Be More Like Peter MacKellar
Much like superstar athlete Michael Jordan, Vice President of Strategy Peter MacKellar, occupies some rare air. Maybe that’s why so many of CSG’s senior women sent Associate Editor, Candace Warren knocking on his door in the name of professional development. Read on to find out why Candace says we should all aspire to be “Like Pete.”
“Speak up like a man, but don’t be an asshole about it — be like Peter.”
It was this pearl of wisdom that would inspire me to raise my hand at a CSG gather and tell our Chief Marketing Officer that I would be thrilled to learn more about how I could support the agency’s sales engine because I spent most of my career in sales environments where I got to make sales guys look good and do a lot of cool marketing shit in New York. The jury’s still out on whether that was a complete dick move — but I like to think I sold it with charm, moxie and just a dash of #BlackGirlMagic.
This wouldn’t be the only time that a senior women sent me down a yellow brick road to CSG’s Wizard of Awesome.
Need to ask a few stupid questions about basic concepts in finance? Talk to Peter. His answers are always fundamentally easy to understand and completely free from judgment for having asked in the first place.
Struggling with CSG-related performance anxiety? Talk to Peter. His eternally zen approach to the work we do is a damn wonder to this Associate Editor with the constitution of a chihuahua who is internally panicking about at least three different things at any given moment. He cares deeply about the work, but he also has the wisdom and self-possession to keep a safe mental distance from it.
And it isn’t just senior women who see the value Pete brings to the CSG team. I’ve long suspected that he gives great performance reviews — a fact that was enthusiastically confirmed by Coordinator, Hannah Triem:
“He actually rocks. He usually trusts that since I am really hard on myself anyway, I have already thought about the 12 areas I need to get better in, and doesn’t beat the dead horse.
The narrative is: ‘Here are 3 things you are doing well and here is one area where I think you can level up.’
And if I don’t know how, I can easily ask for guidance. ”
Peter MacKellar serves strong brother vibes. And when I say “brother,” I don’t mean like an actual brother, I mean it like the way black people use it, which is more meaningful, I think.
I once asked Peter what he thought about CSG’s senior women recommending him as a source of professional development. As you can imagine, he responded with the kind of laidback humility you’d expect.
“I just try to be a good person. And nice to everyone.”
Everybody should be more like Peter MacKellar.