning whether you’re too ugly, too annoying, too uncool to be successful…
But that’s a lot to move through in the 10 minutes you’ve given yourself to scroll between Zoom calls, so instead of looking inward at why you’re feeling the way you’re feeling, you take the path of less resistance: searching for reasons to make her wrong.
And then it hits you —
Logo-less branding? More like rush job. There’s no way she can actually solve her clients’ problems with a cheap and dirty offer like that.
You include a suite of custom-designed logo marks for a reason.
Because it’s the responsible thing to do.
You crack your knuckles and take to typing:
“I wouldn’t trust any designer who isn’t including at least one logo in their identity offer. The reason I haven’t given into the logo-less branding trend is because I don’t believe in rushing to get my clients out the door. I’ve been doing this for 10 years — I know that brands without logos don’t see the same success, long-term.”
You feel the tension start to leave your body, cathartic.
She’s wrong.
You’re right.
You press post.
PETTY LITTLE BITCHES
This style of content is RAMPANT on Threads right now, and it’s making strong, respectable leaders act exactly like that petty little bitch who ditched you at recess, 20 years ago.
Leaders who have spent years honing their ability to hold space for others are abandoning any sense of decorum when it comes to online discourse.
Leaders who have cleaned house when it comes to the toxic relationships in their IRL lives are fostering new frienemies, through their feeds.
Leaders who have studied compassionate communication to the point that they could teach it are now keyboard-warrior-ing their way into saying things they don’t really mean.
I’d argue that it’s not their fault they got caught up in it, but it is their responsibility to stop.
Whenever a new social media culture rises, it’s a call to understand ourselves, better. To witness ourselves on a new spectrum of reactivity, to examine why we feel the way we feel, so we can land more deeply in what we truly believe.
Threads is quite literally designed to spark reaction.
In a matter of minutes, we’re exposed to hundreds of messages that will most likely make us feel some type of way. The algorithm inundates us with topics that are alive for us, related to our last anxious Google search or the heated debate we had over dinner. The more recently it was on our mind, the more reactive we’ll be, when we see it.
The goal of the platform is to participate, with an off-the-cuff vibe that can challenge the thoughtfulness with which we show up. It’s never nice to comment on someone else’s post with a heated quip, but the type of reaction I’m referring to isn’t even adding to the original discussion — rather, it’s being sent out into it’s own ether as if it was born from an independent thought.
There are three parties at play, here:
Activated reactions
Authentic perspectives
Constructive dialogue
In order to lead effectively on Threads — or any social media platform, honestly — we need to sense the difference (within ourselves) between an activated reaction and an authentic perspective, and we need to make a conscious decision to engage in dialogue ONLY WHEN it’s constructive to our community, at large.
DEFENCE VS. CONVICTION
Defence and conviction feel similar in the moment (and even look similar, on the outside), but we can identify which is fuelling our keystrokes by tuning into our motivation.
When we’re on guard — attacked, threatened — we’re motivated by defence.
In the example I kicked off with, there was a clear defence motivation.
Designer A felt threatened by Designer B.
When we see something that makes us feel a little pissy, for whatever reason, it’s natural to be driven to self-soothe, reassuring ourselves by making someone else wrong so that we can feel more right.
That process is all fine and fucking dandy when it’s happening in our private journalling sessions, but it’s detrimental to our leadership when aired on the public stage.
In this state, we’re more likely to say shit we don’t mean, or claim opinions we haven’t fully formed for ourselves, yet — and even if we DO believe the things we’re saying, there’s insecurity behind the POV because we’re trying to prove something.
This type of communication gives absolutely nothing to our people (besides perhaps the ick).
Not strategic.
Not supportive.
When we’re revved up — inspired, passionate — we’re motivated by conviction.
We’re sharing because we deeply believe in something, and we have a formed, meaningful opinion about it. There’s real power behind our POV, because we’re NOT trying to prove anything.
This type of communication is FOR our people, calling our community into an idea so that they can benefit from a new way of thinking.
Strategic.
Supportive.
We can move from DEFENCE → CONVICTION quickly, we just need to take a fucking beat.
To let that prickly feeling in our fingertips pass.
To give ourselves room to react in private before we respond, in public.
To address WHY their post activated us, what bruise of insecurity it’s pressing on, and what we can do to address that beyond a sassy little clap-back.
Leadership isn’t about being unaffected — It’s about learning to process what affects us before it starts affecting our people, too.
CONSTRUCTIVE DIALOGUE
Let’s say Designer A and their green-eyed-monster took their fucking beat, didn’t rush to post an activated response to their own feed, and after they were finished work for the day, took some time to figure out why they were feeling so freaked out about Designer B’s sudden financial success.
They’d discover it had nothing to do with the whole “logo-less” thing, and more to do with them feeling a bit of scarcity in their own world, heightened by their past experiences being passed over and left behind.
There’s an impactful conversation bubbling beneath this, one where Designer A steps up and leads a dialogue on the relationship between investing in full-scope design and becoming the top choice for investors, speaking gigs, or whatever opportunities their own clients are seeking. On a personal note, they could include their own story about not feeling like they belong anywhere, and how important it is for them to support their clients in finding their place in their market, as a result.
Kinda beautiful, no?
The lesson here isn’t to avoid Threads when you’re in a shit mood or to stop posting all-together in fear of petty-little-bitch syndrome, it’s simply to learn how to use the inevitable agitation to your advantage. When you acknowledge it, you can examine it’s root, letting it lead you to a plot line that is much more compelling than any rushed reaction would have been.
“My way vs. Their way” is a lazy debate — but true online leadership is born in the layers that lie beneath it.
Loved this convo & it’s sooo related to an astrological current of the time: mars opposite Pluto. Activating our defensiveness basically since October - through April, we’ll continued to be tested to not give our power to the loudest fastest reactions within us, but the chosen one. Mind bogglingly cool to think about how that can trickle down to a cultural phenomenon on a social media platform
Love u for this