When it works, it works. Such is the ethos of bigwigs in NYC and beyond who swear by a variety of oddball tricks to give them a leg up in their careers. These execs share the bizarre strategies that they say give them a competitive advantage.
Get upside down
Dr. Shaun Nanavati, chief science officer and co-founder of the anxiety-management app AQ, is a big fan of inversion.
“I do headstands when I’m feeling anxious and on a regular basis when I’m feeling a little foggy, just to get more blood to my brain,” he said. “I start each day by doing a headstand for a couple of minutes.”
For the Nyack, NY-based neuroscientist, who works for AQ’s Manhattan-headquartered parent company, Mindwell Labs, he finds doing headstands “a great health tonic” to relax and naturally reduce anxiety.
“I’ve even done scientific studies and co-authored a research paper on the anxiety-reducing benefits of headstands. Our studies show that headstands increase the tone of the vagus nerve — the longest nerve in the body — and so stabilize the activity of both the heart and lungs,” he added.
Nanavati certainly practices what he preaches. “I’m also the world’s only startup founder who gives media interviews — and anxiety tips — while standing on my head,” he told The Post. In fact, AQ and Nanavati just released a set of short educational videos on various aspects of anxiety management, all recorded while he was doing a headstand.
Obviously, this isn’t for everyone (and if you haven’t done them before, you shouldn’t attempt this without having an instructor guide you through it safely), so you might want to try similar stress-busters like earlobe massage or yoga poses such as downward-facing dog or legs-up-the-wall.
Talk to your plants
Jaime Maser Berman, founder of Maser Communications in Westfield, NJ, has implemented this odd MO since 2014, when she started her own communications consulting company.
“At the time, my husband and I were living in a one-bedroom apartment in Soho, with my ‘office’ being a desk crammed into a corner of our living room,” she said, adding that she had spent the previous 14 years working at p.r. agencies and cosmetics companies and was used to bustling work environments with constant chatter. “That was clearly not the case anymore once I went out on my own. So I started talking to my plant — a tiny little succulent, named Mott, after our address in Soho — which a friend had purchased for me during a weekend trip to Mohonk Mountain House when I needed to vent or talk something out.”
She’s well aware that it sounds ridiculous, “but you do what you have to as a solopreneur.”
For her, talking out loud to her plant helped her better form her thoughts and hone her pitches. Fast-forward nearly nine years later, with a move to Jersey City and then to her current house in between, and her succulent co-worker has grown so much, it’s been repotted three times. “I like to think our ‘conversations’ have something to do with that,” Berman said.
Incidentally, talking and listening to plants is also advocated by King Charles III, but we couldn’t get the royal to comment.
Make a fake email
When Elli Frank first started her experiential talent and model staffing agency, Eye5, in 2002, she was on a shoestring budget, bartering office space in exchange for nannying.
Struggling to collect past-due invoices in her firm’s nascent days, Frank got creative. “My emails requesting payment were largely ignored, as people tended to respond to emails coming from men at a faster rate than those coming from women,” Frank recalled. “I couldn’t afford to hire an accountant back then, so I did the next best thing; I created an alter ego, an older gentleman who was Eye5’s accountant. ‘Allen’ had his own email address and began requesting clients pay deposits, settle invoices faster and when he had to demand payment with a final request, he left handwritten notes in a fruit basket signed formally as ‘Allen,’ ” continued the Flatiron-based business owner.
Almost instantly, the overdue invoice issue was resolved. “On one occasion,” Frank said, “friendly flirtation ensued between ‘Allen’ and one of my older clients. In fact, he was so well-received, ‘Allen’ received emails asking if he was taking on any additional clients for bookkeeping services.”
While Frank has since retired Allen in favor of a credentialed accountant, he still comes up from time to time with longer-term clients in the know. “We share some laughs about him, along with eye rolls that people still tend to respond to emails sent from a man faster than they do a woman,” said Frank. “But hey, at least the joke was on them.”
Mix up your workplace
Felipe Vasconcelos, CEO and founder of Koda Brands, a remote-first company that owns multiple beauty brands, is an advocate for working from a different location every day for the first part of his day.
“Sometimes I’ll work from different coffee shops, libraries, parks and more. It helps me break the monotony and look at my work with a fresh perspective every single day,” the Riverdale, NY, resident said. “Plus, it’s a great way to explore different neighborhoods in the city. It’s helped me increase my productivity and creativity, and it’s a great conversation starter with clients and colleagues.”
Oh, and for part two of the workday, Vasconcelos still stays on his toes — in his home office-gym. “Not only do I have enough room for my desk and three computer monitors, but I also have a fully equipped home gym to break a sweat during lunch breaks and video calls,” he said.
Take ‘do not disturb’ to new levels
And you thought putting on headphones was effective. Sejal Lakhani-Bhatt, CEO of TechWerxe, an IT company based out of Livingston, NJ, puts orange construction cones outside the doors of her office to let people know when she shouldn’t be bothered.
“In the world we live in, we are dealt with constant distractions and are continuously multitasking, [so] the orange cones allow me to prioritize significant tasks without interruption,” she said of this productivity-boosting hack.
Good idea — our proverbial cones are going up right about now.