September 2, 2025

Steve Jobs couldn't code. Richard Branson is dyslexic and struggles with details. Oprah Winfrey admits she's terrible at the operational side of business.

Yet we constantly think that successful entrepreneurs need to be “well-rounded.”

Need to shore up our weaknesses, master every aspect of our business, and become some mythical renaissance founder who excels at everything.

That's nonsense.

The entrepreneurs who build lasting companies don't waste time trying to be good at everything. They get scary good at the few things only they can do, then build systems and teams to handle the rest.

In this newsletter:

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Weekly Insight

When Tara McMullin co-founded Yellow House Media, she designed the company around what she wasn't good at.

She openly admits to being terrible at operations, and project management makes her want to hide under a sheet. The day-to-day parts of running a business just… aren’t her thing.

This doesn’t sound like the blueprint for a successful entrepreneur, but Yellow House has been running for more than six years.

Actually, I’ll amend that: Yellow House has been running well for more than six years.

That’s because, from the outset, McMullin and her partner structured the business so she'd never have to touch those day-to-day parts.

She’s focused on the creative. Her role is high-level strategy and client-facing storytelling. She’s the secret sauce.

Everything else gets handled by people who actually enjoy that work. Production schedules, team coordination, client onboarding. All delegated.

Yellow House Media succeeds because McMullin identified the few things only she could do. From day one.

This isn't just about preventing burnout (though it does that). It's about building, and leveraging, a competitive advantage.

McMullin’s been running her show, What Works, for 12 years. She knows what it takes to produce a high-quality podcast and editorial product. So, at Yellow House, she’s wickedly effective at doing it for clients.

Good enough that clients seek out Yellow House specifically for her approach to those problems.

If she'd spent half her time wrestling with project management software and coordinating deliverables, she'd be mediocre at lots of things, instead of exceptional at the few that drive success for her business.

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Intent to Action

I’ll lead this section with the advice I have to repeat to myself, a lot: stop trying to be good at everything.

However, I’ve also seen that advice lead to existential spiralling more than once (whoops), so I’ll pair it with a process to help you systematically identify your edge, then fire yourself from the stuff that's not working for you.

Step 1: Audit what you do (5 minutes)

List out the 8–10 things you do most often in your business.

For each task, give it two scores on a 1–5 scale:

Multiply those numbers. At the risk of sounding like a cornball, let’s call this your Edge Score.

The tasks with the highest scores are your superpowers. The lowest scoring tasks should start packing their bags.

Step 2: Write your edge statement (3 minutes)

Fill in this sentence: “The most valuable thing I do is ___. When I spend time on ___, the business moves because ___.”

If you don’t know this off by heart, let your Edge Scores tell you which tasks are most valuable to you, and to the business.

For example: “The most valuable thing I do is sales. When I spend time on discovery calls and proposals, the business moves because I close deals faster than anyone else.”

Step 3: Protect your edge (2 minutes)

Open your calendar right now. Block one hour next week for your highest-scoring activity.

Name it “Edge Hour: [whatever your thing is].”

Treat it like a client call: no moving or cancelling it. Don't let someone else book over it.

Step 4: Fire yourself from one drain (5 minutes)

Pick the task with the lowest Edge Score. You're going to eliminate it this week.

Three options: delegate it, automate it, or drop it entirely.

Delegate: If the task is important, and you have a team, send this message to someone: “I'm refocusing on [your edge]. Can you own [the task] going forward? Success looks like [one-sentence definition].”

Automate: Most repetitive tasks can be automated with tools you already have. Connect your apps with Zapier. Set up email templates. Use scheduling software.

Drop: Kill low-scoring tasks that don’t drive outcomes. Even if you have the time for them right now, they’re unnecessary energy sinks. Get them out of the way before they start dragging you down.

If you can’t drop the tasks? Figure out how you can. Otherwise, this business is going to keep draining you. And what’s the purpose of that?

Step 5: Measure what matters (3 minutes)

Track these three things for the next two weeks:

The goal here is twofold: drive your business forward, and let you enjoy the thing a bit more. True success as an entrepreneur means being able to live the way you want, while earning a living. If that isn’t the goal… what is?