š” The Lightbulb
A daily email about monetizing and visualizing your corporate expertise. Give me ~1 minute a day, and I'll help you turn what you know into your most differentiated and lucrative asset.
š” You know it when you see it
You know it when you see it: Wavy, metallic facades. Windy staircases. Peekaboo glass. An apparent aversion to right angles. You donāt have to be a student of architecture to recognize a Frank Gehry building like the Guggenheim museums in NYC and Bilbao, the Dancing House in Prague, or the Walt Disney Concert Hall in LA. I remember living in Miami Beach in 2011, when his New World Center symphony hall opened, drawing excited eyes from everyday residents and the art and architecture worlds...
š” A gut-punch and a game-plan
Of all the ālooking backward/looking forwardā pieces Iāve read over the past few weeks, one stood out among the rest. Itās an essay from self-described ācreative strategist & futuristā Zoe Scaman titled, āSo You Want To Be A Strategistā. In it, Zoe makes some frank observations that the agency/consulting model for strategy work is crumblingā¦ That the path she took into independent work has all but disappearedā¦ And that she wonāt/canāt tell everyone āitās going to be okā. But before you say,...
š” Minimum lovable product
Even if youāre not a product manager, or in tech at all, you may be familiar with the term āminimum viable productā or MVP. In laymenās terms, it essentially means a barebones prototype of a digital product you can test in the market to see if thereās any traction. The idea of focusing on an MVP was a pretty radical concept even just 15 years ago, challenging the assumption that you needed to have a fully functional and polished product before any sort of public release. Instead, build and...
š” The logistically inconvenient option
We had the inaugural meetup of āSeattle Solosā last night ā my attempt at getting fellow ex-corporate soloists in the area out from behind our screens and actually interacting with each other in real life. I mentioned to some attendees that I had one binary success metric for the evening: whether or not people would show up. And boy did they. Twenty-three people, to be exact. Now that might not sound like a large number, but it was certainly enough of a critical mass for both familiar faces...
š” Very Niche: Kid-free cruising
I spent the first week of the new year on a Virgin Voyages cruise to the Caribbean. One of Virginās core differentiators is that its cruises are adults-only. That strategic decision on Virginās part permeates through the entire operation: No need for family-sized cabins No need for daycare or kids programming on sea days No need for high chairs or kids menus at onboard restaurants No need to set and enforce youth curfews No need to censor or sanitize entertainment options Sounds like a lot of...
š”The Lightbulb's evolution: Where to next?
Welcome back to The Lightbulb! And a special welcome to those who joined the party over the holidays. If you can stomach one more New Yearās reflection, I'll take a minute on where this email started and why it's ok that I don't know where it's going. I started The Lightbulb as a vehicle to distill and share my POV on the solo consulting experience ā you know, the simple/tricky/frustrating/thrilling experience of acknowledging, packaging, and independently deploying your hard-earned corporate...
š” 12 Lightbulbs of Christmas [2025 Recap]
So, if you've been here since January, Iāve written to you 219 times this year -- if you're mathing, I write Mon-Fri and took a short summer hiatus. So first off, thanks for still being here. I hope thatās a signal that youāre getting value from micro-doses of my always-evolving lens on solo consulting. Weāve covered a lot together, and the umbrella theme over all of it has been simply: How to nail your consulting niche and become known for it. In fact, thatās almost exactly the positioning...
š” Rethinking your pricing next year
A super-sized sprint in a fraction of the time. How to charge? Still pricing based on inputs and deliverables? Hereās a āfresh out of the ovenā example to consider moving away from that. I just wrapped my final 2025 IP Builder (aka āIntellectual Headshotsā) sprint earlier today. If I havenāt banged it over your head enough, itās a 2-week sprint, split into 3 one-on-one working sessions, and we build 5 āheadshotsā of your expertise ā a cohesive visual narrative that articulates your clientās...
š” 4 C's to building trust
Listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts How did you make friends during your first year at college? Or start to build a reputation at your first corporate job? Or corral a new social circle when moving to a new city or country? My guess is you didnāt have a plan, you just subconsciously A/B tested a lot of things, and eventually it sort of just fell into place. As solo consultants, we find ourselves wandering that foggy path again - whether just starting out or pivoting to a new audience or ICP....
š” Very Niche: Naughty or niche?
The sea of red and white above may look like the opposite of a niche strategy but ho-ho-hold on. There are niche professions. And then thereās going niche within a niche profession. Serious Santa Clauses are a jolly example of both. As a profession, being a Santa Claus will find you in rare company and high demand. Itās a highly specific, time-sensitive job, after all, and not everyone can do it. But before you think Santas are just a commodity ā seen one Santa, seen āem all ā or āany Santa...
A daily email about monetizing and visualizing your corporate expertise. Give me ~1 minute a day, and I'll help you turn what you know into your most differentiated and lucrative asset.