Hi,

This week’s newsletter is more mindset related - it’s about the idea of saying no and how important it is as an artist, creator, executive, and professional.

It was inspired while reading the book The ONE Thing by Gary Keller.

Let’s explore below.

Let’s dive in ⬇️

I recently finished reading the book The ONE Thing by Gary Keller - Keller is the founder of the real estate company Keller Williams and wrote a best selling book on the power of focus - how some of the most successful people in the world focus on the “one thing” that has the most impact on their business and life.

The book focuses on this question: “What’s the one thing I can do, such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary?”

While reading, there was a profound section on the idea of saying no.

Keller shares the story of how Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997 and after returning, eliminated most of the products Apple was producing.

When Steve Jobs re-entered the company in the late 90’s, Apple’s product line wasn’t producing the successful results we know today. They had over 350 products and because they had so many, their offerings were confusing, overlapped with each other, and generally speaking - too much. They were also on the verge of losing $1B that year.

Jobs reduced their product line from 350 to about 10, with a focus on 4 core products:

1. iMac (consumer desktop Mac)

2. Power Mac G3 (professional desktop Mac)

3. Power Book G3 (professional portable laptop)

4. iBook (consumer portable laptop)

The thesis of how Jobs focused on these products was organizing the product line into 2×2 categories: Desktop + Portable and then Consumer + Professional.

This 2×2 formula was called the Apple Product Matrix.

Jobs used the Matrix to reduce the product line and eliminate unnecessary products like printers. Apple went from hemorrhaging money and losing $1B in 1997 to a profit of $309M in 1998.

By 1999, their profit was $601M.

That’s actually insane. They went from being on the verge of losing $1 billion to a profit of $601 million just by simplifying and focusing.

Part of this success was attributed to the iMac (it was a runaway hit and massively successful) but also the operational efficiencies that opened up with reducing the product line - fewer suppliers, less warehouses, simplified supply chains. More concentrated effort on a few things and making those as successful as possible.

When reading this story, there were a few big takeaways for me.

The most obvious is the power of saying no and simplifying. Putting a core focus on the most important products, simplifying the business, and going all in on a few things.

There’s an important caveat here though…which answers the question of “how to know what to say no to"?

The answer is that Jobs created a framework to help his decision making and give his company a North Star - anything that didn’t align with that Product Matrix didn’t fit the vision and was eliminated.

The power of saying no (or rather the inability to not say yes) is a concept that really resonated with me because I see it so often in my life.

Artists who feel like they have to say yes or chase every opportunity.

Creators who feel like they have to produce content about everything.

Executives + professionals who feel like they have to say yes to everything and burn themselves out. Yes to every industry event, opportunity, partnership, etc.

As I reflected on this concept, I realized that even when having conversations with friends of mine that are entrepreneurs building their own businesses, they spoke often about having to say no to things in order to stay on track. Similiar to Jobs, they had a decision matrix they used and if something didn’t align with that matrix, it didn’t happen.

One of my friends who’s built a successful cafe business actually showed me a Google Sheets spreadsheet once with numbers that ranked the importance and priority of things. If a decision didn’t align with that spreadsheet, he didn’t go for it.

It’s not just about saying no - when on the journey of being an emerging artist or rising professional, it’s important to say yes sometimes. Saying yes pushes you out of your comfort zone, opens opportunities, and helps you cover more surface area.

What is important is having a framework that allows you to make decisions.

For example…

You’re a professional in music, entertainment, or tech (or any other industry for that matter). Your decision matrix for how you spend your time looks like:

1. Networking and building relationships

2. Learning skills

3. Focusing on your wellness - going to bed early and waking up early for meditation and the gym

You start getting invited to industry events and social gatherings every week and you’re not sure what to say yes to. There are all different kinds of events starting at different times.

Some start at 10PM while some are right after work at 6PM. Based on the decision matrix with a focus on wellness and sleep, it probably makes sense to go to the one at 6PM and hold off on the one at 10PM.

Now…some may argue that for a rising professional, sleep is less important and what’s more important is putting yourself out there and creating opportunities.

There may be validity in that but the point is the framework that helps make those decisions. Most people don’t have a framework, so they yes to everything and get pulled in 100 different directions.

Take my friend who owns the cafe - they could’ve introduced tons of products on their menu over the years but they have a focus on a few core menu items while slowly introducing other products here and testing them.

Here’s an example of a decision matrix for an artist - let’s say you’re an artist working a full time job and only have so much time to create art. Your decision matrix looks like:

“For the next 6 months, outside of work, I’m only going to focus on making new music and content.”

No parties, drinking, feeling like they have to attend every event, etc. They have a framework for how they are approaching that period of their life.

Setting a framework is essentially setting expectations and everyone’s looks different.

Hopefully this was helpful on your journey.

Thanks for reading, until next time.

_{The Vault}

 1) Claude - last week’s newsletter featured Claude Code, a coding tool that is part of the Claude family. Claude itself is an LLM similiar to ChatGPT. While I still use ChatGPT, I’ve found it helpful to prompt in multiple places and saw that Claude can actually provide different kinds of responses than GPT - my responses (with the same prompts), have been interesting perspectives. More info HERE

2) The Artist Marketing Playbook - I teamed up with my good friend and fellow music marketing expert Drew De Leon to present The Artist Marketing Playbook. An in-depth look at what an artist can do to set themselves up for success in 2025. More info HERE.