Have you been fired for being "difficult" when you were just telling the truth?
Nine layoffs taught me that being labeled a "bad fit" doesn't mean you're broken. It means the system is.
For fifteen years, I watched the same pattern repeat across startups, government contractors, and Fortune 100 companies: Organizations hire problem-solvers, then eliminate them when systemic issues persist. They use individuals as scapegoats rather than addressing root dysfunction.
If you've ever been told you're "not a culture fit" after identifying problems no one wanted to hear about, this is for you.
If you've left a meeting thinking "am I crazy, or is everyone else pretending this makes sense?" - you're not alone.
And if you've been fired for speaking truth to power, then watched the same problems destroy the people who stayed silent, you already know: being a "bad fit" is often the sanest response to insane systems.
What you'll find here
This site is home base for the book, my ongoing writing about workplace dysfunction, and a community of people who've been labeled "difficult" for recognizing problems others ignore.
The book reframes being a "bad fit" as a positive indicator of integrity when recognizing dysfunctional systems, using OOUX methodology and fifteen years of documented workplace experiences.
My writing explores patterns like the isolation economy (where companies use NDAs to prevent workers from recognizing patterns), the translation tax between creative and business perspectives, and frameworks for identifying when you're being set up to fail.
The newsletter brings these insights directly to you, along with stories I'm still documenting and frameworks I'm still developing.
Book Bonuses
Free worksheet My Job: Should I Stay or Should I Go?
This is the color version of the OOUX color code chart from Chapter 9:
| Color | Workplace Reality | Personal Reality |
|---|---|---|
| Blue | Objects - The structural things | Your structural objects |
| Yellow | Proper nouns - The specific instances | Your specific instances |
| Green | Actions - What's actually happening | Your actual actions vs. stated intentions |
| Pink | Metadata - Information about the information | Your metadata |