I share short, partly visual emails, crafted through my lens as a creative director in deep-tech. Join me for insights on effective communication, marketing, design, psychology, and the philosophy of value.
The one thing your pitch must do, no matter how deep-tech
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If you're in deep tech, you probably don't think of your presentations as "conveying emotions." That's something for actors or marketers, right? Wrong. Emotion isn't a side effect of your presentation—it's the goal. Every presentation aims to inspire action. Logic alone doesn’t move us—emotion does. (hence e-motion) Researchers found that people with damage to the emotional centers of their brain (specifically the ventromedial prefrontal cortex) couldn't make decisions—not even simple ones, like what to eat for lunch Without emotions, decision-making becomes paralyzed. This doesn't mean you need melodrama—like bursting into tears over a data point. But it does mean being intentional about the emotional subtext. What emotion are you aiming to convey—excitement, curiosity, or urgency? Without an emotional connection, your audience won't act, no matter how clever your technology is. |
Creativity in Deep-Tech
I share short, partly visual emails, crafted through my lens as a creative director in deep-tech. Join me for insights on effective communication, marketing, design, psychology, and the philosophy of value.
For years, I put off building a portfolio website. Showing the finished work never seemed enough to convey what went into it. A kind of curse of beauty: the more impressive it looked, the more I worried it would be mistaken for something superficial. Now I’m letting go. I’ve put together a portfolio I’m proud of.I’m trusting that the work can give you a glimpse of the world through the eyes of the deep-tech founders I work with. What comes through for you? Hit reply and tell me - I’d really...
Startups move forward as investors, champions, and talent choose to commit to their mission. But they struggle to accept the conditions under which that commitment must be earned. Startups waste resources trying to turn evidence into certainty, as if enough of it will eventually add up to proof. It won’t. For instance, there is no way to know in advance that an investor’s money will be better spent on your startup than on any of the other 99 startups they meet. This is baked into the startup...
Ask a founder why their solution is valuable, and the conversation often drifts toward money. I get it. Unlike value, money is objective, tangible, and measurable. But notice the circularity hidden in that reasoning. Why is my solution valuable? Because it will make money. Why will it make money? Because it does something valuable. That confusion is why so much investor communication feels like noise with little signal. Here's the thing.. Value and money are not the same thing. Value is the...