Patrick Schober shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Patrick, we’re thrilled to have you with us today. Before we jump into your intro and the heart of the interview, let’s start with a bit of an ice breaker: What is a normal day like for you right now?
I do best on a schedule. A normal day starts at 4:00 AM. I make coffee, grab a snack, then head up to the office. In that first quiet hour of the morning, I can focus on tough work completely uninterrupted, and I like to set my schedule for the day.
I slip outside at 5:00 for a run. By the time I get back, my son’s waking up, so we sit on the couch and watch a couple of cartoons until we play with some toys. Lately, he’s really been into painting and Lego.
At 7:00, we get my wife up, and I’ll shower and get up to the office for a little while. At 8:15, I run my son to daycare. When I get back, I’m 100% in work mode.
A typical day usually includes a blend of content creation, client meetings, team strategy, and emails. Always emails.
Around 4:00, I do a final check to see if I have any outstanding messages or tasks to tackle. Then I’ll pick up my son from daycare again. Depending on the day, we might stop by a local library to check out a few Spider-Man books and visit the nearby park—or maybe we’ll go to the mall to run around with the kids in the play area before grabbing some mac and cheese at the food court.
The rest of the day is usually spent as a family. Our son goes to bed around 8:00, and I try to be in bed soon after!
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m the founder of Poetica Marketing, a branding, marketing, and events agency in Pittsburgh. We’re a three-person shop with deep experience in Health & Wellness, Live Entertainment, Real Estate, and Nonprofits.
I think what makes us unique is our insistence on living our core values:
1. Growth & Results: Our services are confusing and overwhelming if you’re not a professional, and we’ve had many clients who come to us because they’ve been burned or lied to by past agencies.
Our client goals are our goals, so everything we do comes back to the bottom line. If we’re not performing on your behalf, we’re not doing our jobs.
2. Honesty & Integrity: We believe in giving our best to our clients—no matter what. That starts with being 100% honest during the sales process. Sometimes we’re an excellent fit. Sometimes we’re not. Regardless, we’ll be the first to tell you.
3. Community: We have a unique skillset, and it’s often priced out of reach for deserving organizations. We regularly aim to donate 10 hours/month of our talent and expertise to nonprofits we believe in.
4. Family: As business owners and parents, we believe the only thing bigger than business is the people you love. And we also acknowledge that’s true for our clients as well; the decisions we make through our campaigns have a direct impact on the paychecks for our clients’ employees and their families. With that in mind, our focus on Growth & Results becomes even more important!
Thanks for sharing that. Would love to go back in time and hear about how your past might have impacted who you are today. What was your earliest memory of feeling powerful?
When I was in 8th grade, my class took a field trip to a local ropes course. My small class of ~20 kids frequently asked for my perspective in tricky scenarios or for me to stand in precarious spots where an extra individual was required for safety.
I didn’t think too much of it at the time; I’d known many of these kids for the last nine years, and I was simply filling a role I’d filled countless items before.
A few days later, I received a letter from the school guidance counselor, who’d served as a chaperone on the trip.
In it, she’d praised my work at the ropes course, and acknowledged how rare it was for someone to be a unanimous source of trust, reliability, and insight. “It’s interesting how leadership works,” she wrote, “in your own quiet way, without doing anything to seek it out.”
That letter meant the world to me. Inside, I was a gangly, awkward teenager terrified of going to high school in a few months and even more scared of the world beyond that. But that letter was the first hint that I might have something to offer the world.
What did suffering teach you that success never could?
I love this question because it fits perfectly with a small revelation I had recently.
For context, running a small business is hard. Outside of becoming a parent, it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done.
In business, some days suck. I don’t think there’s much you can do to prevent that; you’re always going to run into issues with clients, money, or employees.
After a recent hard day, I realized something:
I’ve had plenty of tough days, but I’ve always picked myself up and pushed forward (regardless of how much time I spent wallowing).
I think resilience is a core ingredient in the foundation of “success.”
There are plenty of people who are more talented than me who have gone out of business. There are plenty of people who are smarter than me who have gone out of business.
But I don’t think there are a ton of people who are more driven than me who have gone out of business.
Bottom line: Success isn’t about a lack of suffering. Success is about pushing through the suffering and realizing it’s only a blip on the radar.
I think our readers would appreciate hearing more about your values and what you think matters in life and career, etc. So our next question is along those lines. Is the public version of you the real you?
I believe so. My truest self, I believe, is a results-oriented individual who tries to maintain a light-hearted approach with a sense of humor.
Of course, that wasn’t always the case. When I first started Poetica, I was young, unsure, and relatively inexperienced.
Because of that, I felt driven to present myself as slightly more polished and more serious than I really was.
Today, though, I’m much more comfortable being myself in front of my team, a client, or an audience.
I’m comfortable flipping back and forth from serious strategy to silly banter, and the clients we attract seem to appreciate getting the best of both worlds.
Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. How do you know when you’re out of your depth?
I’ve always loved having smarter people around me. Even in high school, I pushed myself into tougher classes where I knew the smartest kids would be; I thrive when everyone else around me is a little more advanced.
I’ve found myself building a similar network in the professional world; I’ve built a strong network of industry connections I can call on for advice.
That bullpen sometimes makes me bolder than I probably deserve to be.
I can’t do everything in marketing, but there’s not much I don’t think I can take on with my network.
I know I’m out of my depth when I can’t move the needle anymore—even with the help of our friends.
A perfect example: I whiffed it on an account recently.
We’d worked so long on the sale, I wound up focusing more on actually getting the account than I did focusing on whether they were actually a good fit… They needed someone with a different skillset than ours, but I blocked that out.
I wanted the sale. And I got it.
A couple months in, I realized my mistake. I couldn’t please the client, and I couldn’t get the right results in their social media.
It sucked. I hadn’t made that mistake in years.
It was a humbling moment, but it was a good reminder to stick to our core values.
If I hadn’t set our values aside just to get the sale, none of that would have happened.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.poeticamarketing.com/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-schober-pgh/
Image Credits
Tyler Newpol
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