From burnout to breakthrough

In 2017, I was seven years into operating a 35-person digital agency called New Haircut. We had been squeaking by on razor thin margins since day one. Never more than 90 days out from having to close our doors.

Maybe I picked the wrong business. But I kept at it, tirelessly.

Mostly, I sat stuck in the hamster wheel of sell, fulfill, repeat. No time for anything else — family, fun, nothing. My sleep was in the toilet. I barely saw my kids. This was NOT the vision I had when deciding to go into business for myself.

New Haircut had become a shitty, self-imposed job.

I was making a quarter of peers in corporate America with triple the stress. At the end of 2015, approaching full-on burnout, my 24/7 work routine landed me a divorce.

Living the dream, right?

It’s a tough story and there is a happy ending. But it’s also the right place for us to begin… the hard reality of trying to grow a service business.

I get it. I know the struggle. I know the risk of trying new things that might affect your family, your team, and their families. I know what’s at stake.

If this resonates, stick around. Because by 2021 New Haircut had productized our services, resulting in profit growth of 1,810%.

We made $80,000 selling $200 digital products like courses, toolkits, and ebooks — low-ticket, self-serve versions of our premium, done-for-your services.

Crazy, right? It gets better.

As those digital products attracted a growing number of ideal clients and demonstrated our expertise, they helped market and sell $899,303 in premium services.

We had built a flywheel — an automated sales funnel.

It’s been 4 years since I launched those digital products and I still wake up to new leads and new sales in my inbox.

If that isn’t passive revenue, I don’t know what it is.

This is my journey of discovering the power of productizing your services with online offers that attract your ideal clients and earn you predictable revenue, on autopilot.

And it’s what led me to start my new business, Profit Ladder.

Welcome to Profit Ladder

👋🏼 I’m Jay Melone.

My mission is to help 100,000 service-based business owners build wildly profitable businesses without being swallowed by their own company and burning out.

Right now, with all of your revenue coming from people-powered services, your growth is limited by your time and your monthly billable hours.

To make matters worse, you also need to allocate time and energy to market and sell — which not only drains you, but limits your earning potential.

Just as you finish working with a client, you need to hustle to sell more. You’re caught in the sales rollercoaster.

But when you productize your services, you’ll

• Fill your funnel with ideal clients
• Shorten your sales cycles
• Create consistent revenue
• Unlock passive revenue
• Automate your sales & marketing

Imagine, a client buys your productized offer. The entire transaction happens online and without your involvement. They use the product to learn or generate a win for their business. A few weeks later, you get an email from them, asking you for pricing of your high-ticket consulting or coaching. You show up to the sales meeting and they’re already 80% sold. You close the deal with them in days (not months).

Too good to be true?

I’m living proof that you can reach more people who need your services, provide them more value, and create more impact.

All the while, you’re increasing your wealth which wins you back your time and freedom to live your life on your terms.

That’s what I’m up to…

Want to do it with me?

Subscribe to my (free) newsletter

You’ll receive weekly ideas and inspiration to grow your profits.

The past several years have been tough. Not too long ago, I wrote a Medium post to share my story of living in the shadows of severe burnout. But over the past few months, I’ve begun emerging from those dark places.

Of all the shadows, the one that struck deepest was the lack of purpose I felt in my work… until three months ago.

See, I’ve been running my company, New Haircut, for close to 14 years. I’ve shared publicly how it felt like a prison I’d built for myself. How I’d been ceaselessly chasing the wrong thing. Too proud to let it go and spiraling as a result.

But back in November 2019, before all of the work-related stress began to mount, I began tinkering with a way out.

I created some no-code, digital products that my company began selling online.

Instead of me having to fulfill the services that my consulting clients hired me to do, I packaged up all of my skills and expertise into toolkits they could use on their own.

I absolutely loved the process of creating and selling these products. But no sooner had I built and launched them, I was setting them aside.

See, I was only making a few hundred bucks for each toolkit. And as a business owner with mouths to feed, I felt like the responsible thing to do was to focus on selling my high-ticket services.

Flash forward to January of 2023, and I can tell you that my decision to chase money resulted in overwhelming stress and depression. The kind that knocks you down and out. Until three months ago.

Three months ago, I remembered my toolkits. I remembered the fire I’d felt while creating them. And so I started dabbling again.

I worked on the toolkits. I refreshed the website. I created content and funnels to help prospective customers discover them. And wouldn’t you know, people started buying them again. In fact, I’m about to cross $80,000 in sales.

One morning, a few weeks back, I woke up to Stripe notifications that several people had purchased while I was asleep.

That flickering flame inside me turned to a steady burn.

Lightning bolts

I started sharing my experiments with friends, some of whom are also business owners. One founder friend spent all of 10 minutes listening to my story before offering me 50% revenue share to do the same thing for him!

50%… really?!

As a life coach, he wanted to grow his practice but was already working long days to meet with his clients. Even if he could work around the clock, many would-be clients on the other side of the world couldn’t meet because of timing conflicts.

Many other prospective clients simply couldn’t afford his 1:1 coaching. But an online coaching course would solve all of these problems, for him and his clients.

And so he had been trying for the past few years to package up his coaching services into online courses. Unsure how to do it himself, he hired people that overpromised and under-delivered.

He didn’t know where to go from there. He was stuck.

Now here’s the inflection point in my story

Three more founder friends I chatted with a week later described the same growth challenges. When I shared my story, they offered me the same revenue split to help them…

Have you ever had one of those bolt-of-lightning experiences?

Where you have this massive aha moment.
Where everything becomes quiet and clear.
Everything aligns, perfectly.

Three months ago, that charge ran through me from head to toe. And I haven’t stopped working on the idea since.

And so here’s the reason for today’s post

I’ve started a new company to give founders everything they need to know to grow their services business — coaches, consultancies, agencies…

I’ll teach them how to build revenue engines with digital products that unlock new income streams.

I’ll help them grow without having to constantly hire.
I’ll help them stop trading their time for money.
I’ll help them diversify their revenue.
I’ll help them expand their reach.

I’ll help them spend less time working and worrying, and more time earning and thriving.

I’ll help them build self-sustaining growth loops that create profits they reinvest back in the business, without all of the burnout.

And the most exciting part, I’m helping them for free.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m going to earn a healthy living. But I’ve figured out a way to help busy founders without charging.

To do that, I’ve started a free newsletter called Passive Profits.

The newsletter serves up deep dives on real growth strategies.

Each week, I devote dozens of hours of research to curate guides, tools, and success stories packed with ideas and inspiration.

Each newsletter is a playbook founders can follow to build digital products: courses, digital downloads, ebooks, and newsletters that not only earn revenue, but boost sales of their premium services.

Man, do I wish I had a resource like this three years ago.

How you can help

Simple.

♻️ Do you know someone who will benefit from this? Forward this post to them so they can subscribe for free.

👏🏼 Clap for this post so your founder friends discover it on Medium.

🙌🏼 Thank you for helping me spread the word. I appreciate you.

And wish me luck!

The alarm sounds on my phone. It’s 4:55 AM. I rustle around bed a bit, hoping the alarm’s blaring will silence itself somehow. I pull the covers over my ears to muffle the sounds of morning. Gone are the days of leaping out of bed, charged with optimism and curiosity.

The alarm momentarily hushes before resuming its next cycle. I trace the outline of sunlight that grabs hold of the edges of my bedroom curtains.

Without realizing it, my head is already busy at work — processing, planning, and inevitably, worrying. Before my feet have a chance to hit the cool wooden floor planks, my mind has produced an assortment of past problems and future threats to sort through.

On this particular morning, I opt for a serving of guilt. I replay an interaction-turned-sour with my 12-year-old son the night before. And now here come the shoulds…

I should have let him speak his mind.
I should have asked more questions.
I should have been more patient.
I should be a better Dad.

I exhale a faint grunt and plod to the bathroom. Atop the bathroom sink, I reach for my phone and silence the alarm. It’s 5:02 AM. I’ve been awake for seven minutes during which I’ve consumed myself with regret, shame, and grief.

In a moment of desperation, I convince myself to analyze last night’s exchange once more. Maybe reliving it this time will bring some new insights and reprieve from the troubling thoughts and feelings. Unsurprisingly, they only strengthen — now internalized within my consciousness.

Next, to complete the mind-body connection, my limbic brain floods me, head to toe, with stress-inducing chemicals like adrenaline, norepinephrine, cortisol, and dopamine… the circuit completes. What started as a thought, has turned into a fully embodied experience. And as this same routine returns, day in and day out for years, my body becomes addicted to this fear-based state, subconsciously forcing my mind to remember, or otherwise invent, things to worry about.

Sound vaguely familiar?

This morning ritual is how so many of us indoctrinate our days. But it gets worse before it gets better.

From there, we turn outward to try and recover our quickly spoiling morning. We check our messages and inboxes. Once those queues empty, we head over to our favorite social media channels. We compare ourselves with the false world around us. We carefully review likes and comments from last night’s post. We like and comment on others’ — because that’s the right thing to do.

When social fails to refill our tanks and our sense of lost connection, we drop deeper. To match those plummeting emotions, we scour news media outlets for the doom and gloom we’re sure to find.

Then it’s off to Amazon to buy something, anything, for ourselves. We conclude: These new decorative, artificially-aged shelves for the living room will make me feel better.

And once all of those external actions betray us, we seek out friends, family, and coworkers — anyone willing to absorb our venting about a world that’s unfair and endlessly falling short of our expectations.

Finally, by the end of our day, we feel justified to disconnect by pouring ourselves a drink and binging Netflix until our eyes heavy and we withdraw to bed. But guess what’s waiting for us tomorrow?

Breaking the cycle

The more familiar that morning read to you, the harder it may have been to get through. I imagine a percentage of readers dropped off — too close to home, it reminded them that they aren’t yet ready to wake up. To become aware of how they’re living so that they can begin to end the cycle. They don’t realize they have that level of power over their lives, if they’re willing to do the work.

So they retreat to safety — back asleep within the matrix where they get to choose ignorance. They get to hide out in the false personas they created to fit in.

Because, after all:

“Our personality is not who we are but who we had to become.” — Dr Rangan Chatterjee

But when the inevitable suffering returns, they stand in their victimhood, numb themselves, and shove it down — out of sight.

That’s life, after all. Isn’t it? Except, some of us don’t believe that.

We suspect there’s much more to it. We’re here, looking for clues. We’ve been paying attention.

But as our awareness builds, we thrash harder between two existences that live in tension with each other. One moment we’re practicing unfamiliar habits that usher in new levels of joy and peace. The next, a wave of discomfort levels us. Our old, familiar patterns return. We recoil, reasoning to ourselves that we must have been losing our minds. In fact, we are…

We’re beginning to unlearn decades-old programs, which scares the ever-living shit out of us. Because if everything we assumed to be the normal path forward is now sweeping us in the opposite direction, the ground below becomes fractured.

We start colliding with deteriorating floors and walls of a reality that no longer feels like home. As the veil thins further, we catch glimpses of our true reflection — authentic, empowered, abundant. Our lifelong compulsions reveal and then recede, in waves that crash violently on the shore, only to give way to new, softer sand.

Over and over, we feel enlightened one second and back asleep the next. But with each succession, we’re a bit more suspicious, more curious, more aware. We sense what seems to ring true as our full potential, yet remain uncertain how to access it. How to embody it. How to sustain it when we invariably slip back into our habitual programs.

Just keep swimming

These rough waters are the same streams I’ve been swimming in the past seven years — stuck, alongside so many countless other souls.

We were never taught how to step out of the current pulling us downstream. No one gave us the tools to leave behind the lives we never asked for. And so it’s at this stage that the vast majority of us concede. We stop treading and let the tide take us.

It’s so much easier to say “yes” to what’s familiar:

To our family and friends, many of whom are also fast asleep.

To the promise of obtaining fulfillment, if not this mountain top then surely the next.

To a sense of eventual security, so long as we work hard and make lots of money.

I’m here to tell you that I see you — swimming, fighting, drifting. I’ve been there with you, flailing about in those waters. Except, this time around, we’re going to reach the river bank.

If I make it there before you, I’ll wait. I’ll cheer you on. I’ll remind you you’re not alone. That you’re not crazy to be paddling upstream — to waters where you glide in complete peace, toward the shores of your intended life. To the life you chose.

And if you happened to make it there first, throw me a line. It gets choppy in here.

The person you’ve been doesn’t need to be the one you remain. This is a story about waking up to choose the highest version of ourselves. Because that’s all it is — a choice.

I’m introverted.
I’m shy.
I’m a lone wolf.
I’m impatient.
I’m analytical.
I’m a man of science.
I’m forgetful.
I’m unable to focus.
I’m forever chasing money.
I’m a frenetic overthinker.
I’m not creative.
I’m not a real writer.
I’m not a real entrepreneur.
I’m serious and somber.
I’m frustrated.

These are the labels I’ve used to chronicle who I am.

I’ve rooted in them for decades. Repeating them, incessantly — to myself, friends, family, coworkers, and strangers, until I fully embodied them.

As negative as they might appear on the surface, they’ve served an important role — they’ve kept me safe while I’ve been asleep. They’ve provided shelter, while I chose to remain small. They allowed cover for me to shrink within the shadows — not yet ready to thrive in the light.

You see, these are the labels of a child. An eight-year-old, who developed his sense of self from his surrounding environment.

While still innocent and awake, he understood life as it was meant — everyone living free, connected, and aligned with their highest selves. But, confused, he watched everyone exist exactly the opposite: friends, siblings, parents — adults and children alike — all living small, separate, and misaligned, so as to, somehow, satisfy those fragile others around them.

Afraid to break from society’s norms, he, too, practiced dimming himself to make others feel safe. He shaped his thoughts, feelings, and actions based on the fears of others. And in doing so, he went to sleep, losing himself to the frightened, fractured world around him.

That’s been my story. Until now. Until realizing that I’d been asleep.

As I wake up, I remember that it was all a dream… A story I stepped into a long time ago, but am choosing to rewrite. A persona I invented but am ready to part with.

I’m remembering that my thoughts, feelings, and actions are entirely my own. My life, my work, my words, my ideas, my emotions. The space I occupy. How I express myself. Who I spend time with. It’s my story that I get to author. A story that, this time, I’ll write in alignment with my heart.

Because everything that makes up my being is not only mine to choose but has a higher purpose than that once scared eight-year-old gave himself permission to reach for. How could he have known to?

No one ever told him that he gets to decide.
No one ever told him that he is his own creator.
No one ever told him that he could love himself, and in doing so, be a light to all around him.

Not because they didn’t love him, but because they were just as confused and afraid. They didn’t know any better. They were doing the best they could.

And so I had to wake myself up. I had to learn to interpret the messages the universe was serving — not as challenges happening to me, but for me. I had to experience pain as an invitation to let go of living small so that I could rise up and return to alignment with my highest self.

As I wake up, I’m remembering how unimaginably limitless I am. How much light and love I have. How grateful I am for all I have. And how lucky I am to be able to share it with others.

And as I transform, I’m allowing myself new labels of who I am becoming:

I’m larger than life.
I’m the center of my community.
I’m patient.
I’m heart-centered.
I’m brilliant.
I’m living in complete abundance.
I’m decisive.
I’m playful and happy.
I’m filled with confidence.
I’m grateful.
I’m at peace.

These labels are just as much who I am, as well as who I’ve always been. I just had to remember.

And you?

Who will you become again when you wake back up?

Waking up others around you

The truth is, everyone must choose to wake up on their own time and terms. For me, that looked like hitting rock bottom and having nowhere else to go.

On my way down, I was fortunate to meet guides & teachers that modeled their highest selves. In doing so, they planted seeds my subconscious needed to begin waking up. Thank you. I love you. ❤️

And so that’s why I’m writing these articles. Because I feel called to. Because it’s my light for others.

If you received my light today, consider helping it reach someone else by tapping the clap 👏 icon below. Thank you. 🙏🏼

“You can do hard things.” As you read that, what’s your first reaction? What do you tell yourself?

If you’re like 85% of the population that’s struggled with low self-image 🙋🏻‍♂️ you might scoff and think: Not me. I never do hard stuff… I’m a wimp, especially compared to others.

If your child or friend shared that same self-portrayal, how would you react?

I’m guessing you’d challenge them — you’d be quick to acknowledge all of their recent acts of resilience, right?

If we see our family and friends through this confidence-building, uplifting lens, why don’t we apply it to our own feats? I think there are a couple major forces at work here.

One, we mistakenly jumble together confidence and cockiness. We wrongly believe that any form of self-acknowledgment is equivalent to bragging. In reality, there’s a healthy margin between patting yourself on the back and shoving your accomplishments in everyone’s face.

Two, we place way too much emphasis on how the world around us measures our wins (and losses) — fraught with a few major pitfalls:

1. Others lack the context to truly measure our merits — nobody fully knows everything we’ve been through
2. What others view as easy might be Herculian to us, and vice versa
3. Relying on outer recognition of our inner accomplishments teaches us to lose faith in our own opinions — social media has only systematized and accelerated this reliance on other humans or, worse, algorithms, to score our performance.

I don’t know about you, but I’m over it.

How about, instead, we retrain ourselves:

• that we’re worthy and capable
• to keep our own score
• to see the climb we made to reach today’s top
• to celebrate the hard things we’ve done

What follows are two of the core habits I’ve integrated that have helped me slow down, take notice of my accomplishments, and keep climbing.

One: Build in moments of quiet

During the average newborn baby’s day, their brains predominantly operate in the slower delta frequency. Adults hit delta during deep sleep. Then, until the age of four, toddlers’ brainwaves are primarily in theta — a frequency characterized by high-creativity and curiosity.

But as we grow into adults, our brains spend more time in beta and gamma, frequencies most useful for problem-solving and heightened awareness, respectively. That’s helpful for adulting, especially work.

The problem is that we remain in these frequencies, with limited moments of downtime. From trips to the bathroom to entire vacations, we keep consuming, keep solving, and, otherwise, keep our phones glued to our faces. And as the world around provides us fewer opportunities to slow down, reflect, explore, and imagine, we miss out on the quiet moments that lead to connection and breakthrough.

Fortunately, there’s one tool we can access to build in moments of quiet, consciously shifting ourselves from gamma and beta, into alpha and theta.

I know that you know what meditation is. Maybe you’ve tried it. If you’re like me — a recovering overthinker — you’ve decided that sitting quietly with your breath and your thoughts doesn’t work. And when you’re struggling most, you’ll probably opt for ANYTHING other than actively noticing your mind’s incessant chatter. Me, too.

My meditation habit, which I started about ten years ago, looks like single-digit days of consistent practice, followed by long absent patches.

Why do I stop each time? Because my mind convinces me that I have better things to do. In fact, I dodged this morning’s session. Hold, please. I’m gonna sit quietly for a few and breathe. 🧘🏻‍♂️

Man, I needed that.

And that’s the thing!.. In ten years, I’ve tried to talk myself out of quieting down countless times. But never did I ever regret a single sitting — even when grief came forward or I was ceaselessly distracted. When that happens, which happens a lot at first, it’s tempting to convince yourself that meditation is useless. Or that it doesn’t work for you.

A friend of mine told me once:

“Meditation works the moment we decide to sit down and do it.”

What he meant is that meditation is less about how well we do it and how we feel afterward, and more about the conscious commitment to honor ourselves and go inward — of witnessing the myriad external things pulling us away and still choosing to sit with ourselves.

Sure, there are proven physical, mental, and emotional benefits of long-term meditation practice. But, thanks to my friend’s framing, I’ve learned to shift my focus from measuring my progress to celebrating my decision to show up for myself.

So, I get that you don’t want to do it. What I can offer is that, just like working out your body, the more you work out your mind, the more natural it becomes and the better you get at it… not that we’re keeping score. 😉

But if you still need some proof that it’s worth your time, I’ll tell you that since I’ve started I’ve noticed a dramatic improvement in my ability to become and remain aware of my thoughts — especially unhelpful ones. Instead of becoming consumed, I’m now better able to spot them and set them aside. I flag them as just that — thoughts; i.e. not reality. I breathe deeply, calming my sympathetic nervous system, and I choose to move on to more productive thoughts.

And since the average human has ~6,200 thoughts per day, training our minds to let go of the crap that doesn’t serve us in place of a mind that’s calm, centered, focused, and loving, we elevate our mood, our work, and the world around us.

Here are a few tools & resources that have helped me build up my practice:

Books

• Joe Dispenza’s Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself
• Pema Chödron’s Making Friends with Your Mind
• Amishi P. Jha’s Peak Mind: For the overly analytical, time-obsessed Amishi’s research proves the benefits of a daily 12-minute practice

Apps

• HeadSpace: I found their guided meditations helpful when getting started — it helped me know I was doing it right.
• InsightTimer: I used this to explore different modalities & deepen my practice. I also found one of my favorite teachers there, Sarah Blondin.
• FitMind: When my logical mind was hungry for the science behind meditation, I used this to really advance my practice.

Devices

• Apollo Neuro: While this thing has many uses, re: meditation I use it to settle my body and aid its ability to reach alpha and theta brainwaves.
• Whoop: I use this to see and analyze the data behind my meditations — how my body responds and my overall stress levels.
• Eye mask: I’ve found that blocking out light more readily coaxes my brain into slower frequencies.
• Google Nest: For additional help blocking out surrounding distractions, I like the simplicity of asking Google to play white noise.

My practice

In terms of what meditation looks like for me, I’ve experimented a lot. I’ve tried various times of the day. I’ve tried guided and unguided, with music and silence. I’ve tried short bursts and longer durations. In my office, in nature, in my car. So many variations.

Currently, what seems to work best is meditating in the morning, following a short (15-min) core workout, stretch, and cold glass of water. The attention on my physical body allows me to settle in, shake off any stored anxiety (and cortisol), and do a better job of sitting still.

I’ve found that I need to sit for a minimum of 30 minutes in order to give my mind time to shift from gamma and beta, to alpha and theta. During those first 29ish minutes, my mind is busy revisiting memories, worrying about the future, and planning my day. I used to get frustrated. Now I’ve learned to let my mind do what it needs to, while actively bringing my attention back to my breath. Then, somehow, at around minute 30, my mind relaxes, I breathe deeply, and I feel grounded. I then do a scan through my chakras and imagine warm, loving energy surrounding them.

At that point, it’s not uncommon for me to “see” (my eyes are still closed) an array of lights dancing in front of me. Scientifically, that’s said to be the activation of our pineal gland. Spiritually, that’s the opening of our third eye.

I then remain quiet for an additional 10 to 30 minutes. All told I devote 40–60 minutes. It doesn’t happen every day but that’s always my intention.

To wrap up on meditation…

I hope you’ll be patient (and persistent) enough to experience how much meditation can become a readily accessible anchor in your life. The more you build your practice, the more it’ll serve your larger growth — expanding your ability to tackle harder things, more regularly.

Two: Create a personal vision

Funny enough, my job is to help companies plot and prove exciting new visions. During that work, the team pays special attention to create a north star of a shared mission and compelling future. Looking back, I’m not sure how I ever started a new project, venture, or business without this step.

But for as long as I can remember, whenever prompted to similarly capture a vision for the life I wanted to manifest, I deemed it unnecessary. I dismissed it as a waste of time. Until recently.

A few weeks ago, I was invited to journal on my 10-year vision. Instead of bulleting out a bunch of vague, lofty goals, we were encouraged to get really specific with the intentions we were calling forward. We were also asked to write it in the present or past tense as if our intentions had already unfolded.

I initially resisted. I’d open my journal and invent something, anything, to interrupt the assignment. Then, I just started writing and something surprising happened… I fell in love with the activity and my vision.

The more I wrote, the more excited I became about what I was writing, and the more inspired my vision became. It felt like, for the first time ever, I was transcribing my subconscious’ deepest desires. Sure, we all daydream, but something shifted by capturing the sights, sounds, experiences, and opportunities with written words.

I wrote about the wildly successful businesses I had started and sold. I wrote about my new and elevated relationships with family and friends. I wrote about my peak physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health. I captured fine details of my home and community, the transformative events I organized, the courses and coaching I offered, the ways in which I served, and how I spent my time — which I cherished daily. I got specific with dollar amounts, names, places, and feelings. It felt real because I believed it to be.

And so I learned that one of the biggest “hacks” to doing hard things is to, first, see yourself doing and completing them. This has always sounded silly to me. I’ve dabbled with Law of Attraction stuff but never recouped any rewards. Now I know it was because I was only thinking about the outcomes. This time around, by taking pen to paper, I had caused an opening — maybe in the universe; definitively within me.

But writing out your vision is just the first glimpse of the medicine you’ll receive.

Reading your writing

The real power of writing down your vision is to go back and read it, over and over again. Each time, it feels more real than the last.

I now start each morning reading my vision and then meditating on it. Remember when I said that meditation becomes an anchor in your life?

Starting my day this way primes me to show up as my future self intends to live and work. It helps me prioritize the tasks that will manifest my vision.

And because I’m an auditory learner, I recorded myself reading it so I could just listen to my vision at the click of a button.

I also read it before bed which programs my subconscious to dream and inhabit this new reality. I’m devoting my thoughts to the life I want. In time, those thoughts become my feelings, which then shape my values and beliefs, which produce a new set of results… a new reality.

Supercharging your vision

There are two additional steps I’ve learned from others (still yet to experience myself) that will help to actualize your vision: (1) annual check-ins and, (2) sharing with trusted partners.

1/ Annual check-ins: Annually, return to your vision and re-read it. What you’re bound to notice is that one, several, or all of the intentions you set have taken shape, in some form or another. Seeing your vision manifest is what shifts your perspective from hoping this woo-woo stuff works, to knowing it does.

2/ Sharing with trusted partners: Finding and working with an accountability partner that you trust and, is equally committed to their vision, can be extremely supportive.

I only encourage you to be very selective with whom you invite. Sharing with the wrong partner(s) can hold you back and disrupt your journey. I’m lucky enough to have a community — my soul family that’s doing this work together and supporting one another.

If you don’t have anyone to share with, I’d be honored to be your partner. Send me a note: jay@newhaircut.com. ❤️

I’m here for you. I’m there with you.

If I can do hard things, you can, too

As we wrap up here, I want to get vulnerable with you…

Initially, I wasn’t sure why I was writing this or who it was for. I faced waves of doubt, shame, and guilt.

The inspiration came from a proud moment I was having with myself — mentally cataloging and celebrating recent hard things I had accomplished. In that moment, I wanted others to feel similar pride, compassion, and joy with themselves.

Since I like to write, I just started typing. But I struggled to keep at it. The ‘shoulds’ did a number on me, as they often do:

• You should be working
• You should focus on making money to support your family
• You should write about something you’re qualified in
• If you’re really going to do this, you should make it quick

If that weren’t enough, I repeatedly chastised myself that no one would read it. And if they did, they wouldn’t find it remotely helpful or interesting.

Throughout all of my self-deprecation, what kept me going was remembering the commitment I made to be a light for others.

And so I hope these words, somehow, helped you. I hope you feel seen. I hope you keep going. I hope you realize how worthy and capable you are.

It’s December 21, 2022. Winter solstice arrives at the perfect time as I prepare to close down business operations for the rest of the year. I welcome the opportunity to slow down and disconnect from another busy year that felt more fraught and frenetic than years past.

I set my out-of-office. I’d be away for 12 days, not due to return until Tuesday, January 3rd. I’ve similarly taken this time off the past 13 years of running my company. I always welcomed it as a moment for quiet reflection on all I’d received and gratitude for what was to come. This time around though, I noticed those opportunistic feelings gave way to a subtle sense of disquiet — a sinking suspicion that the renewed enthusiasm I typically experience at the start of a new year would escape me in 2023.

I had no evidence to feel this way. 2022 brought with it much to celebrate. A growing team, renowned clients I was proud to be working with, refined offerings that my market valued, and reliable revenue to invest back in the business. And the year before was our best since launching in 2010.

So I chalked up this foreboding dash of discomfort to my all-to-familiar habit of focusing on the negative. As it turns out, I only wish it had been another case of overanalysis. Upon my return that first week of January, I’d enter into one of the darkest stretches of my personal and professional life.

This story is about that experience. Of hitting rock bottom, overcome with self-detachment, depression, and burnout. But instead of remaining there or retreating through the same dark tunnels that took me down, as I had done so many years past, this time I discovered a commitment to surrender and emerge transformed.

It’s my story about rediscovering myself and my bigger purpose. It’s my story, but it’s yours too. Because it’s the story of being human. Of the struggles we all face but only the bravest lean into in search of a life worth living.

The dark way down

It’s now Tuesday morning, January 3rd. I walk into my home office for the first time in over a week. Until that moment, I didn’t realize I had not only been avoiding my return to work but also physically residing within my workspace. Everything about it felt like a self-designed prison.

My first act, which had become a well-worn habit, was to scan my inbox hoping to hear from a prospective client about working together. Nothing helped elevate my dopamine and endorphin levels like the closing of a new business deal. I hunted through several dozen spam messages, cold solicitations for crap I didn’t need, and the typical flurry of vendor invoices. Finally, my eyes landed on a familiar name — someone I’d been communicating with throughout November and December about a major opportunity we were sure to win. I clicked open the email. “Thank you so much for the time you took to create your proposal…” My heart sank. I knew all too well where this was heading.

No matter, I thought. I had plenty of experience of losing seemingly certain business opportunities. To assuage my bruised ego, I darted off to LinkedIn to check my messages, review new connections, and evaluate my recent post’s reactions — intending to surface my next opportunity. But it was quieter than I’d hoped. Fewer connections and messages, and a marked drop in engagement of my content. Something was off.

This pattern would repeat for the rest of January. One after another, each of the opportunities I had worked hard to bring to the table fell off. The companies I planned to work with throughout ’23 were hit by the market downturn, racked with budget freezes and layoffs. “Check back around Q4 to discuss opportunities for ‘24.” For a small company with cash reserves to last about one quarter, that was a death knell… unless I could drum up some new business in short order.

Fear steadily developed into full-blown panic. I had been on this rollercoaster ride before. Since opening our doors, we’d perpetually chased opportunities to survive, let alone grow the business. Operating from a scarcity mindset had become my default. Constant worry, stress, and anxiety were my steady state.

And so I knew to divert all of my energy into business development — the one job I had to do but rarely enjoyed. I messaged hundreds on LinkedIn and emailed countless others. As my lower and lower-vibration energy grew, the reception of my outreach dimmed. I went from positive, warm, and relational to negative, desperate, and transactional. The nos started to pile up.

Suspecting the worst, I stopped paying myself in late January to ensure I had the runway to keep my small team employed. As a preview of what’s to come, I’m writing this post in June and have yet to resume paying myself.

Then in March, something amazing happened that also sent me spiraling harder and faster than I could have ever seen coming. My incessant sales hustle seemed to momentarily pay off — a first-degree connection introduced me to their executive leader who was building a Product organization within a well-known enterprise. Within hours, we were scheduled to meet.

From the get-go, our conversations flowed. He had problems I knew I could solve, and my offers landed well with his hopes and expectations. A couple of days later we were meeting to review a proposal that, if awarded, would keep us busy for the next 12 months. That sense of steady, reliable revenue for that stretch of time was a goal I’d yet to accomplish in my 13 years of business.

A few days afterward, my son Jason and I headed to his annual soccer tournament in Richmond, Virginia. Stopping for gas, I checked my phone — another fear-based habit that had come to run my life as of late. A text from the executive leader: “Can you chat for a few minutes?”

First thought: He’s gonna tell you they went with another vendor.

I frantically wrote him back, “Sure can! Call you in five?” “Perfect,” he replied. I filled my car’s gas tank, breathed deeply, and hit the call button. He answered and went right into it, “Thanks for making time, Jay. We’re going to go with you guys.” My eyes watered, and my heart leaped out of my chest.

I pumped my fist and high-fived an unsuspecting Jason, who took special notice of my teary eyes. I barely remember the rest of that conversation. A wave of relief washed over me. I pulled over and texted my partner, Laura. “We did it, hunnie!” Next, my parents, who were well aware of the challenges my company had been facing. Finally, Taylor, to let her know that everything would be OK.

But to my surprise, after 15 minutes of celebrating, a gripping numbness hit me. Then that familiar wave of dread came. But why? This was a HUGE win for me, my team, and the company. Fortunately and unfortunately, I had the next five hours of mindless driving to analyze where these thoughts and feelings were coming from. Of course, I already knew. They were the same feelings that came up after nearly every contract I had won.

The hard truth, which I had done a phenomenal job of suppressing for nearly 13 years, was that I never loved my work. On most days, I loathed it. I started my company because I was sick of working for others. There was no grand vision. There were no clear problems I was passionate about solving. There was no plan or business model. And there were certainly no customers lined up waiting to work with me. Just an itch to create something of my own.

Sure, there have been many days I’m proud of the brand I’ve built. So many loving people have thanked me for my work — for inspiring them. What a blessing. But in the end, what I’ve always known in my heart is that the business I built is not the work I’m meant to do. And so all that praise and recognition from the outside, which should have felt like a warm blanket, grew into a tidal wave of guilt and shame. So many others would kill to be in the position I was in. And therein is where I and countless other entrepreneurs see their companies as an inescapable death march — trapped by the allure of success but ultimately doomed to suffer and perish.

Worse, we put ourselves out there to try and win business we ultimately don’t want to do. Then add the countless rejections, the constant battle to stand out, and the regret of taking on projects purely for the paycheck. Parts of us get whittled away until we no longer recognize ourselves, eventually reaching complete detachment from our souls.

That’s a glimpse into my professional life for the past decade-plus — chasing opportunities that put food on the table but fail to align with what’s in my heart. I’ve run toward untold mile markers labeled Success. Each time I round the bend, the finish line stretches just out of reach. The constant pressure I’ve put on myself to win keeps me endlessly hunting a victory I’ve always wanted but never seem fit to claim.

But I shoved on…

As I had done every other year in business, I put my head down and continued the grind. That big contract I had won and briefly celebrated would take months to get paid on, so there was a lot more work to do to keep us afloat.

Over the coming weeks and months, I spiraled… harder and further than ever before. The grief and loneliness I’d felt while grappling with my divorce a few years earlier felt like a walk in the park compared to the low places I found myself in.

Emotional outbursts became prevalent. I was miserable to be around. Short-tempered one second, racked with apologetic guilt the next. On multiple occasions, I’d have to fight back tears simply from attempting to read and respond to work-related emails. Everything triggered me. The worst, by far, was spending time on LinkedIn. I resented everyone and everything there, especially the algorithm, which I decided was, single-handedly, out to ruin me and my business.

Then, acute physical conditions started appearing. First, months of brain fog made it nearly impossible to focus. At its worst, it became difficult to see and keep my balance. I chalked it up to allergies and started a daily dose of Claritin. Then issues with my prostate had me making five to ten bathroom trips per night. When surgery didn’t resolve it, my already shitty sleep morphed into full-blown sleep deprivation, worsening the brain fog. Finally, I landed in the hospital after experiencing chest pains and a throbbing in my neck and head that felt like the worst flu of my life. It’s still unclear what happened, but after meeting with five specialists, it was determined that air had escaped from my lungs and into my chest, neck, and shoulders. The likely culprit? Excessive strain.

I had heard others talk about burnout. I always figured it was just a slightly heftier dose of stress.

Shit, in my 20s, while working 100-hour weeks at Accenture, I’d often pat myself on the back for bull-rushing burnout with sheer grit and mental toughness. Little did I know how debilitating true burnout is — physically, emotionally, spiritually. But as it turns out, it was exactly the medicine I needed.

See, if that wall I hit had been softer or only held its ground for a couple of weeks, I would have dusted myself off and jumped back in the game, as I always had. But this wall hit me, ran me over, and pushed me deep into the Earth. I couldn’t get up. I would have to dig my way out until I was in an entirely new place.

One night, I lay on the couch, searching for something inspirational to watch and lift me up, even if momentarily. I had declined to go to a local concert with Laura. As had become expected, I wasn’t feeling it and refused to be a drag on her night. It was another night of sending her out alone, devoid of the love and partnership I once brought to our relationship.

After cycling through several spirituality-themed Netflix documentaries for a while, a thought popped up that I’d go away on a solo trip. I would rest, recharge, and, who knows, maybe even rediscover myself. After texting with some of my more well-grounded friends, I settled on a week-long vacation in Medellín, Colombia. After a few hours of research, I had the perfect hotel and itinerary mapped out.

As I was about to purchase my hotel and move on to airline reservations, I remembered my friend, Mona. Something told me to seek her advice. I shared a text-friendly version of my situation. I remember telling her I was at a 9 out of 10 with burnout. Because only the weakest and most delusional would allow themselves to reach a 10 out of 10... or so I shamed myself some more.

I could see that she was typing. Then she stopped. Shit, I thought, I spooked her with that 9 out of 10 burnout crap. And then, a link appeared: 1heart.com. She followed with, “It sounds like you need more of a wrecking ball.” She nailed it. While it may sound dramatic, a wrecking ball was exactly what I needed. After all, it was the only thing that had a chance of removing this unbearable wall from me.

What I didn’t know then was in that moment of opening the link from Mona, my journey of deep healing had begun. And I’m not talking about getting out from under a few months of slumping revenue, but healing a lifetime of disregarding myself and neglecting my heart.

What follows next is nothing short of my own personal miracle — the start of discovering the man I’m meant to be. The man I want to spend the rest of my days being. For myself, my sons, Laura, my family, and the world around me. You, too.

If you’ve made it this far and you need it, I hope the rest of my story gives you hope — no matter how dark things may feel.

We are our own medicine

If you happened to click on that 1heart link above and skimmed the program, I wonder if the same thing happened for you that did for me…

When Mona texted me that link and I opened it, I traveled a series of feelings and emotions. Initially, there was curiosity. As I got deeper into the work, program, and success stories of others, curiosity turned to hope. I sensed a way out.

Next, I read about their use of ayahuasca — a sacred plant medicine used by indigenous tribes for thousands of years to help disrupt unhelpful conscious thoughts and open up space for oneness and more heart-centered, intentional living. I read about the group I’d be a part of and the intentional work I’d be doing along the 8-week program. A tinge of resistance crept in, knowing that surrender, vulnerability, and discomfort would be part of the work.

As I continued reading and researching, my default mode network went to work. The more excited and hopeful I became, the more my mind enacted its self-preservation mode, spinning up stories to prevent me from acting:

I’m not cut out for this program. And I’m clearly not successful enough like these other leaders. So I won’t even be accepted. And if I do somehow sneak through, it won’t work for me.

Ah, the stories we tell ourselves. The endless chatter from our inner critic. Though, somehow, I was able to override my mind long enough to submit an application. Fuck it, I thought, what’s the harm in applying?

To my surprise, the next morning I had an email from Camila, the program coordinator. They had reviewed my application and wanted to schedule me for an interview with their leadership team. Again, more stories littered my mind about them using these interviews to discover the fraud I am.

Leading up to my interview, I Googled the person I’d be meeting with, Barry Stamos — co-founder of 1heart and a serial entrepreneur with multiple exits in the billions. Why would someone of his success allow a busted, burned-out entrepreneur into his community? I thought, This will be quick. He’ll ask me some questions and recommend I try again when I’m further along. He’ll probably even become aggravated with his team for scheduling my interview.

It was the exact opposite. Barry was warm and patient. He led me through some grounding breathwork to open our conversation. Then he asked sincere questions and probed further, out of pure interest of who I am and how I got here. As we wrapped up, he shared more about the program and said, “I think you’d be a phenomenal fit for the program, Jay. There are still others applying, and though it’s not entirely up to me, I’m going to recommend you to the larger team.”

Of course, I resigned to believe he said that to everyone, and within a few days I’d be gently dismissed. Instead, two days later I received an official offer to join the next 1heart journey. Just like when I received the verbal commitment from that enterprise leader about working together, my heart fluttered. Except this time, the fluttering didn’t turn to numbness or dread. In fact, it hasn’t stopped fluttering and has only grown stronger.

I read the acceptance email again. Then once more, making sure I didn’t misread something. I texted Mona, “Holy shit, I’m in. This is happening!” “Yay!!” she replied.

No doubt, the initial draw to a program like this is the psychotropic plant medicine in an exotic destination. For 1heart, that culminates in an in-person, week-long retreat with three ayahuasca ceremonies nestled in the beautiful, lush jungle of the Chirripo Mountains of Costa Rica.

Especially for us Westerners, we convince ourselves that these one-off experiences are the antidotes that can provide us a quick fix. But I’ve come to learn two important, holistic truths along the way:

One, there are dozens of tools and modalities we can leverage to support our transformation — from meditation, journaling, breathwork, and exercise, to ayahuasca, psilocybin, and other sacred plants. In the end, the real medicine has always been and always will be ourselves.

Two, the moment we say yes to experiences like this, the universe begins working to line things up for us. It’s not the final outcome that leaves us transformed but the journey we travel through to get there.

So while the experience in Costa Rica was nothing short of life-changing, there have also been myriad other synchronicities that appeared, heartfelt conversations with my new 1heart family, prompts I journaled on and set intentions toward, books I read (included below), and the work others have put in before me (also below) that have supported my still-in-progress transformation.

Lighting the way back up and out

As I prepared for my trip to Costa Rica, I spent a good amount of time meditating on and journaling about my intention entering into this work. The more heart-centered clarity and intention you bring, the deeper your insights and breakthroughs will be.

My intention was to discover myself — not rediscover. See, after 30 years of numbing myself with work, drugs, and alcohol; keeping loved ones at arm’s distance; and doing what I thought the world expected of me, I had no idea who I was. If I left Costa Rica with a glimpse into my true nature, it would be a massive victory. Little did I know, that was just a taste of what I’d walk away with.

I sat with and journaled on my biggest fears:

• I’m going to run out of money
• I’ll never be successful
• I’m failing my sons who will eventually push me away
• I’ll end up alone

As well as my limiting beliefs:

• I’m too old to change… it’s too late
• I’m too passive… I never fight for what I want
• I can’t make up my mind… I’m too indecisive
• I’m just not cut out for hard things… I should give up trying to be an entrepreneur
• I’m an imposter… my life and my work are bullshit

It’s amazing the therapy we receive by writing these down and consciously choosing to let them go. Releasing them was exactly the right precursor leading up to our three ayahuasca ceremonies.

During the ceremonies, there were moments of panic and pain — physically and emotionally. However, if you went into the ceremony with complete surrender, on the other side was always love, peace, and bliss. And to be clear, I’m not talking about some high you get from doing a bunch of drugs. This was different — an altered state that’s difficult (not impossible) to access during our busy days of email, meetings, and incessant small talk. It was freedom from all of it.

For me, it was a chance to allow my subconscious to come forward. Sometimes it brought up repressed and overwhelming grief from the past. Other times it produced waves of terror of an unsure future. But I learned to breathe, face it, let it in, and let it go. Because right around the corner was joy and play. That showed up as belly laughs, uncontrollable sobbing, and sometimes both at once.

I felt a softening in my heart. I was surrounded by loved ones. I saw my sons. I knew their hopes and fears. I saw the loving Dad I am and the more patient Dad I’ll be. I found my Mom and Dad, across time — as children, young adults, and the people they are today. I saw Laura — the pain she hides, the hurt she feels, and the love she continues pouring into the world. But, I didn’t see them as separate individuals from me. They were me. We were all one. It was beautiful. My heart stretched wide open and brought us all together.

And now, here’s what brought me to my knees… for as long as I can remember, I’ve been a man ruled by science and logic. Someone who decided that religion was for the weak and gullible. But there I sat, at the edge of my makeshift bed, purge bucket between my knees, surrounded by 40 other leaders, experiencing the presence of God. Even typing those words (for now) still feels foreign to me. And yet, I felt it. With tears streaming down my face, I sat in the light and love of God.

I knew, or maybe I remembered, what it meant to live. All of the books and talks I’d consumed about being in the present moment now resonated throughout my body. I was humbly, magically alive. I was deeply connected to my life and the Earth around me. I embodied the life I would now live. I saw the man I am to be.

At that moment, my intention became clear. I would become a light in the world around me. I know it will be hard. God, will it be hard. My friends and family will assume that, of all people, I’ve clearly lost my shit. And that’s exactly why it has to be me. Because if a closed-off, overly analytical guy like me can get vulnerable, open his heart, and share it with others — especially the ones most afraid to do the work — then anyone can be inspired to do the same. Not for fame or even a ‘thank you.’ Purely out of love.

Keeping an open heart, in life and work

Throughout the week in Costa Rica, I noticed my tendency to want to seclude myself from the group. I mean, two weeks prior these 40 people were legit strangers. Now everyone is labeling us family?!

When I first arrived, everyone, especially the staff and returning alumni, referred to one another as brother and sister. Oh c’mon, with eyes rolled back… My skeptical, judgmental mind was on full throttle. But something in me told me to go toward the group. To practice opening. To demonstrate vulnerability. Neither of which are easy for me — the opposite. But as I continued to see myself open-hearted in ceremony, I understood that seclusion and labeling myself ‘introverted’ were just choices. I could choose differently. I could show up. I could do the work. And by the end of the week, as strange or as rushed as it may sound, these 40 people were my family. These women are now my sisters. The men, my brothers.

Living any other way, with armor on and walls up, isn’t living after all. It’s just existing. To live is to love yourself and the world around you. And so, as new and challenging as that mindset still feels to me today, I know that with time and practice it will become who I am and who I attract into my life.

As for my work, going into this program, I was ready to shut down my company-turned-prison. As grueling as it would be, after 13 tireless years, I had prepared to say goodbye — hopefully from a place of knowing that it was the right thing to do. Instead, what became clear is that I can and should apply my expertise as a product strategist and entrepreneur to companies with missions that align with my heart. And so I’ve decided my company will focus its services on organizations dedicated to leaving our planet in a better place than today. If you’re working in ClimateTech, GreenTech, or AgTech, let’s talk.

Also, in learning to say “yes” to my heart, new and exciting opportunities have started appearing that I’m considering. That’s how the universe works, right? When we get out of the way and out of our heads long enough, we allow its perfection to open our hearts and serve us what we’ve been looking for all along.

My journey is your journey

So this is me now. Open-minded and heart-centered, with a ton of work to keep it going and integrate this new awareness into embodiment. I’m going to slip. I’m also going to get back up. Because that’s life — beautifully imperfect, so long as we keep showing up.

And so, I hope my commitment to be a light awakens that same light in you. Because no matter how small and insignificant you tell yourself you are, you are beautiful, a light for someone else’s shadows, and we’re all waiting for you to shine.

I’m here for you. I’m there with you. I love you. ❤️

My commitment to support you

If you’re feeling lost, stuck, or burned out… If you have questions. If you just want someone to hear you, please reach out by leaving a comment below or messaging me on LinkedIn. I’d be honored to be there for you, like so many others have been for me. 🙏🏼

Resources that supported my journey

There are more — I’ll keep adding to this list as I remember them

• Pema Chödrön’s books
• Dr. Joe Dispenza’s books
• Adam Roa’s: You are who you’ve been looking for
• Brandon Evans’ Lost on Purpose
• Andrew Huberman’s podcast
• Helge Hellberg’s coaching
• Brené Brown’s books
• The Way of Integrity
• Michael Singer’s books
• The Four Agreements
• Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender

Thank you

To Brandon, Barry, and Tom for creating the 1heart container

To the angels of 1heart: Salman, Mike, Dani, Simone, Miguel, Andrew, Christian, Camila & Pablo.

To Jesus, Gracia Maria, Delfina, and Kuauhtli for their indescribable magic.

To David for Kinkara.

To my elevation group for seeing me.

To my entire 1heart family, so much love J18.

To Mona for bringing this experience into my life.

To God for not giving up on me.

And to my family and friends, my lifelong teachers.

If there was one thing I could have learned at the start of my product career, it would be that advocating executive leadership about the value of product and design is a waste of time.

The more that sentence stings, the more you’ll want to keep reading.

But know that what follows comes from someone who’s been in your seat. Someone who’s been advocating for Product for 12 years now, with too little to show for it. Until recently.

The gist? Prove it, then evangelize. Not the other way around.

Product leaders are worn down

Over the past couple of years, I’ve talked with dozens and dozens of leaders in Product, Design, Research, and Engineering. To simplify, I’ll refer to that quad as “product.”

Roughly 75% spend a minimum of 30% of their time pitching, advocating, and educating others on the value of Product. They do this with their managers, stakeholders, executives, and business colleagues.

While those conversations and presentations produce varying degrees of progress, 80% of these product leaders report feeling frustrated and worn down. The time they devote to advocating does not produce nearly the results they expect or hope for.

Many have said to me some version of:

“I just want to do great work and stop talking about it.”

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said the same.

Again, as someone who built a business and **tons** of content dedicated to proving the value of being product-led, customer-centered, and design-driven, I can vouch for the disproportionate amount of work required to convince others outside of Product the value our work delivers. That is, until a few months ago.

From approval-seeking to value-driven

During a conversation with a well-respected design leader-friend, a light bulb went off. And what now seems like the most obvious thing in the world became abundantly clear while chatting with her.

We, as product leaders, place our focus on winning the hearts and minds of our executive leaders so that we gain their buy-in to becoming product-led. But we’ve reversed the order of how product orgs gain funding and traction.

First, we need to show the value of Product. Then we gain executive confidence and support… to keep going, to build the “perfect,” mature product org we’ve always imagined — continuous discovery practices, customer panels, data-informed experiments, evidence-driven prioritization, all of it.

You might be thinking: ‘Well, no sh!t! But I’m handcuffed until I get their approval.”

That’s a big-time false belief.

Here’s the blessing and the curse: Your business stakeholders don’t have the time or background to immerse in the details of which products you build, let alone how you build them.

Sure, some like to meddle too much during discovery and design. But at the end of the day, they’re paying attention to one of two outcomes (sometimes both): That the products you create grow market share or help save the company money.

Do they think about doing right by the customer? Probably.

Do they care that the product team is operationally empowered? Maybe.

What I’m more certain of is that our business allies devote most mental cycles to keeping the business in good standing. That’s where their core responsibilities lie.

Which products and services the company ships to maintain company health is what they’re relying on you to answer.

Redefining Product’s role

If the mission is for Product to be a vehicle that drives business value, then we need to stop talking about the value of Product and start showing how Product is a tool to improve company cash flow.

Stop asking for permission. Stop waiting for the perfect set of priorities. Start where you are.

Start with the solution-muddled directive that no one on the team wants to work on. Use your expertise to show that it’s a poor business investment.

Simultaneously, bring forward 2–3 alternative opportunities for the business to invest in. Opportunities that align with business objectives, you’ve validated with the market, and show a direct path to revenue.

Opportunities that put wins on the board earn you the attention and respect of your executive leaders. They now see you as a partner.

And partners secure powerful champions in their corner — executive allies that confidently fund your product vision. Allies that no longer see Product as a cost center but as a revenue generator.

A real union between business and product. 🤝

— -

🙇 What’s coming up for you as you read this?

🙋 What questions do you have?

🙅 What objections?

Leave a comment. Let’s talk about it.

From Cost Center to Revenue Generator: Redefining the Value of Product was originally published in New Haircut on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Contrary to the discovery methods we teach & use with product leaders at Google, Home Depot, Amazon, Intuit, etc, I skipped discovery and jumped right to solution mode.

I was convinced that I knew what to build… That it would be faster to build first, and measure and iterate after.

❌ [Outcome: Build Trap] I wasted 12 weeks, built the wrong thing, and had to start over.

🔥 In this article, I’ll break down 5 indispensable discovery methods I’m using this time around.

1/ Customer advisory panel

First, I’ve recruited a highly-targeted customer advisory panel of product leaders.
(In an upcoming newsletter, I’m going to share best practices on building these panels, sourced from some UX Research friends of ours.)

Our panel is currently at 5 customers, covering 1 core persona and journey.

As I build up additional evidence on the problems we’re attacking, I’ll build the customer panel to 20 customers. That’ll enable us to widen our coverage to include additional personas and use cases.

💡 Business stakeholders will often pressure you to build an exhaustive panel from day one. This is expensive and unwarranted. Start small and add segments only after your core persona validates your problem space.

2/ Problem Discovery

Next, I conducted Problem Discovery interviews to prioritize and understand our customers’ needs — as much as I think I know them all, inside and out.

Some of the questions I ask include:

• What’s your most important job that causes you the most problems?
• How do you currently complete that job?
• Tell me about the last time you did it? What problems did you run into? How you did you navigate them?
• What worked well with your approach?
• What didn’t work well?

💡During problem discovery, having scripted questions is helpful. But knowing when to go off-script and allow your interview participant to take you on an unexpected riff are the magical moments when you discover their hidden, unmet needs.

3/ Problem Framing

Third, I used our own Problem Framing process to connect company objectives to reframed customer needs.

Our business objective for 2023 is to grow and diversify revenue with new self-directed offers for our core market of product leaders.

I’ll use the insights from my problem discovery interviews to identify customer-centered opportunities that will achieve that business goal.

[Output] Hyper-focused, customer-validated problem statement to guide our upcoming solution discovery.

At this point, we’re clear and aligned on the right problem to solve. Now we’re ready to solve the problem right.

4/ Design Sprints

Next, I used our advanced format of Design Sprints to concept and test new offers efficiently.

Our favorite tool for gathering rapid customer feedback is a prototype. Our most trusted framework for prototyping is a design sprint.

Notice that in order to be ready for solutioning via design sprints, we started with business strategy and problem discovery. That business and customer lens provided the right foundation to prime the team with viable, desirable, and feasible solutions.

When we’re building new products, we run design sprints in batches of 3s:

• Foundational sprint: Get feedback on an initial solution we’re curious about
• Iteration sprint: Iterate our initial solution to close the gaps on things we missed or messed up during our foundational sprint
• Alt sprint: Get feedback on 1–2 alternative ideas — something to compare against our initial solution

💡One major pitfall we fell into during our early days of running design sprints was going all in on our first ideas; i.e. we fell victim to our own solution bias. This was especially true if we received lots of positive customer feedback. But our first ideas are rarely are best.

Running iteration and alt sprints following our foundation sprint allowed us to build on what we had learned while allowing new and interesting ideas to surface.

💡Use our Design Sprint Advanced Playbook (free) for a comprehensive guide on running high-impact design sprints, including pro tips, examples, and our team’s sprint upgrades.

5/ Opportunity Playbook

Finally, I built out an Opportunity Playbook to help us see and decide which ideas to add to our roadmap, and take to market.

This playbook includes things like:

• Business objective overview
• Market opportunity analysis
• Competitive analysis
• For each idea: path to revenue, risks, investment

💡We always try to have at least two (ideally three) opportunities per playbook. Doing so enables us to compare options. It provides us a range of opportunities based on our risk appetite, budget, and timeline.

Where to next

Our discovery-powered product development landed us some exciting products we’re busy building.

But discovery isn’t a one-and-done thing. We follow a continuous discovery practice. That means as we move from prototype to MVP to scale, we’ll continue to test and learn with our product leader market.

That’s the beauty of our customer advisory panel — it enables us to schedule customer interviews each week, so we can keep learning and building products our customers needs — products that deserve to exist.

👋 If you’re a Director / VP of Product Management or Design and would like to join our panel, get in touch.

Your turn

Listen, product discovery is hard! We all look for shortcuts, hacks, and silver bullets to avoid it. Myself included.

I hope you consider the discovery methods I shared today. I highlighted the ones I use and trust most.

Just remember: New Haircut spent years building and iterating our playbook of discovery methods.

If you’re just getting started, introduce parts of each method, one at a time. Go slow. Experiment based on your team and needs.

Most importantly, steer clear of trying to go from a product maturity of 0 to 5, let alone 0 to 10. Doing so will burn you and the team out. It’s also a surefire way to build enemies with your cross-functional partners.

Product Discovery is a Waste was originally published in New Haircut on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The question I had to answer first, in order to change my life.

Over the past 18 months, I’ve questioned everything.

Should I keep going? What for?
Should I be doing this kind of work?
What am I doing wrong? Why is this happening to me?
Should I get a job? What job? What am I qualified to do?
Does that mean I’m quitting?
Am I being selfish? Is my family suffering because of me?
Am I modeling traits I hope my kids adopt?
Should I work harder?
What else can I learn?
What do I really want?

Turn’s out, there’s another question I needed to ask myself first.

A lifelong story in a moment

I’ve been running New Haircut for 11 years. In parallel, I experienced personal and professional challenges that forced me to go deep, dig up, push through, and relearn. It’s been a long journey. And yet, it feels like everything became clear overnight. What happened?

A few weeks ago, I sat on the floor of my home office. Stretching in the dark, I got ready to start my day with a morning meditation. As I lay there, the typical early morning thoughts raced through my head. Of course there were the to-do’s and plans for the day. Much more prevalent were thoughts of worry, regret, and fear. They were all so sad.

Even though I’d been meditating for years, I rarely practiced mindfulness outside of those designated minutes of silence and stillness. This morning, for whatever reason, I decided to really take notice of my thoughts. I wondered, while resisting mightily the urge to self-judge and chew myself up further, Are these the thoughts I prime my brain with each morning? They were.

In that reflection, the expression ‘negative self talk’ finally made sense to me. After decades of hearing the phrase and questioning my relationship to it, only now did it rang true. It had never clicked before because I had always translated the word negative to mean cruel. Never had I considered that I might be talking negatively to myself with words that prompted sadness.

My whole life flashed before me. Scenes from childhood that I didn’t know I still had access to came rushing forward. Each memory reinforced a theme that I had taught myself early on in life — sadness can be a weapon to deploy. A tactic to remain small by playing victim. It was a place I hid for when things eventually went wrong — a place filled with excuses not to succeed.

In that moment, I discovered the fundamental question buried below all of the other questions I had been previously asking myself — What do I need to let go of? My answer was now blindingly clear. I was finally ready to let go of my relationship with this sad narrative I had developed to keep safe.

Since that morning, things continue to shift and open in curious ways. And yet, it’s important to express how long, isolating, and demanding journeys like this can be. There have been countless moments where I decided I wanted to give up. So many days of feeling like someone else was writing my story. Like I was stuck in autopilot, mistakenly blaming others for how things were turning out.

Only with the love and support of others was I able to keep at it. Most importantly, the love, support, and patience I gave myself.

And so, I’m sharing this experience to inspire you to keep going. To realize that the sharp points are there to wake you up and lean into. To believe every inspirational story you’ve heard, because one day you’ll be the person sharing yours for others who need to hear it.

Big and small changes

Here’s what’s been changing for me. First, there are the big things.

My openness to new opportunities has expanded, and with it, my confidence to take them on. As I’ve opened, others increasingly turn toward me, more open to engage in new and exciting ways. Opportunities I previously, subconsciously, may have pushed away, are suddenly all around me. Saying yes to them is happening with greater ease and velocity.

I’m more and more comfortable setting boundaries that would have previously been too awkward to get past. And each time I do, a better opportunity presents itself.

Challenges drop in, as they always do. Now, it’s becoming more obvious to see them, karmically, as the new possibilities they represent.

My relationships bloom at home and in my work. I apologize more readily. My phone buzzes more often. Strangers stop me. My Dad says “I love you” and I remember, in my body, how it felt to hear that as a boy… as his son.

I’m proud of myself. More so, I allow myself to be proud.

Also, the little things — things we tend to pass off as coincidences.

I think of people, some I haven’t seen in years, and they call or text moments later. My body craves healthier food. I sleep better.

I’m increasingly detached from the idea of fixing people or situations — especially their feelings about me, which I probably invented to begin with. This freedom gives me new reserves of energy.

I read something and see others mentioning it in unexpected settings. New people on a similar journey or at a similar vibration appear in my life.

Tears roll down my cheeks that used to remain welled up and hidden out of sight.

At times, the beauty of it all is overwhelming.

You’re ready

First, don’t question it. You’re reading this because you were meant to. You’re ready because you’re here.

It’s your turn now. I want you to really dig deep on that same question:

What do I need to let go of?

It will most likely be a persona you’ve developed to hide behind. A narrative you’ve been telling yourself — one you believe to your core. Question it. Pull it apart. Why do you believe that? What does it keep you safe from? By being that version of yourself, who are you hiding from becoming?

Three things to remember throughout this process

One, leave the criticism, regret, and self-judgement out of it. You’ve taken that approach your entire life. What good has it done for anyone? This persona lives and breathes only by you feeding it with perpetual analysis and self-berating. You’re going to begin breaking that cycle by feeding the good wolf.

Two, there is no right way to do this. Even if you feel worse at times — remain curious, kind, and detached from the stories. Realize that you’ll be dismantling a lifetime’s worth of bricks you’ve stacked up around you. Be patient. Take one brick down at a time. And remember the virtue of impermanence as you rebuild your new narrative.

Three, remind yourself over and over again of the notion that everyone is doing their best — including you.

For me, the answer came in a flash one early morning. But it took years of pushing through pain, of releasing self-doubt, of therapy and coaching, of quiet reflection, of asking for help, of forgiveness, and of re-learning.

And so my closing message to you is to persist. Not only does the universe want you to, but it’s waiting anxiously to reward you. Any path otherwise is one that someone else created for you. And we both know that the only right and true creator of your life, is you.

Keep going.

Design transformation. Design-driven. Human-centered design. Design thinking. Design sprints.

These terms are everywhere you look around the business world. It would appear that Design is having its moment. And yet, for decades now, many are still doubtful of the value offered, if any.

That doubt persists because we’re using the wrong words and focused on the wrong outcomes, which frustrates some and alienates everyone else.

By redesigning the language we use, questions we ask, and criteria we use to measure success, we’ll transform how work happens — and in doing so, our ability to solve any problem we choose to.

Words spark feelings

On a cold October night in 2018, I sat in the main gathering room of a private workspace snuggled in the heart of Chelsea, NYC. After a long workday, a friend (let’s call him, Phil) and I sat enjoying a nightcap while waiting for a mutual acquaintance (let’s call him, Steve) to join us.

Phil and I drifted onto the topic of a design sprint I’d be running later that month for a group of business executives. Phil asked about the intention of the sprint — specifically, the value that a group of business-minded folks expected to get out of it.

What he was digging into was, in fact, the argument for a new leadership development program he and I had co-created earlier in the year. The thesis of the program was that in order for innovation to yield results and practices like design thinking to take root, you need the grassroots support of others outside of the usual players — design, product, technology, and research. And so the program sought to catalyze business innovation by bringing cross-functional cohorts together to learn and lead new principles and methods — methods not unlike design sprints.

Steve arrived. As he settled in, we invited him into the discussion. Almost immediately, his postured stiffened, his eyes rolled back, and he shared his position,

“Design sprints represent everything wrong with innovation.”

Steve is a notable member of the design community, with many who have followed and supported his work for decades. His outlook mattered. It also wasn’t the first time I’d heard the likes of it. Over the course of that year and the year before it, outside of the small but growing bubble of design sprint teams I collaborated with, many other design purists had taken opposing stances against sprints.

Steve continued, “There is no shortcut to design. There’s a process. There are systems that have taken years to establish and refine. And here come design sprints claiming to figure it all out in a few days, where everyone in the room gets to pretend to be a designer!” This is how he felt. And his feelings weren’t wrong.

Design sprints felt threatening. He saw them democratizing the craft of design to non-designers. He framed them as a shortcut — as a way to cheat the design process that skilled designers use to do their job.

In fact, the first time I learned about design sprints, I had a nearly identical reaction. I remember saying, “How on Earth will spending 5 days in a design sprint do anything to change the products we build over the course of months?!”

The difference between Steve’s feelings and mine was that Steve, a Designer, felt threatened from sprints. But being from tech and product, I felt more alienated — as in, this feels like something I’m not equipped to participate in.

Where our discontent converged, was that we were both simply confused. And the name wasn’t helping.

To me, a non-designer, the word ‘Design’ felt outside of my purview. After all, designers do design, right? And the word ‘Sprint’ implied fast. Put them together and the definition we elicit is a change in process that makes design go faster. Which isn’t wrong! But, perhaps, not where you want to begin the conversation.

Because what do we know about people and change? Most don’t like it. Many resist it.

Inviting people to accept change involves using words and language that disarm and invite open-minded curiosity. Design Sprints, in a name, scores poorly on that front. As does design-driven and design transformation.

What person working in HR wants to be design-driven? They want to be HR driven! Or perhaps, people-driven.

How would being design-driven help a Recruitment Manager solve the problems she’s expected to deal with on a daily basis? Likewise, what Head of People would jump to contribute budget towards HR’s design transformation initiative?

The challenge, then, is demonstrating to the team and its senior leaders, the value and applicability of design in solving the problems the HR team works on, while minimizing the confusion and fear such change evokes.

We enroll their support through the words we use and the path we propose to get there.
And we create successful outcomes when we use design to transform how work happens within HR.

Redesigning teamwork

I think the most fundamental criteria for measuring the success of any business is its people. When the spirit of a team is broken or lacking, so is its creativity. Without creativity, there’s little ability to solve complex problems in innovative ways.

And so at the very core of it — what’s really broken here — is that nobody ever taught us how to work together. This is the most kernel problem that design transformation seeks to shift.

Today, we organize a group of people to work on a project based on their skill sets. We wish them godspeed to follow a generic series of protocols and processes that may have partially worked for one group solving one problem but has little relevance to this group and this problem.

We start by asking questions like: When should this be completed? What’s the budget? What features should we build? What’s the market opportunity? How much revenue does it need to generate or money does it need to save us?

No room in the conversation for the team to meet, to see one another, or to understand the problem they’re being asked to solve.

From the outset, each person checks in with shields up. They hold back their best ideas, tensions build, productivity drops, and the final products & services disappoint. What’s more, the output-driven metrics we used to define our success point toward failure. The team is disbanded and we miss our opportunity to understand what really went wrong.

What if, instead, we started the conversation by asking: Who should be part of the team? Who will lead each conversation? How will we decide what’s important? How do we want to communicate? How will we create safety and trust between us? How should we negotiate in order to effectively resolve conflicts? How will we partner with others outside the team? How will we measure and report our success?

Our definitions and practices around teamwork need to be redesigned — the way we meet, share ideas and make decisions.

When we harness design to shift how work happens, team members open — from feeling unsafe, to safe enough to raise their hand to tackle complex problems in bold ways.

From avoiding or ignoring conflict, to channeling it to unlock new, hidden opportunities through empathy and curiosity.

From one person maintaining all of the power and biasing the conversation, to cross-functional teams equally owning and contributing.

Redesigning outcomes

If you also believe that a company is as successful as its people, then in order to realize that success, we need to shift more of our focus from business metrics to organizational outcomes. Because teams that intentionally design how they work, will produce exciting business results. This is the order of operations: design great teams that produce successful results. It doesn’t work in reverse.

For example, I constantly go back to Suzanne Pellican’s story of leading transformation within Intuit. Theirs was a 7-year journey, where the outcome was to shift from many siloed centers of innovation to a cohesive culture of innovation.

To do that, she retrained and equipped each organization to solve their challenges using the same human-centered mindsets and methods her Design teams had historically relied upon. Her focus from the start was changing Intel’s definition of work. In doing so, Intel reaped the rewards of not only innovative products & services, but a newly invigorated workforce that’s maintained years after Suzanne’s departure.

What did that look like? How might we recreate her success, especially if we don’t have a 7-year timeline to work within?

Of course, I don’t have this all figured out. Up until this point, I’m acutely aware of what doesn’t work — of how things look and sound inside organizations that must change… that want to change.

But similarly, with each conversation, one small win at a time, I’m also building up a picture of the mindsets, words, and approaches that do work.

So for now, here are the organizational outcomes I push toward to signal that we’ve built a foundation capable of radical innovation.

1. Psychological safety: The groundwork that makes everything else possible. Psychological safety becomes the fundamental metric used to measure the success of all teams — the level of mutual trust & respect exhibited.
2. Feedback loops: All conversations — from 1-hour meetings to month-long programs — are designed to include reflection and feedback. This shifts the value of teams gathering from one-off outputs to lasting outcomes.
3. Learning mindset: Curiosity is no longer contained to a process like Discovery or within a function like Research, but viewed as a mindset that’s openly encouraged. Asking intentional, powerful questions is favored over telling.
4. Distributed power: Because the best ideas often come from quiet corners, seniority and title are part of the ideation and decision-making processes, but not mandated by them.
5. Showing over telling: Words on their own can be as powerful as they are misunderstood. Teams are now visualizing their ideas, allowing others to better understand them and build on top.
6. Problems over solutions: The most innovative products & services are rarely traced directly from today’s problem to tomorrow’s solution. Human-centered businesses prioritize the importance of understanding the root problem before jumping to [obvious] solutions.

I need your help to continue to flesh out these ideas and get them in front of more people. Especially those who feel threatened and confused with the challenges interwoven within design transformation.

What have I not considered? What parts of this conversation still need to be addressed?

What does it look like to be a human-centered business?

How might we make the journey there easier, better, more inclusive?

Where to next?

More and more companies have senior executive design functions — VP User Experience, SVP Design, Chief Experience Officer. Inside these organizations, Design has been officially welcomed to the table. They’ve managed to procure business value by applying design principles to solve important market challenges. These are the success stories we hear about. If we look closer, though, the journey there has left many feeling threatened and many more, alienated.

I suppose that’s why we’ve referred to them as transformations. Because it’s been bigger, slower, more complex, and painful than a change. Maybe it needs to be this way. Maybe the pain will help to burn in the memory of messy, broken systems for us to steer clear of tomorrow.

As I look back at election year in the US, I think about how poorly designed the general idea of government is. I can’t help but wonder how much more collaborative, productive, and peaceful we may be as a global community, if we were to apply these same principles to how we design the conversations and relationships that shape our world.

I don’t have the solution today. I’m simply in the trenches doing this work — supporting leaders and teams wading through their transformation journeys. It’s slow and sometimes agonizing. And I believe we can reshape the words we use and paths we take to be more inviting and inclusive… to help us pay attention for the outcomes that actually matter… to inspire more to begin.

Thanks to Mona Patel, Jim Kalbach, Mina Jonsson, Richard Banfield, Digant Dave, Julie Lane, Doug Powell, Kim Wiessner, Elaine Schwartz, Doug Stover, Ryan Andersen, and Chris Roberts for their ideas & inspiration in helping to shape this piece.

The real value of design transformation was originally published in UX Collective on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.