He was starting to really annoy me.

I was a new design director, running my first set of accounts and projects with my brand new team.

The executive producer at the agency I worked at was out for parental leave, and we had a contract executive producer filling in for the next few months.

I was leading a pretty big account, and this new guy started coming to my meetings all of a sudden. Any time I’d make a suggestion, he’d suggest the opposite. Any time I proposed a solution, he’d chime in that we’d solve it a different way.

After a few weeks of this, I was starting to get annoyed, but I didn’t know what to do about it.

So I asked him to have lunch with me one day.

He apathetically agreed. I suggested a lunch place a few blocks away, and he said he’d meet me there after his meeting ended.

I got a table and looked over the menu while waiting for him. A few minutes later, he walked in, and the server came over to take our order, starting with me.

“I’ll have a burger.”

”Great. And for you, sir?”

“Just fries.”

“That’s it?” I asked.

“This won’t be a long lunch,” he snubbed.

Ouch.

I took a deep breath, then got straight to the point.

“Have I done something to offend you?“ I started.

“Whaddya mean?”

“Maybe it’s just me, but I feel like everything I say to our client, you seem to second-guess or have a different opinion about.”

“I’ve worked with plenty of designers like you,” he fired back. “You promise the world to clients but then leave the developers and everyone else on the team holding the bag, and the project suffers for it. It always blows the budget and timeline for some creative whim.”

“I get that,” I stated calmly, ”but that’s not me. You haven’t worked with me before. Would you give me a chance to show you that?”

He contemplated.

We ended up spending 2 more hours at that lunch, getting to know each other and clumsily figuring out how to collaborate successfully.

He kept ordering fries, ultimately going through four plates.

Over the next few months, we became close collaborators, figuring out how to take advantage of each other’s strengths. After both eventually leaving that agency, he’s hired me twice at startups he founded and exited. Years later, in an introduction email, he called me the best designer he’s ever worked with.

Sometimes, it takes just fries.

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