Short questions for Dana Perino on her new book

Dana Perino answers questions on her new book, "I Wish Someone Had Told Me…The Best Advice for Building a Great Career and a Meaningful Life."

Why did you write the book?

When my mom finished reading "Everything Will Be Okay, — Life Lessons for Young Women from a Former Young Woman," she called me and said, "Wow, I wish someone had told me all of this." She started working in the mid-1960s, when women were really coming into the workforce in droves. They paved the way for so many of us, and now we have lots of different avenues we can take in our careers. (Thank you, ladies! We appreciate all you did for us.)

I’ve found that since I left the White House and started mentoring younger people that the questions don’t change that much — but the hunger for more advice and guidance continues to grow. So I decided to refresh my advice in a post-COVID and pre-AI world, and to gather the best advice from the most wonderful group of advisors and mentors I could put together in one book. 

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How is this book different from your previous mentoring books?

"I Wish Someone Had Told Me"  is an updated version of the advice that I’ve gathered based on experience, and includes interviews with over forty of my friends, loved ones, and colleagues —  including my husband, Peter McMahon, my college roommate, Andrea Aragon, and country music star Dierks Bentley, as well as many of my Fox News colleagues. They were very generous with their time, and their suggestions are terrific. There’s so much wisdom in their answers to my questions — it opened my eyes to the hard-earned success of the people around me every day. The chapters span the questions of how to decide what you want to do in your career, tried and true ways to get the promotions you want, managing the elusive work-life balance, and focusing on what really matters in your life before you retire, or IF you retire, as my friend Stuart Varney talks about in that chapter.

Who is this book for — when you think about your reader, who do you imagine?

Whereas my last book was targeted at young women, this book has a much larger audience and isn’t specifically targeted at women. I included advice from a wide variety of people so that I could get as many perspectives as possible into the book. I think I’ll be a better mentor now that I have put into a one-stop shop so much rich new advice. 

Here’s who I think would benefit from reading "I Wish Someone Had Told Me":

— ambitious young people trying to figure out what they want to do and what industry they want to go into

— young career enthusiasts going for their first promotion and trying to climb to the next rung on the ladder

— solidifying your position in the workforce and achieving that next level of success in management, as an entrepreneur, or on the executive track

— new parents who are trying to figure out how to handle the responsibilities of work and family

— anyone feeling burned out and wondering about switching careers

— managers looking for fresh ways to give guidance to their employees — to help train, encourage, and recruit talent. 

— those searching for a bigger meaning in their life beyond their career 

Was there advice you gathered in your interviews that helped you think about things in a different way?

I learned so much. Such as how to better handle disappointment and rejection; how to stay curious and be a person that continues to grow, and how to laugh at circumstances instead of getting bogged down by them.

In particular, for example, I loved how Martha MacCallum said that when she was working in television and raising her three young children that she didn’t let herself think more than three months ahead. That’s excellent, practical advice that works for anyone — even those without children (but with a Percy!).

I think I’ll be a better mentor now that I have put into a one-stop shop so much rich new advice that I can use to inform my thinking. 

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What is the best advice you ever received? 

That choosing to be loved is not a career-limiting decision. Back in 1997, when I met Peter on an airplane (it happens, I swear!), I was quite worried about what would happen to my career track if I moved to England to marry him — a guy eighteen years my senior who’d been divorced twice before, and someone I’d known for only a few moths. I was way too preoccupied with what others would think of me, how they’d judge me, if I chose to go for it. A family friend pulled me aside that Christmas and asked me what was going on with Peter and me. I explained my hesitation. And she said, "Don’t give up on this chance to be loved. It may be your only shot." And boy was she right. And making that decision turned out to be the very best one of my life. Twenty-eight years later we are still together, and we pinch ourselves every day that we came so close to not meeting that day. I almost missed that flight, and Peter nearly took an earlier one. That we were assigned seats next to each other was a gift from God that we can never repay. The best we can do is pass on this advice to everyone — choosing to be loved helped make my career possible. Without him, I wouldn’t have accomplished what I have so far — and nothing I’d have done would have mattered at all if I didn’t have him to share it with me.

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What do you wish someone had told you?

I wish someone had told me that I didn’t have to worry my twenties away — that, as an educated American woman, I had already won life’s great lottery. Worry was a waste of time and my greatest hope is that readers will take away some practical tips that they can apply to their lives to ensure that they’re getting the most out of their time on earth. It goes so fast — and I’d buy anyone’s minutes if I could. Since that’s impossible, I’m just determined to make the most of the time I have here with all of you.