Patrice Tanaka - Becoming Ginger Rogers: How Ballroom Dancing Made Me a Happier Woman, Better Partner, and Smarter CEO

PRAISE FOR

This is such a great analogy... how performing fearlessly in the ballroom world can impact ones courage and perspective in the business world. Patrice Tanakas inspiring memoir about the lessons she learned on the dance floor and how she applied them to her life and career is a joy to read.

NINA DI SESA , chairman and chief creative officer, McCann New York and author of Seducing the Boys Club

PR executive Patrice Tanaka writes in graceful, lively prose of her transformation from the depressed, repressed perfectionist known at work as the Ayatollah Tanaka to a ballroom dancing champion she thinks of as SambaGrl. Tanakas toe-tapping tale of how she awakens to the rhythms of her body and learns to dance through her mistakesat work as well as in the ballroomshines with inspiration. It may even send you off to buy a sequined dress and some Ginger Rogers shoes of your own.

ALICE SCHROEDER , best-selling author, The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life

Becoming Ginger Rogers... is about performing full-out and fearlessly in the ballroom world and adopting that approach to great success in the business world. As her client of more than a decade, I can vouch for that being the case. Patrice has written a joyful and inspiring memoir about the lessons learned from competitive ballroom dancing that have helped her to a richly rewarding business and personal life.

CARRIE SCHWAB-POMERANTZ , president, Charles Schwab Foundation

If youre a Dancing with the Stars fan, youll love this book about ballroom dancing and how it transformed Patrice Tanakas life and made her a happier woman and more successful CEO.

EDYTA SLIWINSKA , ballroom champion, Dancing with the Stars, seasons 1-10

Within the public relations community Patrice Tanaka is acclaimed for her firms outrageously creative marketing campaigns. Not satisfied that she was living life to the fullest, she started lessons in ballroom dancing. In her compelling Becoming Ginger Rogers: How Ballroom Dancing Made Me a Happier Woman, Better Partner, and Smarter CEO she reports how she reached stardom in her newfound hobby while morphing her into a more effective manager and boss. Once I started reading, I couldnt stop!

HAROLD BURSON , founder chairman, Burson-Marsteller

Patrice and I have lots in common: both of us started public relations agencies, and both of us became competitive ballroom dancers. Thats why this frank and insightful autobiography touches me. Its more than a thoughtful account of these endeavors: through her courage and sense of purpose she makes us see what love and determination can achieve.

MADELINE DE VRIES HOOPER , founder, DeVries PR

If youve ever thought about learning to ballroom dance, this inspiring book by Patrice Tanaka will convince you to run not walk to your nearest dance studio.

JOHN KIMMINS , president, Arthur Murray Dance Studios

Copyright 2011 by Patrice Tanaka

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

BenBella Books, Inc.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available for

this title.

ISBN 978-1-936661-20-6

Editing by Debbie Harmsen

Copyediting by Lisa Miller

Proofreading by Michael Fedison

Cover design by Ted Mauseth/MausethDesign

Text design and composition by Elyse Strongin, Neuwirth & Associates, Inc.

Ebook conversion by Sean Bellows, Neuwirth & Associates, Inc.

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Significant discounts for bulk sales are available. Please contact Glenn Yeffeth ator (214) 750-3628.

Dedication

To my teachers, Emmanuel Pierre-Antoine and Tony Scheppler, for bringing me unimaginable joy through my dancing, and to countless others who supported me on this journey, including my executive coach, Suzanne Levy; my amazing colleagues at CRT/tanaka and PT&Co.; my friends in the real world and the ballroom world; my wonderful coauthor, Lynette Padwa; my indefatigable agent, Fredrica Friedman; the highly creative and collaborative team at BenBella Books, in particular, my editor, Debbie Harmsen; my late husband, Mr. Sweetheart Assadulloh Hakiek; and my loving parents, June and Ichiro Tanaka, who made all things possible.

CHAPTER 1

The Whirl of Manhattan

Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while were here we should dance.

Anonymous

T he gleaming Dyson DC07 stood on a chair at the head of our conference table, the better to inspire us. This was no ordinary vacuum cleaner. The Dyson upright vacuum looked like a bulbous yellow rocket mounted in a shiny gray launch pad. Where a standard vacuum would have had a compartment for a bag, the Dyson had a clear plastic canister. Within that canister was a spinning funnel of yellow cyclones that whirled the dirt up into the head of the rocket. It put on quite a showfor an appliance.

The Dyson was already a hit in Europe but was unknown in the States, and our public relations firm, PT&Co., had been hired to introduce it to America. Winning the campaign was a huge boost to both our morale and our balance sheet in the limp year following 9/11. The six partners seated around the table were survivorsnot of the attack, which had taken place just two miles from our office, but of the fallout that had sapped businesses in Manhattan ever since. The Dyson could dramatically change things for us.

Sir James Dyson, CEO and inventor of the Dyson DC07, was hiring an ad agency as well as our public relations firm. I always took it as a personal challenge to make our PR efforts at least as powerful as the ad campaignide ally, more so. The mission of public relations is to attract attention to an organization, an individual, or a product by creating newsworthy stories, causes, or events. A great PR campaign can create tremendous free publicity without the use of paid advertisements. Whenever I pitched prospective clients I liked to tell them, PR is the Hamburger Helper of the marketing mix. We can help stretch your marketing dollars at a fraction of the cost of advertising. With the Dyson campaign, we would have our work cut out for us. It was an impressive piece of household technology, to be sure, but it was still a vacuum cleaner. Even the humble microwave reminded people of food. A vacuum cleaner reminded them of dirt. And housework.

Ellen LaNicca, the head of our Home and Housewares practice, was in charge of the account, and we were gathered in the conference room to hear her plan for promoting the Dyson. She stood next to the vacuum, took a deep breath, and began.

There is no Mr. Hoover, Ellen intoned. There is no Mr. Eureka. Theres a Mr. Oreck, but hes a grandpa. And then there is Sir James Dyson, a British inventor so cool that he looks like an actor playing an inventor. The James Bond of bagless technology. Creator of a vacuum cleaner thats as cool as he is, almost a piece of sculpture. She leaned forward, locking eyes with each of us as she delivered her pitch. We grinned back at her, enjoying the show. This vacuum will forever change our expectations of what such a tool should look like and how it should perform, she continued. It actually expels