Going Into 2026 With Intention: Choosing the Right Customers (and Finally Letting Revenue Take the Back Seat)
I’ve spent the majority of my career chasing revenue.
That was true long before I ever owned a business.
I took jobs that promised wealth and sold me hard on “culture.” Roles where future upside was always just around the corner — close enough to keep me pushing, far enough to never quite arrive.
Without exception, I left those jobs in a blaze of glory.
For my fellow gen Xers, think of that amazing scene in the movie, Half Baked:
- "Fuck you
- Fuck you
- Fuck you
- You're cool
- And fuck you
- I'm out" 🖐️🎤💥
Because the culture never matched the story. And the money was always used as the justification for expectations that quietly or LOUDLY burned people out.
When I started my own business, I told myself it would be different. In fact, starting Orange Pegs (and subsequently, Catalyst) ONLY happened because I became disillusioned with the idea that I'd ever find an employer that would fulfill its promises.
I wanted autonomy. I wanted meaningful work. I wanted to stop trading my happiness for proximity to people who didn’t respect the humans doing the work.
And yet, I kept finding myself working for the wrong people.
Not always (you know who you are), but often enough to make my professional life miserable (you probably don't realize who you are).
Different seat. Same bullshit.
When Revenue Becomes the Permission Slip
Early-stage business teaches us a dangerous lesson:
If they pay, it must be worth it.
So, we tolerate more than we should.
We accept clients who treat partners like interchangeable vendors. We normalize burnout culture because “that’s just how it is.” We convince ourselves we’ll fix it later — after the next milestone.
Revenue becomes the permission slip for behavior we’d never accept otherwise.
From the outside, it looks like growth.
From the inside, it's anything but.
2025 Was the Year We Stopped Lying to Ourselves
For us, 2025 wasn’t about scaling.
It was about starting over.
We intentionally stopped chasing clients that were profitable — and miserable.
Clients who:
- Consumed energy instead of creating leverage
- Treated people as disposable resources
- Valued speed over respect and pressure over partnership
- Skipped out on meetings, passed the buck, and scapegoated every problem, filling the air with their grievances, versus working toward the future
... just because they'd pay the big retainers.
Letting go was uncomfortable. Revenue-focused thinking tells you every dollar is non‑negotiable.
But the moment we created space by transforming our product to fit OUR people, something changed.
We started attracting the work and PEOPLE we actually enjoy.
Small businesses.
Solopreneurs.
Founders who are scaling something personal, not simply chasing wealth.
People who work with us, not around us. People whose success is directly tied to ours, not buried three layers down an org chart.
That kind of alignment doesn’t just feel better.
It works better.
A Warning (and a Filter)
You may see me publicly calling out how shitty it is to build success on the backs of others.
You may not like my philosophies or what I have to say.
(Here, I'll make it easy for you to see what I'm all about > visit my LinkedIn profile... check out my posts and comments. I have nothing to hide.)
That’s okay.
If you believe cold, calculated exploitation is just “good business” — whether that’s burnout culture, disposable labor, or financial games designed to avoid paying people fairly — then we’re not each other’s people.
If you think it's acceptable to dehumanize, demean, and/or mock marginalized humans... 👏 we're 👏 not 👏 each other's 👏 people.
Growth Without Intention Is Just Extraction
Every client you say yes to teaches your business what it stands for.
They shape what becomes acceptable. They influence how your team expects to be treated. They define whether growth feels sustainable or suffocating.
If you don’t choose intentionally, the market chooses for you.
And the market optimizes for extraction.
Not dignity
Not fulfillment
And certainly not longevity.
That’s not the future I’m interested in building.
What I’m Building Toward Instead
I want to work alongside people who:
- Care how growth happens, not just how fast
- Respect the humans behind the results
- See partners as collaborators, not commodities (or punching bags)
- Show up to meetings and obsess over solutions, not problems
- See kindness as a strength
I’m not here to turn professional platforms into political battlegrounds.
I’m not trying to turn LinkedIn into "Facebook, Business Edition."
One Facebook is already one too many.
But if you infer my values (equality, dignity, and building a future that doesn’t require burning people out), you’re probably reading me correctly.
If you'd like, DM me... we can have those political conversations privately. I've never shied away from a debate about social or economic policies. If anything, I've spent most of my adult life trying to disrupt the notion that we can't hold these debates at parties and family gatherings.
But at the end of the day, I am here professionally to be the change I want to see in this world by helping those with similar values instead of chasing every dollar that lands on my plate.
A Clear Signal Going Into 2026
This perspective will repel some people.
Good.
If that's you, let me show you the door. Go find somebody with your values to help your business grow. You can be miserable together. If you want, I can even make some introductions.
This perspective will also resonate deeply with founders who want to build something human, sustainable, and genuinely worth showing up for.
If that’s you, we’ll probably work very well together.
As we kick off 2026, that matters far more to me than chasing revenue ever did.
I turn 47 this year. Every minute that ticks by is one step closer to leaving this plane of existence.
When I depart, I want to be able to say, as Frank Sinatra famously sang, that, "I did it my way." And, the only way that's possible is if I did it with MY people.
If you're interested in learning what that means, apply to join our next workshop where we help solopreneurs and marketers build AI tools that gift you the same exact outcome: a path forward that requires exactly ZERO compromises. Attract and close the customers you want without breaking the bank or losing control.
