Meet Lene Baxter | Free Heart & Product Marketer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Lene Baxter and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Lene, how has your perspective on work-life balance evolved over time?
I think that I was very unbalanced as a kid. My grandparents raised me, and my childhood was hyper focused on academics and athletics. In high school, all I wanted was to get into West Point and I remember giving up a lot towards that goal. I was always doing something – studying, volunteering, JROTC, playing hockey. I never went to parties, concerts, nothing you might expect, but I was ok with that. Then it was West Point, the Army, then a transition out of the Army and I got recruited for working in logistics. It was a good fit for who I was, but my life revolved around work. They were insane hours, and it didn’t take me long to realize that this wasn’t how I wanted to live my life. That experience started me down a path that led me to where I am and a lot of it focused on this concept of balance. I think I’m naturally prone to being tunnel visioned and chasing down a goal. I’ll get obsessed, I’ll put all of my time into it, but that isn’t great for other things. Moving abroad has probably helped to change my attitudes. I have lived in China, Aruba, Chile, Spain, and Romania and all of those places helped me shake off the hustle culture (even though I currently work for a U.S. company). The pandemic of course changed the balance even more. As opposed to my kiteboarding school, opening a marketing agency with a friend of mine really opened my eyes more to not just the benefits of remote work, but doing that while working for yourself. Even though I now work for a company, I still put my family and my mental and physical health first. You really only have one life, it’s short, and it shouldn’t be about how many hours you can work.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I definitely took an unconventional path to get to where I am. It has involved career moves and physical moves, and they often work together there.

After commissioning as an officer in the Army after West Point, I stayed on in a research role because of a serious injury that prevented me from deploying (this was still during the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). I was helping with a study looking at civilian attitudes towards women in combat and the “Don’t ask, don’t tell policy”. While I enjoyed the work and I found it challenging, I knew research (stuck inside in a windowless room for hours on end) was not what I wanted to do.

After a medical retirement from the Army from that injury, I was recruited into logistics. This moved me from NY down to Ocala, Florida. I enjoyed the challenge of it and really excelled. It was a good fit for me – I was detail oriented, I knew how to lead people, and I was hungry to prove myself. I wasn’t so keen on working 12-15 hour days though and every time I instituted something to reduce hours for management, I got another project that increased the hours. It felt like an uphill battle. So, at the end of my initial contract, I left.

I had always wanted to move abroad. My best friend and I used to talk about traveling the world or moving to some beautiful beach somewhere and just renting jet skis on the beach. A friend of mine from high school had moved to South Korea for a time and he told me that the visas to live abroad for English teachers were easy to get. So, that’s what I did. A few months before leaving my logistics job, I took a course for my TEFL certificate, accepted a job offer, and moved to China. It was a huge culture shock – this was back before we had phones that would translate everything for you. I remember waking up in my apartment the first morning, totally destroyed from a 3 day journey that had included lost baggage and a missed flight, and I cried. I couldn’t believe what I had done, but it turned out to be the best decision. I learned so much during that time in China.

So, when I moved back from China, I accepted another offer in logistics in Savannah, Georgia. It was with a great company and I thought maybe I would give it another shot. I lasted less than 3 months. I hated it. Some friends of mine had a kiteboarding school and I knew they were looking for someone to teach lessons and work with them. I knew how to kiteboard, but I wasn’t good yet.. at all. I asked them what they thought and they were really excited about it. I remember just saying that as long as I didn’t end up homeless as a result, I was ready to go. This changed my entire life. I started working for them and I had my hand in everything. I was teaching kiteboarding, running the paddleboard side of the business (lessons, tours, races), marketing, sales in the shop, and even got involved with the board distribution for a European board brand. I was spending every day on the beach. I worked every single day unless there was a storm and I didn’t care. I loved it. If I wasn’t working, I was on the beach anyways kiteboarding or paddleboarding, or hitting up the YMCA on the island.

The kiteboarding journey would take me to Key Biscayne in Miami to manage Miami Kiteboarding, Aruba to work for a big kiteboarding and windsurfing center, and eventually to Chile where I opened up a successful kiteboarding school.

My school in Chile was my first business and it was tough. The conditions in Chile were cold and the windy season was incredibly windy and challenging. I was the only girl on the beach teaching. I spent that whole first season camping on the beach so I wouldn’t have to drive back home 3 hours to the capital city. There was no warm water for the shower, every night I had to sweep buckets of sand out of my tent, but it was great. The family who owned the kiteboarding spot befriended me and often invited me to the house for breakfast. I would go to a “mom and pop” restaurant in the town for dinner where my options were whatever the fishermen caught that day and fresh vegetables. I took what I had learned about marketing and branding from my previous experiences and I ran with it. Every windy day, I was slammed with work. I was really doing well, but the season in Chile ended in the winter. I knew I needed something to supplement the winter and the non-windy days. I apprenticed at a CrossFit gym for a few months and then took my certification. I really threw myself into it. I started my own business with just a few clients, but it really grew. I gained a reputation for being knowledgeable and professional. Early on, I got the contract to work with Reebok and Adidas Chile providing them with their corporate fitness classes. With two businesses, I was working basically every day, but I loved it.

At some point though, I knew I wanted to move on from Chile and wanted a more steady income that didn’t tie me to a place. The friend who had owned the kiteboarding school in Savannah was working for an e-commerce company and they needed someone on their marketing team. I had been up for a job as Director of Activities and Sports at an international school in Chile and this remote role on a marketing team. I got offered both jobs at the same time. I remember it being a real decision point. The job at the school was a dream job in many ways, combining so many of my strengths with my love for athletics, but it would have meant staying in a place that I felt I needed to move on from. So, I took the other job. I stayed in Chile for about 6 months while I worked on my visa paperwork and moved to southern Spain.

During the pandemic, our company was acquired by another company. They fired everyone except for me and my friend. It was awful and we decided it was time to work for ourselves again. We both left the company and started a marketing agency. We worked with companies that ranged from a children’s book author to a kiteboarding company, a 3PL logistics, tech, to sustainable packaging. It was really challenging working with so many different companies, but I learned a lot in the experience. You know, when you work for a startup, you end up doing everything and wearing a lot of different hats.

I’ve since moved on and work for a tech startup doing product marketing and project management. It has its own challenges because it’s at such an early stage, but everyone I work with is so talented. It’s probably the most talented team I have ever worked with.

The journey to get to where I am was not an easy one. There were so many decision points that could have led me on a completely different path. Every time that I had something in front of me, I took the path that I thought would make me the happiest, not the one that would lead to the most money or the most prestige or a better position, but the happiest.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I’m a fan of wandering, so I would do a lot of that, but some of the highlights are definitely..

I really love Key Biscayne. That area is so beautiful. I would definitely take them to see the lighthouse and to just walk around and appreciate the beauty of the island. I couldn’t miss a visit to Crandon Park for some watersports – paddleboarding if it’s a calm day or kiteboarding if it’s windy.

I lived in South Beach for a while and I think it’s always worth walking around. Sawgrass Mills for sure for some shopping.

You can’t go to Miami without getting cuban food – my favorite is a colada with a guava and cheese pastry (you know, for the ultimate sugar rush).

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
My grandparents deserve a huge shoutout. They raised me, dedicating their retirement to giving me every opportunity they possibly could. They took the world, showed it to me, and pushed me to be free. My grandfather died when I was a junior at West Point, but my grandmother died a few years later. I remember her telling me that I should follow my dream to live abroad and go. So, I did. I moved to China and it felt like a big step into a big world, and it changed everything.

Instagram: @lenebaxter

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lene-baxter-764ba9b/

Image Credits
Monica&Oscar Studio for several (though not all) of the images.