I want to do meaningful work.

I started my career as the first marketing hire at an early-stage startup. Looking back, I don't think I appreciated just how unusual that experience was. There was no playbook, no marketing team, and very little hand-holding. Most days, I was figuring things out as I went, making mistakes, questioning myself, learning quickly, and trying again.

It wasn't always comfortable, but it taught me something that has stayed with me ever since: the work is almost always better when you're willing to apply yourself fully.

So it's not surprising that one of the best feedback I've received in my career is from the founder who said:

“Onyinye, you always fully apply yourself in everything.”

I've not forgotten those words because they capture the kind of person I'm trying to be daily. Sure, it's easy to look busy, it's easy to do just enough to get by. But it's much harder to genuinely care about the craft, to ask one more question, look a little deeper, and keep refining something until it works. Whether I'm interviewing customers, writing, building an AI workflow, or preparing for a product launch, I want to know I gave it my absolute best.

I believe that work should matter and that marketing should be accountable for revenue. But I don't think that starts with clever campaigns or persuasive copy. It starts with understanding people.

The more I've worked, the more convinced I've become that the best marketing happens when you build something people genuinely want and communicate its value in a way that mirrors their words, struggles, and motivations. You can't do this if you don't invest time and resources to understand those you're selling to. That's why I enjoy customer conversations so much. I'm endlessly curious about how people think, how they make decisions, and what closes the sale.

Years ago, someone asked me where I saw myself in five years. I remember telling them that I didn't know where I'd be or even what I'd be doing. The only thing I knew for certain was that I wanted to do meaningful work; work that solved interesting problems and made a difference.

Years later, that answer hasn't changed. I still want to do work that feels a little bigger than I think I can handle; work that makes my heart beat with a little trepidation but excites me anyway because I know it will stretch me in ways I can't yet imagine, and I'll come out the other side a different person.

And I want to do this work with kind and dedicated people. People that are curious, care about the craft, ask questions, challenge assumptions, and are never quite satisfied with what worked in the past. They want to get a little better every day, not for any performative reason, but because they genuinely care about doing great work.

One contradiction about me. I am an introvert who loves organizing events… I've organized a sold-out lunch for female marketers in my city, hosted a paid meetup for marketers in my city and other virtual events. For a long time, I couldn't explain the contradiction. Eventually, I realised it isn't the events themselves that I enjoy. It's watching people leave with a new idea, a new friend, or something that makes their own journey a little easier than mine was.