Matt Swain

LinkedIn for Founders & Execs

I’ve built my career as a creator, thought-leader, author and entrepreneur who helps executives and founders evolve their online presence into genuine influence. I’ve had the privilege of working with global icons such as Wim Hof, Steven Bartlett and Arthur Brooks, and collaborated directly with LinkedIn to shape the conversation around digital content, executive-led brands and how social influence can drive commercial growth.

At the start of 2024, I founded Triangle Branding, an exclusive B2B thought leadership agency built for category-leading founders and CEOs who want to turn their ideas into influence. We help them build human-led digital reputations by using their own personal voice to drive commercial impact through LinkedIn-first content, strategic storytelling and demand-generation systems. 

Over the last 18 months, we’ve helped clients raise over $100M, land deals with companies such as Sony, Nvidia and Virgin, had 100 million eyeballs on clients’ content and generate meaningful inbound opportunities by building executive-led brands that people trust.

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We've generated 1,000,000+ views in the first 6 months with four C-Suite Execs at a 150M ARR leading B2B SaaS platform. 

We've generated 5,000,000 impressions and 40,000 engagements on a leading Harvard professor - with them becoming a LinkedIn Top Voice.

We've helped an energy leader book qualified conversations with SVP's at Walgreens, Starbucks, Mars, GSK and Lidl. 

We've helped agency owners generate organic engagement & MQLs from leaders at THG, Uber, Heineken, Estée Lauder, Samsung, Lavazza, L'Oréal, Tony's Chocolonely and more. 


www.triangle-branding.com

Founder of SOCIAL CLUB

Founder and Manager of SOCIAL CLUB - an exclusive social media community where members manage over 328 million followers. 

If you're an influencer or brand who wants to connect please get in touch. 
If you're interested in investing/sponsoring/collaborating please email on matt@mattswain.co.uk

Every marketer needs to hear this (direct intel from LinkedIn):

I sat down with Jae O., LinkedIn’s Head of Measurement & Ads, to introduce LinkedIn’s latest series - B2B Over Bevvies, sharing the latest B2B insights direct from LinkedIn! 

For the first episode, we debunked the 3 biggest myths killing your results…

Let me know what you think in the comments! 

P.S. Check out how LinkedIn’s measurement solutions can help you deliver outcomes over optics —> https://lnkd.in/measuringROI

LinkedIn for Marketing #AD

I’ve seen a lot of LinkedIn advice lately that’s frustrated me. 

The thing is – we all want LinkedIn to be a place for original thinking and interesting ideas – not AI slop and surface-level takes. 

Yet so much advice is about hooks, formatting and the latest algorithm trends, as opposed to substance, original ideas, interesting anecdotes, and genuine insights.

And from my visit to LinkedIn NYC last week, my takeaway is: LinkedIn wants more original, compelling, journalist-style content: thoughtful pieces that only you could write. Posts that add value, spark interest & conversation, and feel creatively different. This very much aligns with Triangle's approach when we're working with leading US companies on their thought leadership presence (always nice to hear!). 

Also, it was great to finally meet Luiza Cocito and Gianluca Russo in person after working on projects together and seeing each other’s content online for so long. Big thank you to the team for the warm welcome to NYC, the very cool office tour, and even a trip up the Empire State Building observation deck.

Stay tuned for a video from the visit too!

Being honest, we didn’t hit our growth goals for February. 

I hired a key growth lead at the start of 2026 – it took 4 weeks to interview & train them. They were getting ramped up – and then they suddenly quit 2 weeks in. It was a key role, and being honest, I’d overlooked some key aspects in the recruitment process. I saw what I wanted to see. We needed someone quickly and the reality was, they just weren’t a good fit. And I paid the price in the end. 

In that situation, you can do one of two things. 1) get frustrated or 2) get to work. I chose the second. And I’ve been busy searching for talent, 100s applied, interviewed 25+ people last week. And now we’ve found someone better & more aligned, who started with us this week. We’ve upgraded our onboarding process, more incentives, and more checks early on in the process. 

It set our growth back by six weeks, but we’re now in a great place as we head into March.  

And a reminder of some important lessons in the process too:

— Even when the trajectory is up, there will be weeks that test you. 

— When something unexpected happens, you just have to put the work in & take action. 

— Focus on true alignment with your team and clients – don’t try and shortcut this.

Landed in New York and went straight to The Met. I’m starting to think seriously about the kind of art I want to collect one day.

When I was younger, paintings never used to interest me, but over the past few years, I’ve become obsessed with different creative pursuits – movies, theatre, music, and art. So now, whenever I visit somewhere new, you’ll find me in different galleries. 

Thomas Merton said, “Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time,” and Giorgio de Chirico said, “each of them is an enigma, each contains a poem, an atmosphere.” When you find a good painting that speaks to you – it forces you to reflect, pause, and feel something you can’t put into words. It has a life of its own. It’s a still image and yet it has motion, tells a story, and reveals something about yourself.

I’m in exploration mode, seeing what pieces resonate & speak to me, and there is no better place than the Met to get inspired about what I’d like my future collection to be.

Someone pushed back on me last week about LinkedIn. 

"If this works, why can't you show me a %?"

"Surely it all comes down to conversion rate," they kept insisting. 

I disagreed.

LinkedIn isn't an outbound machine you can reduce to a single percentage. 

It's an ecosystem. 

There's the content building authority and trust. The profile converting cold visitors before they've replied to your initial message. The network compounding month after month as the right accounts are being added. The signals telling you who's warm and who's paying attention. 

And yes, outbound – but that's one piece. 

Some of your best prospects won't respond to your first message. They won't engage with your posts either. But four months in, after consistent exposure to your thinking, your proof, your credibility – they come inbound. Ready to book a call. 

By tracking outbound conversion rate, you're measuring one segment of a much bigger system. 

So when you're not booking enough SQLs to hit your targets, the issue isn't automatically the outreach. Across multiple B2B clients, the bottleneck is rarely conversion rate. It usually sits deeper, in how you're positioned, in the quality of accounts entering your network, in whether your content is building buyer confidence, or in whether your profile reflects the level of deal you're trying to win. 

It's worth stepping back and looking at the system as a whole. 

Happy to walk you through how we structure it.

It was 10pm and I’d just been to see Michael Jackson on Broadway, walking down 7th Avenue, I had a proud moment. It felt surreal that we’ve grown Triangle to the point of taking on NYC. 

I still remember being a solo freelancer juggling multiple projects, figuring it all out with just a couple thousand in the business bank account. We’ve come a long way since then! 

It’s one of the things you have to experience to understand - but the buzz, energy, ambition, pace, drive, is infectious here. You feel it walking down the street, in every conversation, it lives in the air. 

Yes, it was a productive time with clients on shoots, coffee conversations and strategy pitches. But my big takeaway from the trip is thinking bigger and moving quicker. Taking the NYC mindset into everything we do.

Founders who post 10+ times per year generate 33% more leads.

LinkedIn shared this stat with me directly during a meeting with their team in LA last October.

Ten posts per year.

That’s the bar for a measurable lift in lead generation. They also shared that founders who post consistently see higher deal size and shorter sales cycles.

Yet many still use LinkedIn for company updates instead of using it to generate revenue.

Company updates don’t build pipelines. 

You need strategic content that moves someone from never having heard your name before to having the level of trust needed to sign high-value contracts.

And this content already exists. You just need a system to extract it. 

Think of the last sales call you closed. You handled the objections, built trust, proved you could deliver, and you created the moment that made them sign.

That is validated messaging — now you just paste the transcript into Stanley.

Stanley already knows your existing LinkedIn content, your voice, how you think, what you've posted about. It extracts the strongest ideas and structures them into posts built from insights that have already converted.

Because if you said it on a sales call that closed, it works. 

If you've been wanting to post more consistently and generate more leads, but don’t want to add hours to your week, this is the system that makes it happen.

Stanley turns conversations you’re already having into content that supports your pipeline.

Try Stanley free → https://lnkd.in/ecEBMT-r

#Ad

Turn sales calls into original content in minutes...

If you want to start conversations with senior decision-makers on LinkedIn – you need to pattern-disrupt with a human-first approach. 

Everyone is getting 10+ salesy messages a day. So you need to make yours cut through and be the one they actually respond to.

New York made something very clear to me: there is more demand for what we do than I realized. Meeting after meeting, it became obvious that our approach to LinkedIn really resonates. From the way we think about positioning, demand & content together, and building enterprise-level credibility. 

So many companies are surrounded by clickbait tactics, freelancer-style playbooks, and surface-level personal branding advice. Very few are helping Series A and Series B to enterprise companies turn LinkedIn into a serious commercial channel that creates trust, category authority, and demand with serious decision-makers.

In-person, it was clear to see we’re speaking the same language – deal flow, growth, funnels, and what high-quality LinkedIn thought leadership content looks like. Sitting in front of leaders of some of the most ambitious, fast-growing companies, I could tell they understood why our work matters, why it needs to be done properly, and why it often makes more sense to bring in a specialist partner with the expertise, data and infrastructure. 

Next trip will be happening very soon!

A few years ago I was experimenting with LinkedIn after seeing the impact of content while working alongside Steven Bartlett.

I had a sense the platform was underutilized. Within a couple of months of posting, I had my first truly viral post with over 20 million impressions, and following that, an inbox full of enquiries. It’s fair to say, I’d proven my point – LinkedIn was powerful.  

Over time, a pattern started to emerge. While I was freelancing across startups – consulting, writing, podcasting, and working on influencer marketing campaigns – the same question kept coming up in conversations with founders and operators: “How does your LinkedIn content do well – could you do the same for me?” I leaned in. LinkedIn stopped being just one part of the work and became the center of it. That focus eventually evolved into Triangle.

In the early days, I was interviewing clients, writing the content, scheduling posts, creating assets, doing admin, and everything in between. In the trenches – figuring things out, working out how to craft content that captured the client's tone, insights, ideas, what drove results, and immersing myself in different industries. This is now the operating knowledge that’s embedded in how Triangle runs.

60+ clients later, and things are very different now. We operate with a full team building LinkedIn ecosystems for companies, all designed around commercial outcomes. Our average client has 20+ years of experience in their industry, so the work is about authentically capturing their ideas and insights – then turning that into the right positioning, buying signals, outbound activity, and content that helps generate 6-figure conversations and contracts through LinkedIn.

I still think back to that first post and where it all led.

I'm proud of what Triangle has become – and very excited about where we’re heading too!

630,000 impressions in the first month.

That's what we generated for a Harvard professor who came to us with no LinkedIn presence and a book launching in March with Penguin.

Here's exactly how we structured the work across three deliberate phases.

Phase 1: Authority building (foundation)

In the first month alone we generated 630,000 impressions.

Her posts quickly started attracting long, thoughtful comments from senior executives at large organizations – Chief People Officers, Heads of HR, L&D Directors, and Org Development leaders.

By now we're well over 1 million impressions total. That rapid visibility positioned her as the go-to voice in her domain and created the trust layer senior buyers need before they even consider a conversation.

Phase 2: Strategic integration (connective tissue)

Most agencies would stop at impressions. That’s where the real work started. 

We’re now coordinating across Harvard Kennedy School, Penguin Publishing, and her PR agency to align every moving part of the launch. 

Content, messaging, and partnerships are being stitched together into a full launch strategy. This includes planning a LinkedIn webinar, developing launch assets, and ensuring targeted visibility to influential leaders who can amplify her reach. The professor trusts us to lead this because we think beyond posts – we think in systems, partners, and decision timelines so the March launch hits maximum impact. 

We’ve since expanded the scope to include newsletter & email list content. 

Phase 3: Revenue activation (where real ROI lives)

The end goal was never “visibility.” Every action we take serves a business objective. 

As the content compounds, we’re actively tracking engagement from heads of people, heads of learning & development, and other senior decision-makers at major companies. We're building the pipeline for $30,000 workshop facilitations and keynote speaking gigs.

Post-launch, we'll leverage the book success and her strengthened public profile to convert that engagement into booked conversations. 

This is the difference between content creation and a LinkedIn ecosystem.

Last week, we ran a launch for a client that reminded us of something simple: senior buyers assess leadership before they assess product. 

Their company's page update reached 853 people, with 10 reactions and 5 reposts.

Not that impactful. 

But across the 4 leaders (COO, CPO, CRO, CMO) we work with to build their authentic content on their personal pages, the reach and engagement looked like this:

→ 88,305 total impressions
→ 1,040 total reactions
→ 59 comments
→ 47 reposts
→ 47 saves
→ 126 sends

100x the the reach & engagement. 

While data proves time-after-time that reach is significantly higher coming from leadership, it's not the only upside. 

When brands post from company pages, people see this as promotion. But when executives speak consistently, it signals internal alignment and conviction that reduces perceived risk for buying committees evaluating long-term partners. Meaning greater trust, market authority and in turn impactful commercial outcomes. 

- - -
If you want to turn your Execs into thought leaders to build visibility, trust, authority & MQLs – happy to share our learnings.

The content you need to generate a million dollars for an eight-figure budget holder is structurally different to the content most agencies provide.

Here is what I mean.

Right now, the entire marketing conversation is dominated by: Should we use AI? Should it be story-based? What format cuts through? What tool wins?

These questions completely miss the point.

The actual question is: what is the outcome you are trying to achieve – and does your content move you closer or further away from it?

When your end outcome is a seven-figure deal with five decision makers across a complex buying committee, the strategy looks nothing like a typical content playbook.

The focus shifts to progression:

1) How do you move a buyer from awareness, to recognition, to credibility, to commercial trust?

2) How do you build a deliberate sequence of touchpoints that supports long evaluation cycles and high-stakes decisions?

The real value of a content partner at this level is not creative execution, but the ability to design a journey that moves a defined buyer through stages of conviction – from cold, to curious, to confident enough to commit.

AI or human? Funny or serious? Story-led or data-led? These are tactical choices.

At Triangle, we are not interested in debating tactics. 

We are interested in whether the content works for your commercial goals.

Everyone talks about winning clients. Nobody talks about retaining them. 

We've just hit 24 months with one of our clients. 

And no – that wasn’t driven by a long-term contract.

We want to work with clients on a long-term basis, but we don’t force that commitment at the beginning. We invest early, we focus on delivering tangible results, and we prove our value as we go. Retention, for us, is a byproduct of performance.

This client came to us with 800 connections. Over two years, we've helped him generate 30M+ views, grow to over 10,000 followers, and position himself as a credible voice in a complex, regulated industry. And driven real commercial outcomes, including recently signing a seven-figure government contract that came directly through our work on LinkedIn. 

These metrics tell part of the story. 

But honestly, retention comes from becoming a true strategic partner inside the business.

Over two years, we learned how he speaks, how he thinks, what he's aiming to achieve. And as his business evolved – new strategy, bigger team, higher stakes, more scrutiny – we adapted alongside him. 

We're now so aligned that most of the work happens without calls. That's what a good long-term partnership looks like in practice. 

At Triangle, long-term partnerships are everything. We pride ourselves on delivering results, building deep relationships, and growing with our clients – and that's why we’re able to retain clients for 2+ years. 

–
If you’re looking for a partner who will embed into your business, adapt as you grow, and focus on commercial outcomes, book a call to see how we’d approach your LinkedIn.

Last week, M&S announced Gillian Anderson as its Chief Compliments Officer on LinkedIn. Here are 4 reasons why you should pay attention: 

1. LinkedIn was used as the main stage for a mainstream celebrity partnership – even though Gillian had no real platform here beforehand. She had only a few hundred connections and had never really posted before. She wasn’t a LinkedIn creator or influencer, which makes it all the more interesting that M&S still made LinkedIn a core part of the campaign and used her popularity & mainstream profile to drive attention here.

2. The campaign was built for LinkedIn, not just distributed on it. This wasn’t just a brand reposting campaign assets onto LinkedIn, after the fact. The platform itself became part of the idea, execution, and storytelling – with Gillian updating her profile with the new title. And stemming from LinkedIn at the core – the partnership was leveraged into commercial ads, and a bigger PR conversation. 

3. It shows a more imaginative, brand-led use of LinkedIn – a sign LinkedIn is evolving from a corporate distribution channel into a creative brand channel. Campaigns like this show how much more LinkedIn can be, and the direction it’s moving in. (Interestingly, over the last few weeks, we’ve had 3 multi-billion-dollar companies reach out to have conversations about creative ways they can be using LinkedIn).

4. It highlights the compounding value of senior leaders building on LinkedIn over time. Because when they've spent years becoming trusted voices on the platform, as M&S leaders have, moments like this become much more powerful. They are not just extra distribution channels; they bring credibility, context, and attention that help the brand own the conversation, deepen the association between talent and company, and make the whole campaign feel bigger than a one-off activation.

Main takeaway: There are so many opportunities to use LinkedIn creatively and cut through. Exciting times ahead for the platform! 

What did you think of the campaign?

Hannah Power

founder @amplify | empowering solopreneurs to create online success, through alignment not hustle | join my next free masterclass to learn how 💫

I’ve spent the last decade obsessed with one question:

Why do some people seem to succeed with ease, while others burn themselves out through extreme effort, and the majority never reach the life they’re working so hard for?

After studying high performers across industries (and living these patterns myself), I realised the answer wasn’t strategy, talent, or discipline.

It was behaviour.

More specifically, who someone is ‘being’ while they pursue what they want.

Most ambitious people operate in one of two modes.

1 | Achiever Mode: driven by control, pressure, and anxiety. You get results but they come at a cost, and progress doesn’t feel rewarding.

2 | Dreamer Mode: ideas without execution. Constant planning, pivoting, and searching for clarity. Thinking feels productive, but nothing actually moves you in the right direction.

Both modes look productive, and both keep people stuck.

And then there’s a third way… Performer Mode.

This is where success comes from alignment, not force. You trust yourself and the process. And because you believe things work out for you, your brain starts to make that belief real.

This isn’t manifestation. It’s science. 

And it can be learnt.

It’s the competitive advantage the 0.1% of elite performers have always understood.

My path to get here wasn’t linear.

I started my career at Accenture, working in digital strategy, building frameworks and scaling operations. I was effective, but constantly cycling between dreamer and achiever mode.

Aged 25 I left, moved to Bali and built my own business as a Personal Brand Coach, helping hundreds of ambitious people move from inconsistency and overwhelm into clarity and flow. And yet, I was still cycling between force and exhaustion myself.

It was through this work that I finally learned how to operate in Performer Mode myself.

I now teach this to individuals and embed it into company culture on a wider scale.

Here’s what I know to be true…

Your thoughts shape your beliefs. Your beliefs shape your identity. Your identity drives your behaviour. And your behaviour creates your outcomes.

Change the operating mode, and everything changes.

What I teach is simple, but impactful:
→ the psychology and practice of Performer Mode
→ how to achieve more through alignment (instead of anxiety)
→ the framework: focus. let go. optimise. win.
→ the core belief: everything is always working out for me

I write about this on LinkedIn, Instagram and in my newsletter.

I’m also writing a book about it: The Flow Era (launching 2027).

If any of this resonates, let's connect 🤍

Podcast Host

Flow, the podcast that unlocks the secrets to finding balance in the chaos so you can live your best life, in every area of your life.

Hi, I’m Hannah, personal growth junkie, ideator and lover of anything related to high performance working, living and loving.

Over the last 10 years I’ve been on a (very up and down) journey of self discovery with a goal of becoming the happiest, freest, most successful version of myself.

5 years ago I came across the concept of flow and it transformed my life. I now use the philosophy and teachings of flow to transform my clients lives and through this podcast, I hope flow can transform your life too.

The podcast will help you understand and free yourself from everything and anything which is holding you back from living the life you're meant to.

Lets get into flow, together.

...everything starts with a dream.

But dreaming without ‘doing’ doesn't build anything. 

And the bigger the vision, the easier it is to get overwhelmed by the gap between where you are and where you want to be. 

So you avoid starting altogether.

You collect ideas like other people collect receipts. You get excited about new projects, but rarely finish the ones you've already started. You wait for the "perfect moment" to take action, convincing yourself you're just not ready yet.

And underneath it all, there's this subconscious belief that if you don't try… you can't fail.

I know this pattern intimately… because I lived it for years.

I call it Dreamer Mode.

For a long time, I was the person who had a notes app full of brilliant ideas, what felt like ten thousand screenshots, and a track record of starting things I never finished. 

I'd get swept up in possibility, build entire visions in my head, then hit the first bit of friction and convince myself it wasn't the right time.

But why? Because I was avoiding the discomfort of actually building something. 

…dreaming feels safe. Doing feels risky.

(and honestly I still slip into this mode sometimes)

I'm dreamer-leaning by nature. I get bored easily, love new ideas, and I'd genuinely rather sit on the sofa watching Love Island than do the hard work of execution most days.

But here's what I've learned through all of this (and through working with my clients and businesses from around the world… 

Dreaming isn’t the actual problem. Staying stuck in dreaming is.

And the best way to shift out of staying stuck, is by intentionally moving into what I call Performer Mode.

This is where you still have your big vision, but also take consistent aligned action without needing everything to be perfect first.

Performer Mode doesn't kill the dream, it teaches you how to build it. It's about taking the idea and breaking it into the smallest possible next step. Then doing that step. Then the next. 

Not because you're suddenly motivated, but because you've made the action feel safe enough to start.

When you're in Dreamer Mode, your nervous system is protecting you from perceived failure by keeping you in the planning phase forever (it can also feel really exhilarating to keep coming up with new ideas, without the pressure of having to action on them).

But when you shift into Performer Mode, you regulate your fear response and give yourself permission to build imperfectly.

So here's my question… 

Do you have a dream you've been sitting on for weeks or months (maybe even years) because it doesn't feel like the ‘right time’ yet? (share in the comments)

And if you want to learn how to move from dreaming to doing (without the overwhelm), join my newsletter where I share 1 simple activity each week to help you shift out of avoidance and into action to become the person everything works out for… (link in comments).

teaching you how to shift the behaviours blocking your success | performance coach | creator @performer mode

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93% of founders are experiencing mental health strain.

That's not a typo. 93%.

And their anxiety rates? 5x the UK average.

I've noticed something too with the people I work with…

They tell me they used to handle pressure well. But lately, a full inbox feels overwhelming, a tough conversation with their team completely drains them, and a simple change of plans throws off their entire week.

They think they're getting less resilient. But what's actually happening is their ‘window of tolerance’ has shrunk.

I came across this concept recently and am obsessed how it explains the growing pressure new technology and AI can put on our daily lives. 

… it’s also a perfect measure of whether or not you’re in Performer Mode (which of course I love).

If you've not heard of it, your window of tolerance is the zone where you can process stress, think clearly, and respond (not react) to what's happening around you.

When you're inside this window, challenges feel manageable. You can problem solve, regulate your emotions, and stay present.

But when you're pushed outside your window, everything feels harder than it should. And you can easily slip into what I call Dreamer or Achiever Mode (if you’ve read my posts you’re familiar with these - but if you want a refresher, DM and I’ll explain!).

The important bit about your window of tolerance: it shrinks when you don’t rest.

Every late night. Every skipped meal. Every week without a break. Every hour spent scrolling instead of actually resting.

Your capacity gets smaller, and your tolerance gets lower. Suddenly things that used to be easy (full inbox, tough conversation, change of plans) feel overwhelming.

I see this constantly with my clients. They operate like this for months (sometimes years) without realising what's happening. They just think they're not disciplined, resilient, or capable enough.

But the good news is, your window of tolerance can widen again. Here's how:

1 | Rest strategically and don't wait until you’ve burnt out. Build recovery into your week before you need it.

2 | Notice early warning signs like irritability, brain fog, feeling rushed when you're not actually behind. These are signals you're nearing the edge of your window.

3 | Regulate before you act. When you feel yourself moving into reaction mode (snapping, shutting down, spiralling), pause. Take 3 deep breaths, then take a walk or do anything that brings you back into your window before making decisions.

Your window of tolerance is your operating capacity and it’s what keeps you in Performer Mode. When you protect it, everything gets easier (decisions, conversations, work, relationships).

Have you noticed your window getting narrower these days? What signals tell you when you're operating outside of it?

Would love to hear different perspectives on this in the comments.

And if you want practical tools to widen your window and operate from your highest capacity, join Performer Mode (link in comments).

We rejected hustle culture because it burned us out.

Now society is glorifying disengagement (…and calling it empowerment).

Did we just swap one unhealthy extreme for another?

I recently read a Forbes article that asked whether the backlash to hustle culture has gone too far. 

And honestly? I think they're asking the right question.

We went from ‘sleep when you're dead’ to ‘romanticise doing nothing’. From girlboss era to soft girl era. From grinding ourselves into the ground… to quiet quitting everything.

Both extremes are exhausting and lack sustainability.

We simple traded what I call Achiever Mode for Dreamer Mode.

Achiever Mode is hustle. You measure your worth by output, and rest feels like failure. You tell yourself that slowing down means falling behind. You hit your goals but realise you've spent years running on anxiety and adrenaline.

Dreamer Mode is the exact opposite - when you disengage entirely, avoid the discomfort of doing hard things, and romanticise rest to the point where nothing actually gets built.

The anti-hustle movement was absolutely necessary. Hustle culture was toxic. It promised that if you just worked hard enough, sacrificed enough, you’d finally ‘have it all’.

But it didn't deliver. So people pivoted to the opposite extreme.

To add even more nuance to this shift… some people are operating in Achiever Mode disguised in Dreamer Mode… 

Trad wives creating 80-hour-week content schedules about not working and ‘soft girl era’ aesthetics that require just as much curation and labor as the girl boss grind did.

The real issue at the bottom of all this is that we keep being told there’s only ONE right way to live. 

What’s missing is the middle ground. 

This is what I call Performer Mode. Where you can be ambitious AND protect your energy. Where success doesn't require suffering. Where rest isn't passive disengagement, but strategic recovery that actually fuels your goals.

(sounds nice, doesn’t it?)

With Performer Mode you don't have to choose between burning out or checking out. You can build something meaningful without destroying yourself in the process.

The question isn't "hustle or rest?"

It's "how do I build success that actually feels sustainable and true to me?"

The girl boss era burnt most of us out. The soft girl era told us to give up. If you're ready for the movement that comes next, join Performer Mode (link in comments).

In the UK, some people are now spending 7-8 hours a day on their phones (the same as a full working day).

…and we wonder why we're exhausted.

Every time you’re on your phone, you know what’s actually happening? Your brain is making thousands of micro-decisions. 

Scroll or stop? Read or skip? Reply or ignore? 

And each micro-decision fires glutamate, the neurotransmitter responsible for mental fatigue. 

So that hour of ‘downtime’ scrolling before bed? I hate to break this to you… but your brain actually experienced it as another hour of work (not rest).

We're living in what I'd call the era of manufactured exhaustion. 

We're busier, more connected, and more depleted than ever. And yet the solution most people reach for (their phone) is the exact thing making it worse.

I see this pattern constantly in the 1:1 clients and companies I work with (no matter where they are in the world).

Some people run purely on adrenaline, burning through energy they can't replenish. They mistake stimulation for rest, and wondering why they never feel recovered. I call this ‘achiever mode’. 

When people find themselves in this mode, their relationship with rest is particularly telling: they see it as weakness. Rest is something you earn (not deserve). So they push through exhaustion, wear burnout like a badge of honour, and keep scrolling instead of actually switching off.

Until the body forces them to stop.

Think about your brain (and performance) like exercise… 

Your muscles don’t grow in the gym, they grow when you rest. Your brain (and performance) work exactly the same way.

Without proper rest, your nervous system stays in survival mode. You make short-term decisions, lose the ability to zoom out and see the big picture, and work harder for diminishing returns.

Real rest (the kind that actually resets your nervous system) requires stepping away from the noise.

So here’s what I would encourage you to try this week…

Choose one thing that actually resets and recharges you. It could be a walk, workout, hobby you genuinely enjoy, time with the people who energise you, whatever you like.

Commit to doing it just once this week (not every day because that might feel overwhelming in the beginning).

And the catch: do it without your phone. Just once… phone free. Notice what happens.

You’ll feel your decisions getting clearer, your energy stabilising, and the ideas you’ve been forcing will start to flow. 

Rest isn't time away from your goals. It's an investment in your capacity to achieve them.

I'd love to hear which activity you’ve chosen to commit to this week in the comments (studies show that telling at least one person will help you commit to your plan).

And if you want one simple activity each week to help you regulate and shift into the most successful version of you, join Performer Mode (it’s free). 

Link in comments.

You start strong monday with a new routine. A "this time it's gonna be different" energy.

But by thursday the routine's fallen apart.

Sound familiar?

You have big dreams, incredible ideas, and potential. But what if I were to ask about the habits you stick to daily?

You know what you ‘should’ be doing… but you're stuck in "I'll start on monday" mode.

And honestly, no judgement from me. I spent years cycling between what I’ve now named Dreamer and Achiever Mode. Today we’ll focus on Dreamer…

I used to get SO excited about a new routine, go all in for a few days, then completely fall off.

The problem is that when you’re operating from Dreamer Mode, you’re driven by excitement and the perfect moment. You treat every new habit like a fresh start and go all in with intense energy, but then burn out. 

This is what happens when you run on excitement without structure. It keeps you stuck in a cycle of starting and stopping.

To end it, you need to move into what I call Performer Mode - where you still have big dreams and work hard, but learn to regulate your nervous system and build sustainable habits. 

Here, success flows instead of being forced. You become 1% better each day by building with consistency instead of intensity.

After working with hundreds of people (and navigating this myself for years), I've found there are 6 habits of the high performer operating in flow.

And the key is to shift from Dreamer into Performer Mode. 

Tell me in the comments which of these 6 habits is your strongest, and which is your weakest? 

1 | Move 
Dreamers go all in Monday with a new intense exercise routine, then give up midweek. 

Shift into Performer Mode by making small changes you can keep consistent, starting once per week then building up.

2 | Nourish
Dreamers get excited about clean eating and consuming motivational content for a few days, then fall back into doomscrolling and snacking. 

Shift into Performer Mode by gradually reducing processed food and time spent on your phone.

3 | Rest
Dreamers either avoid rest entirely (too busy planning) or over-rest (scrolling in bed, avoiding action). 

Shift into Performer Mode by learning to reset your system with quality recovery, not rotting.

4 | Create
Dreamers get excited by new projects and ideas, rarely finishing them

Shift into Performer Mode by focusing on following one idea to completion.

5 | Design
Dreamers tend to live in a state of chaos.

Shift into Performer Mode by building simple (not rigid) routines you can actually maintain.

6 | Give
Dreamers often over-promise and under-deliver. 

Shift into Performer Mode by following through on one thing you said you’d do.

I know… this is a lot of information. So follow the Performer Mode approach…

Pick ONE habit. Make it 1% better. Sustain it. Then add another.

And join Performer mode (it’s free) for one simple activity each week to build sustainable habits towards living your best, most successful life.

Link in comments.

We've been told that anything worth having is worth suffering for.

Alysa Liu just proved that's bull$#it.

When she retired from figure skating at 16 because it stopped being fun, everyone thought her career was over.

But 2 years later she came back with a completely different mindset. Her only rule: if it’s not fun, I’m not doing it.

She danced to her own music, wore what she wanted, and prioritised joy over pressure.

She just won Olympic gold.

Compare this with Olympic gold medal winner Michael Phelps. He achieved his highly-decorated Olympian status through discipline, intensity, and pushing through fear. But he’s also opened up publicly about falling into severe depression after each Olympics.

The difference? 

Michael operated from what I call Achiever Mode. Whilst Alysa is operating from Performer Mode.

Achiever Mode is when you work with force, control, fear, and relentless discipline. It actually does get you results. That is… until your body and mind shut down. 

You have wins in achiever mode, but you're burnt out, anxious, and depressed.

Performer Mode (on the other hand) is when you still have big goals and work hard, but you've learned to regulate your nervous system and build habits that don't destroy you. 

Success flows instead of being forced. You achieve your dreams AND get to be a joyful person.

Here's what Alysa said in a recent interview: "I don't think anything is going to be hard. What is there to lose? Every second you're there you're gaining something, there's nothing to be lost."

That's what operating from Performer Mode in flow sounds like. 

And that's what happens when you believe everything is working out for you.

She didn't just win gold. She broke an upper limit for all of us… proving you don't have to suffer to achieve greatness.

You can do it your way. And it can be fun.

The question is: Which mode are you operating from today? Achiever or Performer Mode? (tell me in the comments).

If you want practical weekly tips to shift from Achiever into Performer Mode to start building success that actually feels good, join my newsletter (link in comments).

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The Battle

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