Chasing meaning > avoiding discomfort
Hi there! I'm Nate. Pell-mell road biker, occasional DSLR-snapper, home coffee roaster, kid wrangler, narrative podcaster, and sporadic mullet perpetrator. But that's nights and weekends.
I started as an ad copywriter, but have grown into an ecosystems thinker with a brand strategist mind, an editor's eye, and an always-on awareness of customer experience. Along the way, I've shaped brands at three-person boutiques and global giants. Refined user experience for headphones, iPhones, and custom homes. Found the heart inside healthcare, heat pumps, and insurance.
As a podcasting instructor, I co-designed an award-winning narrative podcasting training program, launching up-and-coming audio storytellers to new jobs, increased confidence, and their own awards. As editor, I've helped shape and clarify stories for three accoladed scripted podcasts.
But why will all this help you? Because we justify with facts, we buy on emotion. We buy for identity and self-expression and finding our people. Ready to unlock the resonant story inside your product or business?
Things I’ve learned
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We might like to think that “the work should speak for itself” or “the best idea wins,” but trust and collaboration on challenging projects and unmeasurable creative decisions comes from relationships. Asking about a coworker’s kids or hobbies is not work-related, but enables better work.
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We saw this when doing nonprofit work in the Philippines, where the backdrop was 400 years of imperialism, but it’s an important reminder for how I try to approach new contexts: respect those who got there before me. Don’t presume I have the answers. And show I’m happy to be there!
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I got my job at Freshworks thanks to a referral from someone I’d worked with 15 years earlier. That’s an extreme example, but it’s why I try to stay on good terms with everyone I work with.
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At my first agency job (Goodby Silverstein) one of my tasks was cutting fomecore to mount printouts for client presentations. My manager told me to be sure to swap out a new Xacto blade every two boards, to make sure we never got a jagged edge from a dull blade.
At Apple some time later, we had twelve people in a conference room one time discussing whether it should be a hyphen or an en dash in a field in a checkout screen.
In a time when AI can generate fast, superficially-polished outputs, keen human editorial judgment remains critical.
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In auto insurance, the math is painfully straightforward: if you have too many of the wrong customers, you pay out more in claims than you take in, and you go out of business. This is why we created a lighthouse identity for the HiRoad brand: to attract the “mindful mobilites” who wanted to be recognized for their values.
But while “right fit” is do-or-die in car insurance, it also applies to any other non-commoditized product — including hiring.
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When I did my initial competitive audit for Branagh Development, I saw that all the high-end home builders talked about history and quality — but they didn’t talk about the why. For the right customers (those willing to spend several years, several million dollars, and countless decisions on a custom home), the motivation wasn’t solid-core hardwood doors or perfectly-aligned flooring transitions: it was a vision of a better future.