Say more

about that.

I help creative professionals
do their best work.

I’m an advisor and consultant helping clients realize their creative ambitions to the fullest. I work with people from myriad disciplines to tackle complicated issues and develop projects of all shapes and sizes. 

ABOUT ME

SOME OF WHAT I DO

Wondering about something you don’t see?
Ping me.

  • What are the fundamental truths that drive your work? Whether it’s at the personal, project, or company level, we’ll start by building an understanding and articulation of what you’re trying to achieve. Then we’ll illuminate what’s crucial about how and why you do what you do. We’ll put it all together into a set of tools to help guide you through your process, evaluate new opportunities, and make decisions.

  • You’ve got a killer concept: what comes next? We can start with figuring out the right medium and brainstorming potential collaborators, or dive into project structure and budgeting. I’ll help you lay out a plan that you can use to pursue your project independently or bring to collaborators to start a conversation.

  • On the journey from idea to manuscript there are many paths up the mountain. We can refine your concept to prepare for conversations with agents or publishers, or work through drafts of your book proposal. If you’ve sold your book and are feeling overwhelmed about the road ahead, you’re not alone. Let’s find the right path for you to get to your first draft, and turn the trek from forbodeing and unmanageable to ambitious but doable.

  • Are you trying to figure out how to translate your flavor of magic into a fifteen (or fourty-five or ninety) minute talk for a speaking engagement? Or maybe you’re thinking about developing a live stage version of your podcast? Perhaps you’re having initial conversations about a production partnership and you want feel more prepared. Whether it’s the germ of an idea you’re trying to bring to life, a script that’s stuck, a production concept that needs finesse or a talk you’ve given that needs refreshing, I can help.

  • I work with clients to help them navigate their day-to-day, thinking through priorities and preparing for important conversations. If you need a sounding board to make your work stronger or a strategic mind to bring your eyes above the tree line, we can find the right cadence of regular sessions to give you the support you need.

Lobby of an art-deco theater.

I’ve spent my career helping creative people forge successful paths to ground-breaking work.

MY STORY

Taken during the 2013 Radiolab Live Apocalyptical tour.

From podcasting and audio narrative to documentary film, from digital media to theater and live events, from non-fiction writing to illustration, I build trusted partnerships with my clients to overcome even the most complex obstacles. My 15+ years working at the intersection of creativity and business have given me a deep and rich foundation in thinking across the lines of topic, perspective, and discipline. Since 2018, I’ve been using that foundation to cultivate a practice uniquely suited to helping people who don’t fit neatly into one category or another - which is most people who create things for a living. My fundamental belief: No one can advocate for you like you can, and no one will do it in the same way you will. Find more on that below.

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I’ve worked in theater, film, radio, podcasting, consulting, digital media, and more. I’ve even taken a podcast on an international live tour. I hold a BA from Vassar College and an MFA in Management and Producing for Theatre from the Columbia University School of the Arts.

  • "Malissa works with me on many different levels. There’s the fundamental, always-present “How do you plan a creative life so that it makes sense?” question, and she helps me figure out the right structure, organization, and strategy to make the hours in my day add up to a business. But there’s the spookier part, where Malissa acts as creative midwife, pulling ideas out of my head and into the light. She’s an engine of clarity: I can spout some straight up nonsense, but buried in the nonsense is an idea that I’m struggling to put words to, and somehow she can hear the signal in the noise and say it back to me, and I go “Yes! That’s what I was thinking that I didn’t know how to say!”

    Jad Abumrad
    Creator of Radiolab, More Perfect, and Dolly Parton’s America
    MacArthur Fellow

  • “As part of the writing process, books get big and messy and unwieldy. Then, once you’ve figured out what the book needs to be, you have to wrangle it back down to a manageable size and shape so people can actually read it when it’s done. It’s so easy to feel buried when you’re in that alone, which is why I feel lucky to have Malissa in my current project: she can ride the explosion of ideas and materials while helping with the wrangling so it doesn’t become unmanageable. She has an invaluable ability to hold big complicated ideas and have helpful sprawling conversations about them, while also applying her unique experience from her career to help keep things organized and functional.”

    Rebecca Skloot
    New York Times bestselling author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

  • "When I’m working on a long-term project, it’s easy to lose track of the simple, clear, true idea that launched the ship. I know I’m not the only artist who feels this way: we go full steam and then get lost in our own mud. But Malissa is like a compass. Or, rather, she reminds us how to use our own. She has many superpowers, but her biggest is asking the right questions. Time and time again Malissa’s thoughtful, incisive questions have brought me back to the heart of the matter. Helped me realize when I’m over (or under) thinking. Helped me work from a place of strength and simplicity. There aren’t many people who can do that."

    Wendy MacNaughton
    New York Times bestselling artist and graphic journalist

  • "Our work with Malissa has led directly to doubling the size of our business - she is so thoughtful, so engaged and gets right to the heart of our questions. We can see clear paths forward and make actionable plans - and reflect on what we are learning as we go. Malissa is always ready to remind us of how much we have accomplished and how much we have grown as a business and as leaders. We often joke that Malissa is our business therapist - she understands both our strategic goals and the heart and mission of The Mash-Up Americans."

    The Mash-Up Americans
    Media Company & Creative Studio
    Rebecca Lehrer & Amy S. Choi

500

Lions

Philosophy

A long time ago, I ran across an idea that resonated with me so powerfully that I couldn’t let it go—literally. It was, of all things, a fortune from a fortune cookie, which I carried around on my person for many years and still have to this day. It says:

You will be a lion
in your own cause.

These seemed like words to live by: But the more time I’ve spent with them, the more I’ve realized they’re something much bigger—a provocation, a message of hope, a premonition, and a meditation all in one. They’re both a comfort when things are hard, and a fire starter in the dark. They are a truth.

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A number of years after I began consulting, I decided to share this idea with a client navigating a tough moment. It captured their imagination the same way it captured mine; a few weeks later they said, “I’ve been thinking a lot about being a lion in my own cause, and I’m trying to decide what kind of lion I want to be.” And that’s when I made an important connection.

“Did you know,” I replied, “there are over five hundred words for lion in Arabic?”

I’d been told this by my now husband, a native Arabic speaker and lover of languages, in the earliest days of our relationship. Since then, I’d embarked on my own study of Arabic (a slow process that promises to be life-long), but I hadn’t thought to dig deeper into that concept.

When I went looking for more information, I found a 10th century text by Persian poet and lexicographer Al-Husayn Ibn Ahmad Ibn Khalawayh. His “Names of the Lion” is one chapter of much larger work, and while it reads as “little more than a word list”, it actually feels like much more: the “proliferation of names for the lion is in any case symptomatic of the animal’s sway over all who encounter it. This richness in conceptual associations speaks to a wide array of human experience…”

This idea turned a simple fortune into something prismatic and three-dimensional: a framework for how to approach the work.

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My 500 Lions Philosophy is this: We are all different humans making our way through the world. Each step of that journey is an opportunity to find out who we are and what we’re capable of. No one can advocate for you like you can, and no one will do it in the same way you will. Not only is that an opportunity and a strength, it’s also a responsibility and a gift.

You will be a lion
in your own cause.

The question is: what kind?

Let’s get into it

During our free 30-minute intro conversation, we’ll discuss what you’re trying to navigate and get into more specifics about how I might be able to help.