Meeting Corinne Milien
The moment you meet Corinne Milien, you know you have met someone special. Corinne is someone who cares deeply about every human (and animal), has lived an amazing life story (with so many more adventures to come), and has an infectious smile and laugh that lights up a room. Very quickly you know you want to be in her corner.
Corinne and I started working together in the fall of 2021. She had recently shelved a start-up idea (that was, IMO, a high-impact business that needed to happen) and I was looking to do work with my first client through BREAKTHRU Brands. I knew right away that there was a match. After a night of Thai food and beer, Corinne was on the way to becoming a BREAKTHRU client. A few weeks later, we got to WRK (see below for the definition of Corinne’s new verb).
Building Corinne’s BREAKTHRU Brand
What Corinne needed most was encouragement and real, tactical start-up support in order to make the big leap to founder and CEO of her own company, WRK (letsdowrk.com). She hadn’t led as a founder/CEO before and felt some trepidation about how to get started. In my career, I have had many attempts/successes/failures at start-ups, so developing a roadmap to launch was something I had a lot of experience doing. And, those who know me know that I am always ready to share my love of jumping off business cliffs (I am scared of real cliffs though) and my passion for women being in charge.
Our team at BREAKTHRU jumped in and started to build WRK alongside Corinne. The purpose of her business was clear from the start: to close the significant gaps in equity for BIPOC talent across all organization levels and roles in the sports, media, and entertainment industries. Corinne set her heart and her mind on change.
Bringing Corinne’s vision to life
Corinne had been doing the work at a smaller scale for years–supporting BIPOC-focused internship, mentorship, and leadership programs across the industry. She also had deep connections on both sides of the marketplace (BIPOC talent and hiring managers) and knew what was missing. As we dug deeper, we all agreed it was time for her to take that energy and scale her methodology into the broader marketplace to have the most impact.
Looking back at this experience, I am most proud of these areas where we were able to apply our expertise and capabilities as an agency to help Corinne:
Stress-testing business model/pricing scenarios
Building the brand visual identity and brand assets, including pitch materials for the marketplace
Designing a kick-ass website
Giving her encouragement and confidence along the way
We can’t wait to see WRK thrive!
Please support Corinne and WRK by following her and WRK on LinkedIn, hiring her to support your organization’s BIPOC HR efforts at letsdowrk.com, or offering to financially support her initiative to get 10K professional headshots done for BIPOC candidates.
LFG Corinne!!!
Ready to build your own BREAKTHRU Brand?
Lindsay Gaskins, BREAKTHRU Brands’ CEO, is an experienced CEO and entrepreneur. Having led the growth of start-ups and established brands across retail, e-commerce, and technology, Lindsay has a passion for growth, innovation and progress. Learn more about Lindsay >
