Sparkbound

We exist to unlock the potential of people to do more good, better.

Sparkbound is a leadership development academy disguised as a medical sales organization and medical device distributor. We are focused on going beyond transactions and enriching the lives of our people, partners, and practitioners.

Founder & Principal

Enovis

Sr. Salesperson building Sparkbound ❇️

Arthrex

Agency Sales Manager

Arthrex Extremity & Trauma Lead & Territory Manager

Upper Extremity Sales lead

Arthrex Clinical Specialist

Arthrex Technology Consultant | Sales Professional 

Empire Medical

Executive Sales Manager

P4L Fitness & Torque Sports Performance

Director of Sports Performance

Hospital for Special Surgery

Worked independently for Dr. Adele Boskey’s laboratory. Dr. Boskey is 	interested in tissue mineralization; the ultimate goal in the lab was to improve bone quality by providing insight needed for new 	therapies and tissue engineered products. My specific research project was focused on the role of proteoglycans in the bone mineralization process. More specifically, I looked at the effect of 	the interaction between the large proteoglycan, aggrecan, and aggrecanase (ADAMTS) and aggrecanase inhibitors (TIMP) on hydroxyapatite formation in a gel system. My work was paralleled 	with identical studies performed in this laboratory in a cell culture 	system.

Research Assistant

Weill Cornell Medical College

Presented and participated in weekly journal clubs. Partook in a Lab Techniques Workshop and Clinical Skills Workshop. Scrubbed into surgeries at the New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Gave an oral 	presentation at Leadership Alliance National Symposium and written and poster presentation of my research at Weill Cornell Medical College.

Intern

I help salespeople become sales leaders w/ the Salesblazer Method™️ | Executive Sales Leader

Over the last decade, I helped build multiple multi-million dollar medical device territories by developing new markets and strategic sales teams. I also helped customer-partners build their personal brands and land consulting contracts, which led to developing new products/techniques and enhanced patient outcomes.

Then, in 2023, I hit a fork in the road. Do I continue building someone else's company at the expense of my convictions, or do I risk my comfortable life to gain personal agency, take complete ownership over my future, and craft something worth telling a story about?

Building something on my terms and diversifying my income would be the best pathway towards control over my calendar, autonomy over the work I get to do, and the direct impact I can have.

While this pathway has not been easy, the results have been remarkable.

Since leaving a sales executive role with a great brand, I have been able to replace my income by working for myself with less effort (working smart).

I have launched Sparkbound, a medical sales & marketing organization that goes beyond the transaction and seeks to enrich the lives of others.

Sparkbound not only helps our people build influential careers, increase our partners' influence, or improve our practitioners' patient outcomes, but we also want to help aspiring difference makers become the change they wish they could make... and then help them make positive change happen.

My mission is to help you see that you're not stuck. You don't have to labor and live as others expect you to. My mission is to help you challenge the status quo, lead by design, and choose the impact you wish to have.

I love writing about leadership, specifically leadership without titles, about how high-impact professionals can earn personal agency, purposeful productivity (doing more good, better), and meaningful work.

Francisco Martinez

Most people wait for the perfect opportunity to start leading.

The perfect promotion.
The right work/life balance. 
The sales kickoff meeting.
A bigger team.

But here’s what I’ve learned after building sales teams:

There is no perfect opportunity.

The promotion won't make you a leader.
There is no such thing as work/life balance in sales leadership.
Leadership happens before the title. 

The people who get promoted don't wait. 

They start.
They lead anybody.
Create opportunities to serve.  
They find solutions that everyone has been aching for. 

Because they understand something most people ignore:

You don’t build influence by a title. 
You earn it by leading. 

Serving builds trust.
Solving problems makes you indispensable.

That’s exactly how I've gone from a sales demotion to now running my own sales organization.

Not with a perfect plan.

But by showing up every day seeking to enrich the lives of others.

What about you?

Making Leaders Remarkable | Follow for systems & strategies for effortless leadership & remarkable work | Founder & Principal building an 8-figure sales agency from scratch

Character is king. 

Character > Competency.
Character > Credentials. 
Character > Commissions. 

Character lasts forever.

The best leaders aren't the smartest in the room. 

More knowledge won't get you promoted. Try this instead:

Acquire wisdom. 

Here's why:

🧠 Knowledge is about knowing more. 
🦉 Wisdom is about knowing you don't know enough. 

🧠 Knowledge says, "I know the answer." 
🦉 Wisdom asks, "What's the right question?"

🧠 Knowledge recites best practices. 
🦉 Wisdom knows when to break them.

🧠 Knowledge speaks first in meetings. 
🦉 Wisdom listens, then synthesizes what others missed.

🧠 Knowledge focuses on being right. 
🦉 Wisdom focuses on being useful.

🧠 Knowledge collects information. 
🦉 Wisdom connects the dots others can't see.

The leaders who get promoted aren't the ones with the most certifications or the biggest vocabulary.

They're the ones who can navigate complexity, read between the lines, and make decisions when the data is incomplete.

They turn information into insight. Problems into opportunities. Chaos into clarity.

Stop collecting knowledge. Start cultivating wisdom.

Your career will thank you.

What's one moment when wisdom mattered more than knowledge in your career? Share below 👇

-- 
♻️ Repost to help others lead with wisdom
➕ Like and follow Francisco Martinez for more insights

The best medical sales reps don't sell. They serve.

After 13 years in medical sales, I've watched too many reps crash and burn trying to be the smartest person in the room.

Here's what actually works:

Stop trying to impress doctors.
Start trying to improve patient outcomes.

This mindset changes everything.

Here are the non-negotiables for high-performing medical sales reps: 

✅ Lead with patient impact, not product features
✅ Create opportunities to serve your customers. 
✅ Play the long game and build trust as you build your pipeline.
✅ Educate, educate, educate. 
✅ Don't knock the competition. 

Here's the interesting truth:

When you stop selling and start serving, your numbers go up.

In medical sales, we don't just move products.
We're integral to someone's healing.

Act like it.

What's the most important lesson you've learned about putting people before profit?

♻️ Repost if this resonates
➕ Follow for more on character-driven sales leadership

The wrong path looks promising. 

Until you are replaced. 

I used to think success came from putting in the most hours.

→ First in. Last one out.
→ Say yes to every opportunity.
→ Take work off your boss’s plate. 

The formula they sold us:
Be everywhere → Pay your dues → Trust the process

But here’s the problem:

Budget cuts happen.
Burnout persists.
And no one is looking after your career. 
One bad performance can make you replaceable. 

Now I focus on building what can’t be replaced:

1. Your Attitude
You can’t control every outcome.
But you can control whether people want you in the room when things get tough.

2. Your Wisdom
Thanks to ChatGPT, Knowledge is cheap these days.
But applying that knowledge? That’s hard-earned. 
Wisdom only comes from personal experience plus reflection.

3. Your EQ Skills
Tools change. Markets shift.
But people don’t. The ability to communicate and win with people will outlast AI. 

4. Your Character
Character can’t be bought. 
It is developed and tested over time. 
While others focus on competencies and credentials, build the foundation that no one else is. 

5. Your Discipline
Motivation can pack a punch, but has a short fuse. 
Discipline keeps your butt in the chair no matter how you feel. 


6. Your Leadership
Leadership isn’t a title.
It’s creating opportunities to initiate acts of service.

7. Your Point of View
A unique, well-reasoned perspective is a moat.
It sets you apart in a world drowning in copycats.

These 7 things made me indispensable.
No org chart. No market shift. No competitor can take them away.

You don’t need to protect yourself.
You need to build value that no one can replace.

♻️ Repost to help your tribe become indispensable
➕ Follow to learn how to become the one your company can't live without

Don't just pray for a great culture.

Be the answer to your prayer.

It's easy to hope for a healthy workplace—one where you feel safe, valued, and seen.

But culture isn't something you stumble upon.

It's something you help create.

Culture is not:

- Pizza, ping pong, or even pickleball
- Unlimited PTO or remote work
- A profitable business unit
- A mission statement
- HR department
- Core values
- The CEO

The success or attitude of individual contributors is not the measure of culture. 
But is measured by:

- Low burnout
- Employee referrals
- High retention rates
- People celebrate each other
- Alignment of all people and parts
- The way employees feel on Sunday night

Yet, no culture is perfect. Even great workplaces will disappoint at times.
And that's okay.

That's why what matters is how you carry yourself and champion the culture you wish you had.

You bring attitude, habits, and values everywhere you go.

The best cultures aren't found. Courageous people cultivate them.

So yes, pray for a great team, a mission you can stand behind, and a culture that breathes life.

But don't stop there.
Be the person who:

- Gives credit
- Has a bias for action
- Chooses to lead without a title.
- Praises the efforts and success of others.
- Isn't waiting to be asked to serve but creates opportunities to serve.

You're not just a recipient of great culture.
You're crafting it—every day.

How else can someone be the solution to a better culture?

If you want to work remotely, that's great.

If you want a hybrid workplace, that's awesome.

If you want to return to the office to be present with people, wonderful.

If you want to quit and work for a remote company, go for it.

If you want to bring everybody back from their home offices, own up to it.

If you want to go to a 4-day work week, that's also cool.

So many people are trying to fortune-tell the future of work.

Many are trying to push their version of success on others.

They pretend that one way of working is better or superior to the other.

Stop believing everyone's opinions.

You live in the digital revolution, which provides many options.

Determine the direction of your life and what works best for you this season.
Then get after it!

Be faithful no matter where you work.
That's true success.

99% of people overcomplicate career moves.

So, in 2023, I simplified the riskiest career decision of my life. 

What they won't teach you in school or corporate America is that all you need is:

1. Direction - where do you want to go in life? 
2. Anti-goals - what are you not willing to give up?
3. Convictions - Why and what must you do no matter what?
4. People - whom do you have as your personal board of advisors?

Things you don't need:

1. To listen to your heart.
2. 5 & 10-year plans.
3. Large network.

The key is to decide on your career before you need to choose. 

And no matter what, be excellent and intentional. 

Because none of this matters if you suck at your work.

What would you add to this career decision framework?

The best sales leaders don't obsess over numbers. 

They obsess over people (and their growth). 

Here's a simple playbook for developing your people: 

> Invest in everyone, not just top performers.
> Be the leader you wished you had.
> Know your people's strengths & weaknesses (personal SWOT).
Create an actionable development plan that drives better paychecks.
> Become a broken record with the company's mission, values, and vision.
Connect people's "why" to the company's purpose.
> Coach, don't command.
> Delegate to grow people, not just clear your plate.
> Lead from the trenches with daily rep face time.
> Make 1:1s sacred (& follow through).
> Celebrate effort, not just results.

The math is simple:
Better people = better culture = better results. 

Choose people over profit because people matter more. The byproduct? They generate profit. 

Do you agree?

After 13 years in medical sales (17 total in sales), I've had to reinvent my career several times. 

I have been demoted, stuck, and promoted. 

I have represented large brands and startups. 

Every time, it has come down to these basic but powerful habits. 

Here are the 17 powerful habits of high-impact salespeople:

1. Focus on what you can control: your attitude & actions
2. Learn to say, "I don't know, but let me find out." 
3" Give, don't take. Give away your time, expertise, & self. 
4. The day starts the night before. Wake up to execute. 
5. Practice patience, not passivity. Growth takes time. 
6. Like navy seals, train with a pod of peers. 
7. Sundays are for strategy. Plan an ideal week.
8. Get aligned every quarter with your values and mission
9. Always be checking in on your character. 
10. Do what you say you will do, even if it costs you. 
11. First impressions are for impact, not to impress. 
12. Time block high revenue activities. Ruthlessly stick to it
13. Send a weekly highlight report to your boss. 
14. Send a weekly lessons learned report to your team. 
15. End each day with a self-assessment review of yourself.
16. Solve big problems instead of reacting to fire drills.  
17. Go beyond the transaction and seek to enrich lives. 

Medical sales, and all sales, is more than hitting quota. 

It's about becoming the person you would rave about doing business with. 

What did I miss? 

--
♻️ Repost to help your network become a high-impact salesperson
➕ Follow for more tips on how to grow your sales career

Character is king. 

You can't fake true character. 

The truth of one's character is revealed in time.

Trust me when I say:

- mastering influence
- excelling in your role
- crafting solutions as a niche
- teaching others to create success

And above all, being worthy of remark...

Will make it 100x easier to get promoted.

Waiting for an opportunity isn’t reliable. Go create a demand for your skills.

The sales boss who kills careers obsesses over numbers. 

Instead of the growth of their people. 

This is especially true in medical device sales, where companies want market share at the expense of people.  

That's why they obsess over acquiring managers and not leaders. 

Leaders help people grow. 

Sales leadership needs to stop:

❌ Managing spreadsheets
❌ Celebrating ONLY the quota achievers
❌ Compromising culture for short-term wins
❌ Measuring success by one bad quarter report

Instead leaders do the following:

✅ Help their salespeople make SMARTER goals
✅ Help align their goals with the company's purpose and goals
✅ Have clear expectations and stop micromanaging
✅ Recognize growth moments that build character
✅ Invest in their potential even when it costs you today
✅ Measure success by their consistency and direction

The leaders who get this right are the ones who:

↳ Ask more questions of their people (they care about them)
↳ Spend more time coaching and practicing
↳ See potential in people before they see it in themselves
↳ Build careers, not just quarterly results

I've watched this play out over and over.

When you care about the people you care for more than just their numbers. 

You want people not just to hit their targets because they have to. 
You want them to crust it because they want to, and they are bought in. 

What's the most impactful way a leader has invested in your growth?

♻️ Repost if you believe in people-first leadership
➕ Follow for more insights on better sales leadership

Caring isn't a strategy you implement. 

It is a lifestyle you embody daily.

So stop acting like you care. Start actually caring. 

❌ Don't perform empathy for your team 
✅ Genuinely invest in their growth

❌ Don't fake interest in customers
 ✅ Detach from profit and connect as humans

❌ Don't care for the applause 
✅ Care because it's a person you can impact

If you feel you are acting, tell yourself to care genuinely.

Do the work to make an impact, not just to impress.

What's one way to embody authentic care?

♻️ Repost to create a more caring world
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The most dangerous attitude in sales?

"I already know that" or "I don't need help."

I've seen sales careers, especially med sales, crash and burn with that attitude.

Earlier in my career, I saw my own ego get me demoted because of words like that.  

I've seen the most talented salespeople miss opportunities because of that attitude. 

Here's what I've learned about success in sales:

The moment you think you know it all or don't need help, you've already lost.

The top performers who succeed in the long run are the ones who:

↳ Still walk through their checklist before time with a customer
↳ Invite teammates to review your performance
↳ Ask "what would you have done differently?" after every encounter
↳ Read and learn daily
↳ Do not defend against correction from leadership

You only learn from every conversation in the field if you have a humble attitude.

An attitude that wants to improve. 
Craves to learn. 
Never comfortable. 
Is teachable. 

Being humble means:
- You haven't arrived (& never will)
- You can't get there without others

It's not about being weak.
It's about being wise.

Sales is hard and competitive. 

But if you stay teachable and humble
You'll overcome.

Choose a leader instead of a job. 

The wrong manager can hold your career back for years. 

The right managers see your potential, help you unlock your potential, and champion your promotion. 

The best leaders are agnostic to the logo they represent. 
They are believers in the people they are responsible for. 

The best managers prioritize people first, then profit. 

I've worked for great leaders. 

- They believed I had potential.
- They asked about my wife & children. 
- They invested in me even when I deserved to be fired. 
- They designed comp plans around revenue goals, not quota.
- They created roles to solve problems that fit my passion and strengths. 
- They listened - and did not turn on me - when I considered outside offers.

I once struggled because I wasn't sure I wanted to be in this industry. 
My leaders noticed my decreasing excitement, put their arms around me, and said, "Where do you want to be? We'll help you get there." 

They are why I stayed when I was offered better financial offers. 
They are the reason I haven't quit the medical device industry.

Ultimately, their leadership has produced several promotions for me, bigger paychecks, and once-in-a-lifetime career opportunities. 

Choose leaders who want to see you grow today. 

Agree? Let me know your thoughts👇

The best ideas don't come from dreadful meetings. 

More brainstorming on a whiteboard won't move your business forward. 

Ideas matter.
All great things started with an idea. 
That was executed. Iterated. Reshipped. 

Whether ideas to improve the workplace.
Or ideas for new products or companies. 

Ideas accelerated my career. 

I went from being demoted to an accelerated promotion track due to the high-impact ideas I brought to the table and executed. 

But if you never make time to break away to generate ideas, you'll never make time to execute them. 

Here's my Idea OS:

1) Get outside
> Find a happy place. 
> Schedule it during the best time. 
> For me, it's sunrise mornings in the hills and trails behind my house. 

2) Have a plan
> Have an exercise plan: you can walk, ruck, or run
> Have a thinking plan: what are you listening to? Podcast? Music? Audio book?
> For me, it's whatever I am working on or wanting to create. 

3) Come prepared
> I get to my happy place and set time with juices already flowing.
> This means I have already read, prayed, and prepared my heart. 
> Getting out and moving takes it to the next level. 
> Bring the right tools: notepad & pen, notes app, podcast app, etc. 

4) Capture
> When an idea or thought arrives that I want to capture, I pause. 
> I use Ali Abdaal's Voicepal app to record and transcribe all my thoughts. 

5) Create
> Don't just waste this session by doing nothing after the fact. 
> When resolve is high, take action. 
> Make a plan to outline the next steps of the best and most crucial idea you had. 
> Take a step to execute the first thing in that idea. 
> Schedule the following steps. 

Commit to a place and time to get outside and move. 
Chart a course for your time there. 
Capture what matters most. 
Commit to execution. 
Craft a plan around the most essential idea. 
Create and execute. 

For me, not one week goes by without me getting out there at least once. 

What are your favorite ways to get your creative juices flowing? 

♻️ Repost to help your tribe ditch meetings and be more creative. 

Follow Francisco Martinez for more insights like this.

Don't quit. Don't give up. Turn that frustration around. 

Success is not a corner office, a title, or a bigger role. 

Thinking vanity metrics measured success almost destroyed my career. 

Thinking I could impact lives if I had that bigger role hindered my effort. 

I realized that it wasn't my managers keeping me from bigger and better things. 
It was me. 

Once I chose to be a salesblazer, making positive change happen right where I was and leading without a title, my career blossomed. 

Here's the mindset that finds success with or without titles:

- You make change happen for the sake of others. 
- You initiate solving common problems your way. 
- You think beyond your role. Create a rising tide. 
- You are willing to ask for help from your tribe.
- You are faithful with what you've been given.
- You detach from outcomes. Create systems. 
- You know what makes you unique. 
- You don't hate small beginnings.
- You adopt the 12-week year. 
- You aim to work hard. 
- You excel. 

The result? 

You build an impactful and successful career.

The most impactful leaders are the ones who serve. 

Leadership is not a license to do less but a responsibility to serve. 

But everyone gets servant leadership wrong.

It's not about being willing to serve.

But initiating acts of service.

Change from this:

- "If there is any way I can help you let me know."
- "I love helping and serving others."
- "Tell me how I can help."
- "Do you need any help?"

Initiate service this way:

- "I see the best way I can help you is by option a or option b. Which one is it?"
- "You have a lot going on. I am going to take this off your plate."
- "I knew you would say you didn't need help, but I showed up anyway and am ready for you to put me to work."

Most people will not ask for help or say they need it, even if you ask.

Servant-leaders know this and create ways to serve and surprise others.

How will you create opportunities to serve others next week?

Virtual Sales RX

Virtual Sales Rx is a strategy and personalized approach that focuses on building trust and relationships with customers, understanding their needs and preferences, and providing them with tailored solutions utilizing brand awareness, content marketing, and personalized videos. 

We launched an agency for sales consultants that want to build a 6 figure side-hustle that can lead to a 7 figure stand-alone agency.

Chief Evangelist

FEED. The Agency

Voted #1 Agency by the American Marketing Association (Amy Award) for Best Cause Marketing Advertisement. 

FEED is an award-winning healthcare brand agency engaged by doctors and dentists who want to creatively differentiate themselves in their local marketplace in the mindset of their ideal patients. With more than 50 years of combined healthcare advertising and patient marketing experience, FEED can create, design, and deliver talked about patient campaigns for the doctor who is frustrated with cookie cutter marketing approaches.

Recent out of the box creative brand projects include:

1. Video brochures and marketing that generate more patient leads. 
2. ReBranding. We help practices revitalize their brand positioning at critical seasons of their brand cycle.
3. Healthcare professional brand platforms that help physicians and dentists differentiate their unique perspective, procedure, and protocol in the marketplace and mindset of their ideal patients. 
4. Brand Guides for medical device companies. 

Services we provide:

Brand Strategy
Website Development
Personal Brand Platform Development
Lead Generation Campaign Development
Online Brand Reputation Management
Increased 5 Star Patient Reviews
Video Marketing
Brand Journalism and Social Media Management
Creative Design

Principal + Managing  Director

Lorem Cytori USA, Inc

Senior Director, Social Media

The Strategic Incubator

The Strategic Incubator equips healthcare brands to monetize their healthy ideas.

Managing Partner

Smith & Nephew

Director of Pacific Northwest Sales 

MacroPore Biosurgery

Co-Developer and General Manager of a biotechnology bio-resorbable implant used in controlling cardiovascular adhesions.

Responsible for Global Sales & Marketing.

Vice President, Sales 

Straumann Group

Director of Craniomaxillofacial Sales

US Army

United States Army Officer

I help specialty surgeons avoid the money pit of traditional marketing, digitize trust, and monetize their digital thought leadership. 

We help medical technology develop (DOL) campaigns:

Instead of pushing cold outbound at unqualified leads, med tech will:
✔ Attract buyers who already trust & respect them.
✔ Nurture demand at scale with strategic content.
✔ Fill the pipeline with surgeons who are ready to act.

This is how the most successful MedTech brands in 2025 are winning.
Not by chasing leads, but by engineering intent.

I launched FEED. The Agency in 2010 to help med tech companies and specialty surgeons create brand stories that differentiate them from the sea of sameness. We received ADDY and AMY Awards for best healthcare brand marketing and were selected by The American Marketing Association as Best Cause Marketing Agency. 

Personal description:

82nd Airborne Warrior Poet. Army Officer. Husband to Sweet Sandi. Father of three fearless artists.

Matthew Ray Scott

Why I’m NEVER Invited to Speak at Med Sales Meetings (And Why I’m Fine Escaping the Matrix).

Because I say the quiet parts out loud:

1️⃣ Never Carry Anyone Else’s Quota
If someone benefits from your effort more than you benefit from your effort… you’re not in sales. You’re in servitude.

2️⃣ If You Have To Wait To Get Promoted, You’re Not Being Developed - You’re Being Contained. High performers don’t need ladders. They build exits.

3️⃣ Non-Competes Are Corporate Handcuffs
If a company’s best retention strategy is a legal document, the culture was already broken.

4️⃣ Selling Through VAC Is Politics Masquerading as Process
It’s not about innovation.
It’s not about outcomes.
It’s about navigating a maze of bureaucracy, bundle deals, turf wars, and hidden agendas -where the best idea loses to the best internal alliance.

5️⃣ Fear-Based Leadership Is the Real Matrix
Meetings. Metrics. Mandates.
All engineered to keep you compliant, not creative.

The Matrix doesn’t break you.
It just hopes you never realize the door was open the whole time.

Top Physician Brand Strategist for Surgeons | Physician Brand Rx™ Creator | Best-Selling Author | Voted Best Cause Marketing Agency by The AMA.

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The Strange Request That Led Me Back to Arkansas at 50


At 50 years old, I made a decision most people my age never make:
I came back home. To Arkansas.

But because for the first time in my adult life, I stopped chasing what I was supposed to do…
 … and started choosing where I needed to become who I actually am.

It took me five decades to understand this:

If you don’t deliberately choose your WHERE,
your WHAT and HOW will always be scattered.

Returning to Arkansas was my men@pause moment - I chose to listen.
And oddly enough, that clarity came from the most unpolished story/ ritual imaginable:

Peeing in my backyard.

When I was around 35, I was with Seth Tibbetts at his parents home in Texas. A beautiful farm outside the Dallas skyscrapers. 

Dr. Tibbetts, Seth's father, would excuse himself from the table and return a few moments later. This happened twice. We're drinking his bougie wine, so no judgement. 

Dr. Tibbetts excused himself from the table and Mrs. Tibbetts says to me, "Do you know what he's doing?" I responded, "No, Mam." "He's pissing in our backyard," Mrs. Tibbetts said. 

Dr. Tibbetts returns to the table and Mrs. Tibbetts called him out. 

Dr. Tibbetts mentor moment - 
"Matthew, I grew up poor. So I imagined what rich people can do. Rich people have backyards big enough to piss on - and nobody can see them." 

Fast-forward 15 years later, we moved from San Diego to Arkansas Ozarks. A place big enough to piss in the backyard - guests are welcome.

Dr. Tibbetts brief, ridiculous, honest moment became my daily “identity checkpoint.”

That was the surprise:
Coming back to Arkansas didn’t give me nostalgia.
It gave me alignment.

This land - this air - this backyard...
it gave me a WHERE that finally felt like mine
so my WHAT and HOW could trail behind it with clarity.
In my 30s and 40s, I chased opportunity.

At 50, I finally built environment.
And environment changes identity faster than ambition ever will.

Choose a place where your future self can breathe.
The rest will follow.

Your WHERE shapes your WHO.
Your WHO shapes your WORK.
Your WORK shapes your world.

And sometimes, clarity begins in the least expected ritual -pissing in my backyard and 17 seconds of honesty. 

men@pause isn’t about slowing down.
It’s about coming home -
to your geography, your identity, and your purpose.

- - - 
I co-wrote men@pause with two buddies - Chris Lisle and G. Bryan Cornwall, PhD, MBA, PEng

It became a best-selling book in first two weeks of launch. 

Maybe? Because we pissed on the pretentiousness of male hustle culture.

The best career advice is now the worst.


Pick one thing. Specialize. Go deep.

That worked when geography was required and employers held all the cards.

But something shifted.

The most interesting people I meet aren’t specialists.

They’re slash careers.

Lifestyle Design Entrepreneurs. 

Writer/consultant. Designer/coach. Surgeon/speaker.

Not because they can’t commit.

Because they’ve realized the old model was never about them - it was about making them easier to categorize, easier to hire, easier to control.

These people aren’t only in Boston or Orlando.

We’re even in Bentonville, Arkansas.

Turns out lifestyle design isn’t about escaping work.

It’s about refusing to let geography, job titles, or someone else’s org chart dictate how you build a life.

The question isn’t “what do you do?”

The question is “what have you designed?”

Here’s to the ones who refused to pick a lane.

The Creative Ritual That Lets Me Produce 48 Biz Dev Outreach in 48 Hours

Most people think I sit at my desk and grind out content.

I don’t.

I run content micro-adventures.

Here’s what I mean:

Instead of locking myself in a room for 10 hours, I turn my home and neighborhood into a 48-hour creative course - a series of tiny, intentional missions that keep my mind fresh and my ideas sharp.

Each “mission” has one job: harvest 5–8 pieces of thought leadership & biz dev. 

By the end of 48 hours, I’ve gathered the brief personalized videos I create and send to 7 surgeons I want to help and my LinkedIn posts I write for the week. 

Here’s what those missions look like:

• Porch Recon: Coffee + cold air → personal brand posts
• Backyard Perimeter Walk: Dictation laps → raw insights
• Living Room Reset: Floor sitting → contrarian takes
• Garage War Room: Standing desk → brand frameworks
• Coffee Shop Drop-In: 20-minute sprints → punchy hooks
• Library Ambush: Silence → long-form ideas & outlines
• Mountain View Micro-Adventure: Scenic overlook → philosophy writing + videos

Every location changes the energy.
Every movement shifts the ideas.
Every shift unlocks new creative signal.

I call it FIT: Functionally Inspired Transitions 

Move. Observe. Capture. Move again.

No burnout.
No staring at a blinking cursor.
No forcing inspiration.

Just rhythm, creativity, and momentum.

If you create for others - or you’re building thought leadership for yourself - try this:

Stop “sitting down to write.”
Start designing a creative environment that pulls ideas out of you.

Your best thinking rarely happens in captivity.
Mine definitely doesn’t.

The Modern Shepherd

A shepherd doesn’t herd sheep anymore.

Not the kind that matters.

Matt Hallmark understands this. Which is why Ortho Shepherd isn’t really about orthopedics.

It’s about something we’ve almost forgotten how to do.

Think about it:
A Naval Academy ethics professor.
An AI software entrepreneur.
Orthopedic surgeons.
Tony Sommer (most interesting man in world). 

What do they have in common?

Nothing.
And everything.

Because here’s what Matt figured out:

In a world drowning in connection, we’re starving for conversation.
In a society built on networks, we’ve forgotten how to build tables.
In an age of infinite reach, we’ve lost the art of gathering.

The old shepherd protected sheep from wolves.
The modern shepherd protects ideas from noise.

So Matt did something radical:
He asked people to fly in.
Not for a conference.
Not for content.
Not for a transaction.

For a meal.
For discourse.
For the one thing algorithms can’t replicate: presence.

Ortho Shepherd isn’t a business model.
It’s a decision.

The decision that some conversations are worth protecting.
That some people are worth gathering.
That breaking bread matters more than breaking news.

Most of us are building platforms.
Matt’s building tables.

And people came.
From around the country.
Because someone finally asked them to stop broadcasting and start connecting.

The shepherd’s job hasn’t changed.
It’s still about bringing the scattered together.
About creating safe space for what matters.
About leading without forcing.

We just forgot we needed one.

What would happen if you stopped trying to reach everyone and started gathering the right ones?

The Stocking Stuffer Test

Twenty copies.

That’s how many books, Mike Nelligan, a friend just bought to give away as stocking stuffers this Christmas.

Not because I asked.
Not because there was a discount.
Not because he wanted to be nice.

Because he believed the ideas inside might matter to twenty people he cares about.

After such a thoughtful gesture, I think: 

How many people believed in your work enough to put their reputation on it?

When someone buys twenty copies of anything - a book, a course, a product-they’re not making a purchase.

They’re making a statement:
“This changed something for me. And I think it might change something for you.”

We wrote men@pause: Life 2.0 because we saw men struggling with transitions in silence. The book wasn’t supposed to be a bestseller. It was supposed to start conversations.

Turns out, when you give people permission to talk about the hard stuff, they want to share that permission with others.

To my friend who bought those twenty copies-and to anyone who’s ever believed in someone’s work enough to share it:

You’re not customers.
You’re conspirators.

And that matters more than any bestseller list.

11 Elite Tips for Surgeons Who Want to Own Their Brand Category

(Brand Positioning • Digital Thought Leadership • MedTech Monetization • Reputation Management)

1. Create a category, not a procedure.
Patients want the "restless-aging orthopedic surgeon" - not the 17th ortho surgeon.

2. Write the headline that defines your career.
If your name were on a billboard in Times Square, what would it say?

3. Build a branded proprietary protocol.
Surgeons without named processes look interchangeable. THE Orthopedic Journey =Ryan “Saw-Bones” Molli, D.O.

4. Stop waiting to be selected as a KOL; start being a DOL.
Key Opinion Leaders talk about products. Digital Opinion Leaders shape the market w/their own narrative.

5. Digitize trust before the first visit.
Personalized videos collapse the distance between “stranger” and “this is my doctor.”

6. Make your brand a problem statement.
Patients don’t choose surgeons — they buy solutions to their specific fear.

7. Create your Persona Map.
Most surgeons talk about procedures; the elite talk about who they are built for.

8. Become searchable in AI.
If ChatGPT can’t reference you, you don’t exist in modern patient discovery.

9. Build MedTech inbound — not outbound.
Make device companies come to you because of your digital footprint.

10.  Don’t share cases — share frameworks.
Frameworks scale your mind. Cases only scale your technical ability.

11. Stop paying to be found and start paying as little as possible to be heard.

Olympic athletes belong on podiums. But film them walking through the Louvre? 

Suddenly you can’t look away.

Same principle applies to surgeons.

Your clinical excellence is expected. It’s table stakes. What’s unexpected - what builds actual authority - is when you show up in rooms where surgeons ‘aren’t supposed to be.’

Boardrooms. 
Podcasts. 
Stages. 

The OR is your arena. But your reputation is built in the rooms you’re not expected to enter.

After 15 years helping surgeons digitize trust and monetize their reputation, here’s what I hold to be true:

1. The reputation monetization isn’t in being a KOL. It’s in being a DOL.
Most surgeons still dream of being selected as a Key Opinion Leader by a medtech company.

That’s renting influence.
A (DOL) Digital Opinion Leader owns it.

KOLs wait to be chosen.
DOLs build their own platform.

KOLs are controlled by company messaging.
DOLs control the narrative.

2.	Surgeons rely on the least qualified person to handle their digital presence.

And this is exactly why everyone is indifferent.

The practice manager doesn’t understand thought leadership.

The local agency doesn’t understand surgeon culture.

Medtech isn’t looking out for your individual authority.

So surgeons outsource their reputation to whoever has time - not whoever has strategy.

And they get crappy social media instead of digital thought leadership.

Posting isn’t positioning.
Activity isn’t authority.
The surgeons who win will understand the difference.
These aren’t popular opinions.

But in 15 years, I’ve never once had a practice manager ask me what we’ve learned about building surgeon authority.

Only once has a medtech company ask how they could help their surgeons become Digital Opinion Leaders.

Nobody is looking out for your digital thought leadership.

It’s on

God in the Space Between My Children


My son is Catholic.

Mass on Sundays.
Rosary on his nightstand.
The faith of his father’s grandfather’s grandfather.

My oldest daughter is Church of Christ.

Scripture as anchor.
Tradition as compass.
The certainty her husband was raised in.

The first time I visited my wife’s Pentecostal church, I genuflected. Everyone thought I was slain in the Spirit. I just didn’t know whether to duck or dance.

And then there’s Sierra.

The middle daughter.

The one who burned the map.

She deconstructed everything her brother and sister kept.

The hymns.
The rituals.
The certainty.
The comfort.

I used to think I failed her.

One child got my roots.
One child got her mother’s.
One child got… questions.

Everyone warned her about the slippery slope.

But nobody warned me what it’s like to sit at a dinner table with three children -

And realize they’re all finding the same God through completely different doors.

My son kneels.
My oldest daughter studies.
My middle daughter wrestles.

And somehow -

They all arrive.

Maybe that’s grace.

Not one path.

Just one destination with infinite entry points.

I didn’t fail Sierra.

I gave her permission to find her own way in.

Even if it scared me to watch.

- - - 

I encouraged Sierra to write about her journey. A brief snippet below.

Surgeons see something most people miss:

Men aren’t broken - they’re in transition.

Every day you meet the 48-year-old who “just has back pain”…
the athlete who “just tore a tendon”…
the husband who “just feels off.”

But it’s never just the injury.

It’s identity.
It’s transition.
It’s the moment a man realizes his old map no longer works.

As we wrote in men@pause:
“The journey isn’t linear. It’s cyclical. Like seasons.”  

And surgeons often become the first place a man stops pretending he’s fine.

That’s why your work matters so much more than the procedure:
You don’t just restore movement - you help men reclaim momentum, meaning, and the possibility of a next chapter.

Men aren’t falling apart.
They’re becoming.

And surgeons guide that becoming every single day.

G. Bryan Cornwall, PhD, MBA, PEng 
Chris Lisle

Everyone's got an opinion about turkey.
Brine it. Smoke it. Deep fry it. (Don't deep fry it inside, please.)

The turkey isn't the point.
The point is the pause.

[I co-authored men@pause: Life 2.0 - a best-selling book on "pause." https://a.co/d/bn7W781]

Because Thanksgiving isn't really about the food. It's about the rare moment when everyone stops. Stops scrolling. Stops pitching. Stops optimizing.

For one meal, we sit across from people instead of screens.
That's rarer than you think.

Your inbox will still be there Friday. The deal will still need closing Monday. The algorithm will still be hungry tomorrow.
But today?
Today is for the people who showed up. Not your LinkedIn connections. Not your ICP. Not your target demographic.

Just... people. Eating carbs. Telling the same stories. Pretending someone's casserole is better than it is.

That's the gift.

The world tells us to optimize everything. Thanksgiving says: just be present for this one.

So whether your turkey is deep-fried, smoked, or suspiciously dry—it doesn't matter.

What matters is who's at the table.

And that you're grateful enough to notice.

Happy Thanksgiving.

A lot of surgeons who reach out to me say the same thing, just in different words.

They’re excellent in the OR.
Their outcomes are strong.
Their peers respect them.

But online, none of that shows up.

And that gap matters more than most surgeons realize.

Patients are forming trust before they ever meet you.
Peers are forming opinions before they ever speak with you.
Media and medtech are scanning signals before they ever make contact.

We work with frustrated surgeons that do life-changing surgery and still feel unknown or interchangeable outside their immediate circle.

That’s the problem I work on.

I help surgeons translate their real-world expertise into a digital presence that reflects their actual skill, judgment, and leadership.

Not social media.
Not self-promotion.
Not influencer content.

Professional credibility.

When we work together, you stop blending in as “just another surgeon” and start leading the conversation in your specialty in a way that feels natural, dignified, and accurate.

That’s how you become the surgeon patients choose, peers respect, and media and medtech think of first.

If this resonates, you’re not alone.

If you feel like you’ve got a book inside you, here’s what I learned the hard way:

1. You don’t need the perfect year.
 You need one imperfect monk-mode weekend.
 men@pause, our best-selling book, started in 48 hours messy monk-mode weekend-not a perfectly planned season. Momentum beats magic.

2. Format is a differentiator.
 We weren’t the first to write about men’s growth.
 But the "poetic field-manual style" (how I describe) made the book feel different. Format is part of your category design.

3. Don’t write alone.
 Co-authoring accelerates clarity. It removes blind spots and collapses time. My best decision was not going solo. Gave me confidence to approach Scott Sigman MD and begin co-author project: Physician Brand Rx

4. Your book is part of your (slash) career.
 men@pause had nothing to do with my profession-
 and everything to do with my identity.
 Lifestyle design entrepreneur\best-selling author\physician brand strategist, etc. 

If you’ve got a book inside you:
 Start imperfectly.
 Structure boldly.
 Collaborate wisely.
 And let it expand who you're becoming.

Surgeons don’t go viral because of social media.


They go viral because someone finally articulated what every surgeon feels. 

Surgeons don’t need social media help.
They need someone who can articulate their philosophy, their frustrations, and their mission.

If one surgeon writes a courageous post, hundreds rally.

But most surgeons don’t know how to articulate their point of view.

That’s why we help selected surgeons become Digital Opinion Leaders - the ones shaping the profession instead of getting shaped by it.

I wrote this m@xim for a Green Beret buddy and a poet in a carriage. 

The Soldier/

Jacob David George, 32, survived the war. The fog of war took him at his home in Fayetteville, Arkansas. He served three tours as a U.S. Army Special Operations combat engineer with Operation Enduring Freedom. After returning from Afghanistan, he recorded an album, "Soldier's Heart."

The Poet/

William Cowper, the English poet (1774) who wrote the hymn "God Moves in a Mysterious Way," struggled all his life with depression. One day, Mr. Cowper called for a carriage and ordered the driver to take him to the Ouse River, three miles away, where he planned to kill himself. 

The driver of the carriage sensed the state of sadness Mr. Cowper displayed. He said a quick prayer for guidance and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw a rolling fog ahead in the distance. The carriage driver purposely lost his way in the fog, jogging up one road and down another as Cowper fell into a deep sleep. Several hours passed, the driver going in circles, letting his passenger rest. Finally he returned Mr. Cowper to his home.

Mr. Cowper awakened and asked why they were back home?
The carriage driver said, "Got lost in the fog, sir. Sorry."

Mr. Cowper went inside, and pondered how he had been spared from self-destruction. That same evening in 1774, age forty-three, wrote his autobiographical hymn, "God Moves in a Mysterious Way" sung in churches across the world today.

m@xim

You know you're part of a Southern family when...
The group text about the Christmas white elephant submission deadline hits with more urgency than a tornado warning.

Mama Scott got a spreadsheet. A budget cap. And zero tolerance for "I'll figure it out later."
Miss the deadline? You're getting assigned a candle. A generic candle. And everyone will know.

So when I saw the SHART Survival Kit... I knew immediately. This is the one.
Submitting early. With pride.

After 5000 + surgeon published pieces, (2025) we’re learning how surgeons digitize trust and monetize their reputation.

When a marketer tells me “I don’t use AI,” I hear something else.

I hear: “I don’t read marketing case studies written after 2020.”

Same logic. Same resistance to curated knowledge that threatens your monopoly on expertise.

Here’s what I use AI for:

1. Analyzing healthcare trends across thousands of sources overnight.
2. Finding what’s NOT being discussed-the real strategic opportunity.
3. Pattern recognition across almost 200 different surgeon practices.

Here’s what I don’t use AI for:

1. Writing final content. That’s where voice dies.
2. Strategic decisions. That’s where judgment matters.

AI doesn’t threaten your voice.

It threatens your excuse for not having one.

The marketers I want to work with understand:

AI didn’t make authenticity harder.
It just made pretending impossible.

What are you really protecting?​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

P.S. My grandson laughs at my AI researched “G” jokes. No grandpa for me. Just “G”

Surgeons Don’t Need Self-Promotion. They Need Visibility.

I saw this video where someone rolled out a red carpet in front of random people.
Most were uncomfortable for two seconds… and then they adjusted, stood taller, and kept walking.

That’s the part surgeons forget:

Visibility feels awkward at first.
Not because it’s ego - but because it’s unfamiliar.

Here’s the truth most surgeons don’t say out loud:

	•	You’re not avoiding thought leadership because you lack ideas.
	•	You’re avoiding it because you don’t want to look self-promotional.
	•	You want credibility, not attention.

And that’s exactly the point.

Real thought leadership isn’t “Look at me.”
It’s “Here’s what I’ve learned. Here’s who it helps.”

I help surgeons become trusted digital voices - because in today’s world, trust is your currency and reputation your bank account.

My work isn’t rolling out a red carpet.
It’s giving you a clear, honest way to show your expertise without compromising humility, judgment, or professionalism.

You don’t need theatrics.
You need clarity — so patients, peers, media, and MedTech can finally see what you actually do.

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The Battle

Francisco Martinez

Matthew Ray Scott

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The Battle

Francisco Martinez

Matthew Ray Scott

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Francisco Martinez's LinkedIn Performance

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