2026-09-26 17:03:00
We can either accept that this is the state of our audience and plan appropriately…
Or do the very difficult work of changing their state.
2026-09-26 03:03:00
Jennifer is a marketer, project manager and impresario. We’ve worked together on projects, and it’s always a delight. She and I sat down to talk about the hard work of what’s next.
2026-09-25 17:03:00
The problem is with the “and.” (Often a ‘but’ in disguise.)
I want to make the art I have in my head, and I want the market to love it.
I want to have the wedding of my dreams, and I don’t want to worry about money, and I want my cousins and friends to enjoy every bit of it.
I want to take few risks and I want extraordinary returns.
I want to have a difficult conversation and I want there to be no tension, stress or possible downsides.
We hesitate to admit what we really want because when the ‘and’ shows up, we can see we’re being unreasonable. It’s easier to simply hope and dream.
Strategic thinking doesn’t ignore the systems all around us, or the trade-offs that scarcity and competition require. Instead, it embraces them.
2026-09-25 17:03:00
I don’t believe we’re each born with a purpose. We have more freedom than that, the freedom to choose the impact we’ll make.
Our work, though, does have a purpose. The change we seek to make. The people we’re here to make it for.
When we commit to work with purpose, it transforms us as well as the people we’re engaging with.
Who’s it for, what’s it for… if we can continue to return to the purpose of this product, this meeting, this ad–then we can find a common language and coordinate our efforts to make a difference.
Resistance pushes us in many ways. It pushes us to imagine that our work isn’t for us, we’re just biding time until we get to the real stuff. It pushes us to deny responsibility or to blame the system. And mostly, it pushes us to refuse to name the purpose of how we’re spending our time.
Stuck is just another word for being conflicted about our purpose. The knot holds us back because we’ve become entangled in goals that are mutually exclusive.
2026-09-24 21:03:00
Nicole Walters is a bestselling author, a TV star, a community leader, a mom and a maker of magic.
Here’s the conversation we did about The Knot.
PS to celebrate the book, my publisher put the Kindle edition of This is Strategy on sale for $2 this week.
CORRECTED LINK: Today at 10:30 ET, I’ll be doing a live QA about problems and the Knot. Details are here. Thanks.
2026-09-24 17:03:00
They’re not the same.
They (mostly) don’t even rhyme.
People can evade responsibility by saying it’s someone else’s fault.
They can take responsibility, even if it’s not their fault.
In fact, being an adult involves taking responsibility for things that we could point out are not our fault.
We can soothe our unwillingness to take responsibility by blaming someone else, or we could surprise everyone by accepting it in advance.
And shame? Shame’s the deal killer, the dream destroyer and toxic. It’s often on offer, but we don’t have to accept it.
Today at 10:30 ET, I’ll be doing a live QA about problems and the Knot. Details are here. Thanks.
