I’m Dan Oshinsky, and I run Inbox Collective, an email consultancy. I'm here to share what I've learned about doing great work and building amazing teams.
It’s OK if you don’t get everything done today that you wanted to do today.
It’s OK if you’re stuck.
It’s OK if everything needs to change.
It’s OK if you have to wait to do the thing you really want to do.
It’s OK if you have to accept “good enough” now, even if you want to do something great one day.
It’s OK, and it’s just what you’re dealing with today. It won’t be like this forever.
Tomorrow, you get another chance to do better.
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I took that photo in Utah, in fall 2020, at a moment when I didn’t have a lot of answers about the future. Things turned out more than OK in the long run.
I’m lucky to be in a place where I’ve got a career I love and a business that’s growing.
But to anyone thinking that this all happened overnight: It most certainly did not.
That’s why I’m so grateful that I’ve been documenting my journey over the years. And every time I look back upon certain entries — from a year ago, or five, or ten — I’m reminded of what I went through on the road to today.
I can look back and remember the moment when I was sleeping on a floor in Springfield, Missouri — and excited about it!
These stories are humbling. They’re a reminder of what I went through to get here.
And they’re why I’ll keep documenting my story, one day at a time. I know I’ll look back on this time, too, remembering the person I once was — and the person I’ve since become.
Sally and I went to a Mizzou basketball game earlier this year. At the time, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from this team. They had a new coach and nine new players on the roster. I was hoping they’d be competitive; I wasn’t sure if they’d be any good.
And that day, we watched them bank in a 35-footer at the buzzer for the win.
https://youtu.be/Va8LUi6Kgkk
As we walked out of the arena, I told Sally: That’s the kind of win that might make a team believe they could do something special this year.
And then they went out and did just that. They crushed rival Illinois. They beat Kentucky and Iowa State. Had another buzzer-beating win at Tennessee. As of today, they’re ranked in the Top 25 and headed to the NCAA Tournament.
But the thing is: A season like this goes by fast. A quarter of this team will graduate in the spring, and others might transfer. Next year’s team will probably have a half-dozen new players. This isn’t the pros, where you can root for one player for years and years — in college, players graduate or move on.
So I’ve been watching every game I can down the stretch. I’ve been trying to enjoy it all. I know it’ll be over soon. The NCAA Tournament is a win-or-go-home proposition. If they exceed every expectation, their season will still be over in the next two weeks.
I’m trying to enjoy it while it lasts, and share these moments with friends while it’s all still happening in the present. It’s not over yet.
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That’s us after that buzzer beater vs. UCF. I’m a pretty optimistic sports fan, but there’s no way I would’ve predicted the season Mizzou would go on to have.
I had a few candidates take editing tests this week for a part-time editor role with Inbox Collective. (I paid them for their work — it’s only fair that they should be compensated for their time and talent.) And reading through their notes, I kept thinking: These edits are going to make these stories so much better! They pointed out all sorts of edits and structural changes I hadn’t thought of.
To put together a really great website, I know I need editors to help make my work better. My ideas are pretty good, but they’ll be sharpened by a smart editor.
I operate as a one-man operation, but I still need a team around me. I need part-time editors to help out with stories. I need freelance writers I can turn to. I need friends in the industry who I can talk to for advice. I need people I trust who I can bounce ideas off of. I need to do surveys and have lots of conversations with readers to get their feedback.
I need all this extra input and help. It’s hard to do this work alone. And recognizing that means that I can look for ways to add support around me to make sure I do the best work I can do.
I’m doing this solo, but that doesn’t mean I have to go it alone.
I was talking recently with a friend about red-eye flights. When I was younger, a red-eye didn’t really bother me. I’d fly back from the West Coast at midnight, land at 6 a.m., and go to work at 9. Not a big deal!
But I’m in my mid-30s now. My body doesn’t handle red-eye flights anymore. I like being in a bed; I need sleep.
So my travel rules have changed. I’d much rather fly back early in the day and lose a day than suffer through a red-eye. Could I save a few bucks on a red-eye? Yes, but with what I know about my body, why would I want to?
And the same applies to most things that I do. Could I take on that one extra project, work until midnight most nights, and make a little extra money? Sure, but why would I want to? (The business makes enough money, and part of going independent was about getting the flexibility to work the hours I wanted.)
Could I say “yes” to that meeting across town, even though it’ll take a normally busy day and make it extra busy? I suppose, by why would I want to? (I can always hop on a call or Zoom instead.)
Could I agree to write that blog post for someone else’s site? Yeah, but what would I want to? (I have my own website! And that piece of writing is more valuable to me if I publish it on my own site.)
Could I? The answer is often yes. But there’s the second question you need to ask yourself: Why would you want to? If there’s not a resounding answer to that question, it might be the moment to say “no.”
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I took that photo a few years ago while on an evening flight from New York to Paris. (With those flights, you have to fly overnight, sadly.)
In the 1990s and early 2000s, the most trusted name in dining in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was someone named… Munch.
Munch was the food critic for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Munch’s true identify was unknown — they appeared in the paper as a photo of someone with a paper bag over their head. They wrote in third person. (Here’s one line from a review of a local brunch spot: “Munch knew the French toast should’ve been Munch’s choice.”)
Lots of cities had anonymous food critics — not many had a byline like “Munch.” But talk to anyone from Pittsburgh and they’ll tell you what an influential critic Munch was. Their reviews were widely read and respected in western Pennsylvania. Munch stood for excellence in dining — if Munch said the food was good, you could trust it.
Sally and I are on vacation this week, but I’m thinking back to the days before we left.
I had a busy week last week: A big presentation, a dozen calls, work on a few new articles for the site, and a lot of emails to deal with. I’m often busy, but this was more than usual.
And in the 48 hours before we left, with Sally working back-to-back days, I was trying to do everything: All of the work, plus all of the packing, laundry, and cleaning. I don’t get visibly stressed too often, but I was last week. (Just re-writing this, I’m feeling the stress levels rise again!)
So Sally reminded me: It’s OK to delegate. No, she can’t take on my work, but she’ll always have the time to help with errands or tasks around the house. Yes, she’s also busy, but no, that doesn’t mean I have to do everything.
It was a reminder I needed to hear. I don’t have to be Superman — I can share the load with her. There’s no award for doing it all; there are just consequences.
The next time the work piles up, see if you can find a way to share the responsibility and take a little off your plate. You don’t need to do 120 percent of the work. In the long run, you can’t.
When I talk with a prospective new client, they almost always tell me: We want to grow as much as possible, as quickly as possible.
And that’s natural — but my follow-up question is usually: Why?
If you’ve got the team in place, and the strategy in place, I understand the need to grow, and grow quickly — you’re trying to reach a level of scale where your business can flourish.
But so many of the teams I talk to aren’t there yet. They don’t have the team yet. They don’t have the strategy yet.
And in those cases, growth shouldn’t be the top priority. Their priority should be growing their audience to the point where they can prove out their editorial concept and business model. Only once they’ve done that should they shift into growth mode.
Yes, growth always sounds great. But maybe it’s worth asking yourself: What are we in such a rush for?
I’ve been helping one of my writers out recently, and they asked a question: Dan, any chance you know how to fix this little WordPress issue that’s been bothering us?
I’ve got this very site on WordPress, and Inbox Collective runs on WordPress, so I know a bit. I told them I couldn’t promise anything, but I’d be happy to give the issue a look.
And then, over the course of the next hour, we managed to fix that issue — plus a handful of other WordPress issues that had been bugging them for a while.
Does it mean I’m suddenly giving up email and going into WordPress design now? Oh, absolutely not. I still barely know anything about this platform.
But I know enough to share and to help — at least sometimes. And on the right day, that might be enough.
I’ve been working with a few newsletter writers who are in a period of transition. For nearly two years, they’d been writing multiple newsletters per week. Now, they’re all trying to figure out what to do next. Should they write more, or less? Should they change the way they monetize?
And my advice, over and over, has been simple: Whatever you do choose to do next, make it work for you.
There isn’t a single way forward here. There is no one-size-fits-all answer.
Which means that the right answer, for now, is the one that works for each of these writers. It’s up to them to figure out what they want to build and how they want to build it. There’s no need to build around someone else’s constraints or rules — they’re free to do what’s best for them.
Maybe that means, as I told one writer, telling their readers that they’d be taking a month off in December so they can get ahead for 2023 and pre-write the first few months of newsletters. “I’m allowed to do that?” they asked me.
You are, I told them, because this is all about making it work for you.
Maybe it means changing up the way they monetize. One writer’s been trying to push forward with a paid subscription, but it isn’t working as well as they hoped. But they do have a fairly large, engaged audience. Advertising might be a better way forward for them.
“Can I just cancel the paid offering and switch businesses models?” they asked me.
You can, I said, because if you’re going to make this work, it first needs to work for you.
What’s the best route forward? Figure out what’s best for you , and work from there.
