Notes from inside the room.
Short essays for senior corporate professionals navigating positioning, authority, interviews, and negotiation. New writing roughly every other week.
Stop applying. Start positioning.
Why a 100-application strategy is the reason senior professionals stay unemployed at month five - and what to do instead.
The 30-second interview hook for senior roles.
Hiring managers decide in the first half-minute whether you are serious. Here is how to engineer that half-minute.
Executive presence is not charisma. It is compression.
The three-second test that decides whether you get the VP title or get passed over again.
Applying for a specific role: a playbook for senior candidates.
The four documents that turn a $200K req into a serious conversation - and the one mistake that kills it before week two.
Managing up to a non-technical CEO without losing yourself.
Translation is not dumbing down. It is the most senior skill you will ever build.
Negotiating at the senior level without burning the offer.
Three moves that lift comp by $40K on average - and the one move that loses the offer in the final hour.
The six-month search trap.
What happens to your market value at month four - and the recalibration that resets it.
Why your LinkedIn is costing you the role you want.
The five lines above the fold that decide whether a recruiter reads paragraph two - or moves on.
The real cost of a bad senior hire - and what hiring managers are actually scared of.
Understanding the fear on the other side of the table is the fastest route to a yes.
What actually changes when you cross into VP - and why most directors stall.
The four shifts that decide whether you get the title - or stay one rung below for another two years.