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2021. TikTok is exploding for consumer brands. I am on a Zoom call with a TikTok marketer. She’s created millions of views for other clients. Millions. She is not a personality fit. I know that quickly. I hire her anyway. The numbers are too good to ignore. I was hiring the stats, not the person. Within weeks, it is clear. She is not a right fit. I keep her on. For months. Long after it is obviously a disaster. Because I cannot have the hard conversation. Last Sunday, I told

You don't just build a business when you become an entrepreneur. The business builds you, whether it succeeds or fails. When I first became an entrepreneur, I saw an opportunity and I took it. I did not think much about it. I figured I would solve a problem, make some money, and build a living out of it. That was the plan. What I did not see coming was what it would do to me. We rarely talk about who you become along the way. Empowerment. You get to create your own job. Then

I was sick. Really sick. And I was still at work. Laptop open. Accidentally scheduled two LinkedIn posts for the same day. Running at way less than 100%, and feeling bad about it, because this is not how I normally show up. I mentioned it to a friend. He says, “Dhana, you’re pushing too hard. Sometimes you just have to let go and let things fall into place.” He was right. It is not the first time. A few years ago, I was going through hormonal changes I did not know about. I p

"I don't stand a chance." I’m staring at my laptop screen, hovering my cursor over the "Send" button. Last week, I was preparing to pitch a podcast. I pulled up their host submission page, and right at the top was a bold, unblinking warning: We have a very low acceptance rate. My brain immediately went into default defense mode: "They’re looking for bigger names." "Why bother wasting their time?" "You’re just going to get ignored." I froze. Hand still on the mouse, ready to c

Cupcakes for Thanksgiving dinner. Store-bought. I run operations for a living, so I delegated the baking. The table is set. The cupcakes are on the counter. The house smells like a long weekend. Happy Thanksgiving to all the Canadian folks in my network celebrating today! I’ll be spending it with my loved ones. The people who let us show up as the best version of us in our professional lives and catch us when we fall. The people who make it all possible. Nobody builds anythin

"What if we launched a new line?" I look across the table at the founder. We already have a core product that is generating steady revenue, pulling in repeat customers, and keeping the lights on. Yet, here we are, discussing the fourteenth variety of scented toilet paper that nobody asked for. I've seen this exact pattern play out time and time again in business. When you're a builder, opportunities are everywhere. Every week brings a new idea, a new market, or a new feature

“He’ll never reply.” I almost didn’t press send. He’s one of the most popular, highly sought-after speaking coaches in the industry. His calendar is perpetually full. Last week, I cold emailed him anyway. He responded in minutes. I’ve cold emailed hundreds, if not thousands, of people over the course of my career. And I’ve noticed the same pattern over and over again: The most successful, extraordinarily busy people are often the fastest to respond. Maybe it’s not despite the

"We need to hire someone from a big company." I hear this from founders all the time. But in my experience, bringing enterprise talent into an early-stage startup is an entirely different ballgame. In large companies, success comes from managing budgets, optimizing fixed processes, and leading specialized teams. In a startup, there are no teams. No processes. No safety nets. It requires extreme adaptability and the willingness to wear five different hats every single day. In

"Nice" is ruining your company. Early in my business journey, I made a mistake a lot of founders make: I confused being nice with being kind. Nice avoids hard conversations to keep everyone comfortable in the moment. Kindness has the conversation, respectfully and honestly, because it's the right thing for the person, the team, and the business. Avoiding hard conversations doesn't make them kinder. It just makes them later. Because knowing how to start those conversations is

I look up from my notebook. Glowing screens everywhere. Laptops, iPads, digital styluses. I was at a workshop the other day, pen in hand, jotting down notes. I looked around the room and realized I was practically the only person engaging in the ancient act of putting ink on paper. I see it at business conferences. I see it at my speaking club meetings. In a world running on AI, cloud tools, and automated workflows, my paper notebook feels almost like an artifact. I write cod

"I don't know what that means. Can you explain it?" I said this out loud in front of a room full of founders during a recent Black Youth Entrepreneur & Innovation Program (BYEI) workshop. The topic? Palm Pilots and Weird Al. Seasoned operators in the workshop, Jim and Marc, were referencing them with absolute nostalgia. I smiled and admitted, "I think I know what it is, but I can’t quite place it..." The room had a good laugh over the generational gap. But it pointed to a les

A few months ago, during a clinical sleep test, my technician, Jessica, was wiring me up with sensors from head to toe. She checked every single lead. Then she re-checked them. She looked at me and explained that she wanted to be double-sure everything was placed perfectly, so I wouldn't have to repeat the entire test due to a mistake on her end. I have immense respect for people who take genuine pride in their craft. Holding yourself to an high standard is surprisingly rare.

Halfway through his speech at the World Championship, he went completely blank. Friday night, I was watching the Toastmasters public speaking final on Zoom with my speaking club, and we were down to the last contestant when the unexpected happened. Silence filled the room. He paced back and forth on stage, trying to recover. The audience sat dead quiet. After what felt like an eternity, he quickly wrapped up with a brief conclusion and walked off. It hit me hard. This competi

The best metric of operational success isn't on a spreadsheet. It's on a Zoom call when a founder tells me: “I just took a real vacation. No laptop. No constant Slack pings.” “I made it to my daughter's school event.” “My partner and I had a date night without a single fire drill.” That's the real ROI of good operations. As a Fractional COO, I help visionary CEOs step out of the daily weeds so they can focus on strategy, growth, and the next big opportunity. But good operatio

"We live to eat." I look up from my laptop. Two guys at the next table just said it out loud. I say it back. "Me too." All three of us burst out laughing. Two minutes later, those same two guys are on stage. I'm at Shopify's Builder Sundays in Ottawa. Free event, happens every Sunday, but I'd been putting it off for three months. Today I almost skipped it again. Too much on my plate. I went anyway. Brian Huang and Brandon Choi built a web app called Cheat Days. In under two h

Thirty men. Three women. One room. Two years ago, I walked into a business event to hear a talk and meet some new faces. When the presentation ended and networking kicked off, something predictable happened. The other two women in the room instinctively drifted toward me. We sat together, chatted for ten minutes, and formed a comfortable little island. Then, they stood up. "We’re heading out," one of them said. "Are you coming?" "No, I’m going to stay," I replied. "I came her

Four countries. Nine cities. Two graduate degrees. Multiple businesses started, and some closed. I have spent most of my adult life living in the liminal space. It’s the uncomfortable in-between. The void between what was and what is about to be. Liminal space is a strange place to exist. You’ve left the old identity behind, but you haven't fully arrived at the new one yet. The old job is gone. The old city is gone. The old business is closed. And the new chapter isn't fully

I see this pattern all the time, and it’s a quiet company killer. A founder pops up on my Zoom screen, and he looks completely exhausted. He leans closer to his camera and lowers his voice: “Can you talk to my Chief of Staff? He’s struggling to manage our operations.” I look into it. The operations are cracking under the weight of their growth, and the Chief of Staff is completely underwater. He lacks the core operational skills required to handle this level of scale. The plo

Founders start a company to build something meaningful. Then wake up one day juggling inventory issues, hiring, customer service, and twelve Slack channels, wondering: "How did this become my life?" When operations swallow your calendar, you stop being the visionary and start being the firefighter. My job is to take that operational layer off their shoulders so they can get back to being the CEO their business actually needs. I help founders build businesses that don't rely o

I knew one person when I walked in. I’d only spoken to Shayna over Zoom. So when I showed up to her founder’s dinner, I didn’t know what to expect. Long wooden table. Dim lighting. Candles. Then the room filled up with local entrepreneurs. People building incredible companies right here in Ottawa that I had absolutely no idea existed. Two hours in, it hit me. We spend so much time hiding behind keyboards, optimized calendars, and ad-hoc Slack pings. But there is a specific ve