High-performing leaders drive results — but at what cost?

In today’s healthcare landscape, executive and clinical leaders are under pressure to lead through complexity, increase productivity, and maintain high standards — all while navigating burnout, disengagement, and stress within themselves and their teams.

As a physician, educator, and certified energy leadership coach, I help healthcare leaders perform at their highest level — without sacrificing their well-being or their team’s culture in the process.

At Transforming Healthcare Coaching, we partner with healthcare executives and leaders to:

Improve personal and leadership performance under pressure
Manage stress in high-stakes environments
Lead with clarity, confidence, and emotional intelligence
Build team cultures that are engaged, resilient, and aligned
Prevent burnout through systems-level mindset and energy shifts

Our coaching programs combine evidence-based frameworks and assessments with our team’s deep healthcare experience — empowering leaders to show up with purpose, manage complexity with grace, and model the kind of leadership that drives organizational transformation.

This is more than burnout recovery — it’s about renewing the energy for powerful leadership, and it ripples across departments, teams, and, in turn, health systems.

We believe that everyone on the healthcare team can benefit from a coach: physicians, nurses, pharmacists, dentists, social workers, executives, management, OT/PT, RD, RT! Imagine a healthcare team and system that actually works for you, the people caring for others, rather than setting you and your colleagues up for burnout.

Whether you're a Chief Medical Officer, emerging leader, or overseeing professional development in your organization, we can help your leaders become the kind of people others want to follow — especially when the pressure is highest.

Together, we can transform healthcare, one person at a time.®

👉 Let’s connect in the DMs to schedule a strategy call!

More fun facts about me:
Simulationist
VitalTalk Distinguished Faculty
Single mom
Peloton junkie
Foodie
Yogi
Ted Lasso fan girl
Future philanthropist

Lillian Emlet

A wonderful day at the University of Pittsburgh Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business AI and Health conference!

An incredible line up of speakers, perspectives, and scope of topics.

Also great networking and diversity for applications for how AI is transforming healthcare.

Maria Abunto, MD, MPH, MBA HBA Mid-Atlantic region Pittsburgh chapter

Lillian Liang Emlet, MD MS CHSE CPC ELI-MP

Founder, Transforming Healthcare Coaching® | Executive Coach for Physician Leaders | Elevating Performance, Preventing Burnout, & Building Energized Healthcare Teams | Critical Care Physician | Newsletter & Podcast 👇

No alternative text description for this image

The system will continue to change.

And with everyone's efforts, it will continue to change to a more sustainable, healthier workplace for healthcare professionals. 

Get excited for Saturday March 14's Podcasthon international charity podcast festival!

Our episode with J. Corey Feist, JD, MBA of Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation we talk about how far we have come since 2020 and how you can help!

With Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC
Follow us on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Podbean so that you don't miss the episode!

Links to our podcast in the comments below
Link to how you can help in the comments below

#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching

What are YOU doing for your wellbeing and your team's wellbeing today?

I did hot yoga in the AM.
I witnessed supportive conversations between colleagues (venting is necessary! you are not alone!).

Wellbeing isn't all about spa days and vacations.
It's in the little moments that we actively curate.
It's in the leadership behaviours we cultivate.
It's in the policy we support and system modifications to help everyone feel belonging in our healthcare workplaces.

Join Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation National Academy of Medicine Coalition for Physician & APP Well-Being to celebrate Health Workforce Well-Being Day 2026!
#clinicianwellbeing #leadershipcoaching #coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching
Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC Michelle Walter DO, ACC, CPC Vicki Landers PT DPT MHA ACC Gillian Faith MS, ACC, SHRM-SCP, CPQC

How do you grow as a woman physician in leadership?

Women physicians have a higher risk and rate of burnout compared to male physicians. 

So how can we step into the uncomfortable place of growth and find clarity, learning, and action?

I am so honored to be a guest on Cindy Van Praag, MD, NBC-HWC @Inspired Mom MDs podcast this week our episode is released,
Just in time for Women's History Month!

Celebrating all women physicians out there:
We see you, acknowledge you, and support you!

Link to episode in Comments below!

#womenphysicians #coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching

Belonging to the team is critical.

When we have healthy, caring, professional relationships within our healthcare teams, we work better together and provide better care.

Leaders that cultivate belonging invest in long term success.

What is one small thing you can do to intentionally cultivate belonging?
#leadershipcoaching #coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching

Thanks for reading this week's installment of the Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® The Thriving Healthcare Leader newsletter with Gillian Faith MS, ACC, SHRM-SCP, CPQC

View newsletter: The Thriving Healthcare Leader

What makes an exceptional practice? Whether you are in the operating room, Emergency Department, or private outpatient primary care clinic, you can fe

Open article: How to Create Belonging in Healthcare: 
Why Your Team Relationships Matter More Than You Think
 by Lillian Liang Emlet, MD MS CHSE CPC ELI-MP • 5 min read

How to Create Belonging in Healthcare: 
Why Your Team Relationships Matter More Than You Think

Early release glimpse of our Podcasthon 2026 episode supporting Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation that releases on Saturday March 14.

System-level policy change is what J. Corey Feist, JD, MBA updates us on:
With bi-partisan support, the Foundation continues to make change and provide resources to make healthcare (for all professions: physicians, nurses, pharmacists, APPs, etc.) healthier for all.

How can YOU help?

Remind Congress that this Bill should be funded, not just supported:
https://lnkd.in/emg6AESS

#mentalhealth #clinicianwellbeing #endburnout #coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching

Find us on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Podbean.
Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC Podcast Director
Chelseia Concesa Joy Masumbol Podcast Editor

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transforming-healthcare-coaching

We love leadership books!

Did you know that in our medTHRIVE® Connect free community,
We have quarterly Book Rounds book club on non-fiction books relevant to leadership and wellbeing?

Excited that our next author Josh Hartzell, MD, MS-HPEd, FACP, FIDSA is our May 2026 Book Rounds: Sign up in comments below!

Our last author in March was Amy Lafko with People First! (recording in our community portal in Circle)

And I love supporting authors (can you tell I love books?). I want to highlight a new leadership book by Dr. Shanea Clancy, DNP, EMBA-H, RN, CARN-AP,  FIAAN Mountaineering Mindset is OUT! Just released! Available everywhere you like to buy books. 

#booklover #leadershipbookclub #coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching

Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC Michelle Walter DO, ACC, CPC Gillian Faith MS, ACC, SHRM-SCP, CPQC Vicki Landers PT DPT MHA ACC

Health is: Mental health + Physical health.
The fact that my re-credentialling paperwork requires another physician to "attest" that I am of physical ability to perform my duties is odd enough, and all of these questions about mental health as do not serve anyone. 

Thank you to those that continue to reform the system.
The Emotional PPE Project Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation

Associate Professor of Anesthesia, Harvard Medical School | Residency Program Director, Massachusetts General Hospital | President, The Emotional PPE Project

Physician mental health matters, yet physicians often avoid seeking care due to profound fears of professional and licensing repercussions. 

Thanks to the tireless advocacy of organizations like the Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation and others, we’ve seen tremendous progress in state medical licensing reform over the last few years.  But to truly eliminate the stigma and fear from licensing, there is still critical work to be done.

I’m incredibly proud to share our new research, from The Emotional PPE Project and collaborators, published in the Journal of Graduate Medical Education, co-authored with the brilliant Eileen Barrett MD MPH, Kate Hicks, and Lauren Hunt. We analyzed 2021 and 2025 initial medical license applications across all 50 states and Washington, D.C. to look beyond the standard questions, identifying five previously underexplored structural barriers to seeking care. 

While we saw encouraging improvements in several areas between 2021 and 2025, one crucial barrier worsened significantly: *Application Accessibility*. Currently, only 18 states make their full applications publicly visible without requiring registration, down from 29 just a few years earlier.  Why does this matter so much? Because without transparency, physicians can't see the recent progress with their own eyes. This lack of transparency breeds uncertainty and obscures recent progress, which can heighten reluctance to seek care. 

The good news? State medical boards can easily fix this by simply providing publicly accessible PDF examples of their applications on their websites. 

Alongside accessibility, our research highlights four other structural barriers that boards must address: 🔹 Stigmatizing question grouping (e.g., co-locating mental health inquiries with questions about felonies or misconduct) 🔹 Scrutiny of training gaps (which inadvertently deters physicians from taking beneficial medical leave) 🔹 Unclear or ambiguous wording of health questions 🔹 Uncertain privacy protections for personal records (raising fears [or at times stating] that personal health information could become public) 

We must continue to push for a licensure system that supports, rather than inadvertently deters, the well-being of our physician workforce. 

📄 Read our full paper here: https://lnkd.in/e8HwvsGg 
 
➡️ Swipe through the carousel below for a quick breakdown of our findings!

#PhysicianMentalHealth #MedicalLicensure #HealthcareAdvocacy #PhysicianWellbeing #JGME

Barriers in Licensing

Getting excited!

Leading SCCM LEAD (Leadership and Management Skills to Enhance Your Professional Role) 2026 Pre-Congress workshop with Mojdeh Heavner Kyle Gunnerson, MD, FCCM Roshni Sreedharan MD, FASA, FCCM Dr. Kate Madden Sergio Zanotti Kaitlin Alexander

Thanks to the many members of the SCCM LEAD Committee that worked all year to bring this content to life!

Society of Critical Care Medicine
Dawn Herman 
#CritCareMed #PedsICU #CritCareExplore #SCCM2026

It's not too late! Register to join us in Chicago!

We hit 100 episodes!

Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC and I celebrate this week Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® podcast 100th episode!

We have learned a lot after 2 years of working on the video podcast, and we share those perspectives with you this week.

If you have ever wondered...
Could there be more?
What if I fail?
I am not ready yet.

Then this episode is for you.
You are ready.
There is more.
Failure is learning.
The faster you learn, the faster you succeed.
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching

We walk alongside healthcare professionals of all levels and all professions,
To support and augment personal and professional success,
Because healthcare is a team sport, and we are proud to support leaders and their teams.

Have you heard of Podcasthon? 🎧🌍

It’s the biggest charity Event in Podcasting world! An incredible and fast-growing non-profit initiative that unites thousands of podcasters globally. There's no money involved—it’s all about raising awareness for various charitable causes. ❤️

Our charity is Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation
And our interview next week with Episode 99 with J. Corey Feist, JD, MBA CEO of the Foundation is not to be missed!

Get an update on how much progress the Foundation has made in the last 5 years, how you can help, and more!

Follow us for more! 
Catch us on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, Podbean
Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC Podcast Director
Podcasthon #coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching

Leadership + Wellbeing?

I've been asked before about my tagline.
Am I a leadership coach?
Am I an executive coach?
Am I a wellbeing coach?

Yes.
Like our next LinkedIn & medTHRIVE Connect Live Webinar in April with Dusty Holcomb guest speaker will talk about: it is about both leadership + wellbeing.

The unlock for healthcare leaders (clinical and executive) and for founders with million dollar business revenue....

Is leadership + wellbeing.
Looking forward to diving into things with Dusty!

If you aren't part of medTHRIVE Connect where you'll have access to our weekly podcast, private free community where we host our quarterly leadership book clubs, and monthly webinars...Join us: https://lnkd.in/eaNw3gjv

Open article: medTHRIVE by medthrive.circle.so

Career transitions...are just career evolutions.

And they are normal part of the growth process.
This week's Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® podcast with Vicki Landers PT DPT MHA ACC we talk about how you can LEAP through the process.

Check it out! Link to YouTube podcast in comments below:
Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching #careercoaching #healthcarecareers

What matters most in healthcare? The People.

Come join us for our first 2026 medTHRIVE® Book Rounds book club
Featuring Amy Lafko's book People First

It's free, you don't need to have finished the book to join us.
Link to join in comments below. ⤵️ 
Link to book purchase in comments below. ⬇️ 
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching #executivecoaching

Catch us Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® live!
on Wednesday March 11 2026
1pm EST/ noon CST/ 11am MST/ 10am PST

The first 90 days in a new leader's transition is vitally important.
First impressions matter: let's get strategic and curious and learn:
Excited to host a live podcast webinar here on LinkedIn!
Catch us streaming on all the socials.
With Kurt Mosley and Neill Marshall

RSVP so that you don't forget to join us!
Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #executiveleadership #leadershipcoaching #careertransitions

View Lillian Liang Emlet, MD MS CHSE CPC ELI-MP’s profile

Your First 90 Days as a Healthcare Leader

It's never too late to work on and improve your leadership skills. For those moving into new executive leadership position, the first 90 days are critical. We talk about lessons from healthcare leaders with Kurt Mosely and Niell Marshall of Health Search Partners.

Your First 90 Days as a Healthcare Leader

Today's the day! Podcasthon 2026 Episode with Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation CEO J. Corey Feist, JD, MBA

We talk about all the progress that the Foundation has accomplished.
We talk about how the system is slowly changing...for everyone.
We talk about what still needs to be done to help change the system for a sustainable, whole, and healthier workforce.

Check out the episode! 
Everywhere you normally listen to your podcasts: Apple, YouTube, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Podbean.
With Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching #clinicianwellbeing

Change is constant. And everyone we meet is both our student and our teacher.

This week's Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® podcast with Gillian Faith MS, ACC, SHRM-SCP, CPQC is all about how we navigate change as leaders in healthcare. 

Take a listen and let us know what you think by Following, Subscribing, and Leaving a Review. If you've already listened, comment below your perspectives on navigating change.

On Apple, Spotify, YouTube, Amazon Music, Podbean.
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching #executivecoaching 
With Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC video editing by Chelseia Concesa Joy Masumbol

You are a leader.

Even if you don't identify with that term, name, designation, or label.
This week's Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® podcast with Klaus Grim, PA-C, CPC and Gillian Faith MS, ACC, SHRM-SCP, CPQC, 
Klaus unpacks what exactly is "silent" leadership.

Find us on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Podbean.
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #leadershipcoaching

What's better than a book club?

A book club with the author!

Join us at next month's medTHRIVE® Book Rounds where we are joined by Amy Lafko  , author of People First.

How can you find a people first approach to your journey as a healthcare leader? 

Link to register (free) in Comments below!

Leadership Development Expert | Author of “People First”- talent management strategies and systems | International Keynote Speaker |

Do you run smooth, productive meetings?

In this week's Transforming Healthcare Coaching ® The Thriving Healthcare Leader newsletter, Gillian Faith MS, ACC, SHRM-SCP, CPQC gives tactical strategies and tips to run meetings more efficiently.

What other tips would you share? Comment below!
#coachinghealthcare #healthcarecoaching #executivecoaching #leadershipcoaching

Brian Dordevic

Delivering profitable web design with SEO first approach. Official Google partner.

I started as a $4/hr offshore virtual assistant and became a USA citizen & business owner.

I help you generate more profit with your existing traffic efforts by optimizing conversion rates, improving your site speed & content strategy.

Chief Executive Officer

As the CEO of Alpha Efficiency, I steer the strategic direction of the company while managing an expanding team of 30+ professionals, spearheading growth initiatives, and driving operational efficiency.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) & Achievements:

Team Leadership & Management: Championed a culture of performance and accountability that led to a 35% boost in operational efficiency. Regularly oversee talent acquisition and retention strategies to ensure our team is well-equipped for success.

SEO & Content Management: Supervised the creation and execution of our SEO strategy, which saw a remarkable 60% surge in organic website traffic within six months, augmenting our brand's digital visibility.

Paid Media Strategies: Pioneered the deployment of innovative paid media campaigns, resulting in a 50% increase in brand awareness and a 30% rise in customer acquisition, significantly expanding our market footprint.

Performance Benchmarking: Developed and implemented performance benchmarks to ensure constant progress. The systematic monitoring of these metrics brought about a 20% improvement in overall productivity.

Stakeholder Management: Successfully maintained robust relationships with key stakeholders, attaining a 90% satisfaction rate, testament to our commitment to delivering value and fostering transparency.

Financial Management: Maintained stringent control over fiscal operations, consistently delivering profitability and surpassing financial objectives by 15% in the previous year, solidifying our position in the market.

This multifaceted role requires a delicate balance of leadership, strategic thinking, and operational excellence. It's my mission to continue propelling Alpha Efficiency forward, driving sustainable growth, and adding value for our stakeholders.

"BREAKING: Claude can now do $10,000/month SEO for free."

After 16 years in SEO, I see 100% pure cope (here's how not to fall for SEO scams)

None of these guys share results.

None of them share case studies.

Because they don't exist.

It's grift wrapped in a thread.

I've been ranking sites since 2010.

• Real clients
• Real campaigns
• Real money moved ($13 mil VC funded exit secured)

And the recycled take never changes:

"Businesses quietly going all-in on AI + SEO will save a ton of money."
"This feels like buying Bitcoin at $100."

Nah.

Bitcoin didn't require you to understand search intent, site architecture, crawl budgets, or why Google just nuked your site overnight.

Same playbook every time:

List a stack of cheap tools.

Claude: $20/month. WordPress: cheap. Canva: free. GSC: free.

"Total cost: under $100/month." (You need 20x Max Claude, which costs $200. But they won't tell you that.)

Then: "people used to pay agencies $1k-$3k for this."

As if SEO is just hitting publish.

Same energy as people who pay for a gym membership and never workout.

The tool is not the skill.

It never was.

What AI actually cannot do:

• Tell you why your traffic dropped 40% after a core update.
• Read your GSC data and prioritize cannibalization fixes.
• Build a link strategy that doesn't get you torched.
• Audit your site architecture and know what to kill.

It cannot prioritize. It can only produce.
More content faster without strategy = a bigger mess, built quicker.
Can AI speed things up? Absolutely.

I use it every day.

Drafts. Outlines. Content workflows. Elite for that.

But it's a power tool. Not a tradesperson.

You still need someone who knows where to cut.

These posts get engagement because they sell a fantasy.

That expertise is dead.

That 16 years of pattern recognition gets replaced by a $20 sub.

It doesn't.

The people winning with AI right now aren't replacing skill.

They're stacking it on top of speed.

That's the edge.

Link under my profile for real ways to use AI in SEO (results, not slop).

I help you improve Local AI & SEO Mentions for your firm | Official Google & Hubspot Gold partner

Your web developer built you a beautiful site (and disappeared)…

All you are left with:

• Your WordPress login sits at /wp-admin
• Bots already found it
• They're running thousands of password combos right now.
• Your plugins haven't been updated in months.

Each one is a door.

And hackers have the keys to every outdated lock.

• No 2FA
• No WAF
• No monitoring
• No rate limiting

You won't know you've been hacked
Until your AI SEO rankings tank.
And your clients stop calling.

Here's what a real setup looks like:

• A law firm launches a new WordPress site.
• Within hours, automated bots hit /wp-admin.
• But this time it's different
• Rate limiting kills brute force

CAPTCHA blocks the scripts.

2FA stops stolen credentials.

Firewall filters the noise before it touches the server.

A plugin vulnerability drops next week.

Updates are staged, tested, deployed.

Something still slips through?

File monitoring catches it in minutes.

Clean backup restores in under 10.

Most devs build pages.

The ones clients keep on retainer?

They protect revenue.

Be that developer.

I build internal tools and platforms that replace your duct-taped workflows. | Official Google & Hubspot Gold partner

Corporate HATES remote work.

This is how I started a 100% remote agency.

My "Overdelivery Stack" that scaled our clients to 8-figure exits:

• Nitro Cold Brew
• MacBook (or an iPad)
• Great Internet connection
• Stellar client results (recent client got acquired for $13,000,000)

I've scaled our clients from places like Ibiza and Paris.

And my team?

They're doing the same, working from places that inspire them.

✅ No long commutes
✅ No office distractions
✅ No pointless water cooler conversations

Want to swipe my SOPs that allow me to run this company from the comfort of my iPhone?

Sign up for my Substack for exclusive in-depth guides on how to grow a 100% remote company.

Link under my profile.

SEOs are DEAD.

I dared our AI to outperform our best SEO analyst.

Gave them both the same 20 sites. Same criteria. Same deadline.

The AI went first.

Lightning fast, no eye fatigue, 100% grind mode.

259 SEO errors were flagged in under 10 minutes.

Then our human analyst went in, line by line, analyzing structure, intent, UX, and context.

It found 83 issues.

Fewer, yes, but half of what the human eye caught, AI was blind to.

So... was AI actually better? 

No.

This experiment confirmed something bigger than numbers could show.

There’s no more betting on one tool or one method anymore.

The AI caught what was technically broken.

The human caught what was strategically wrong.

Choosing between AI and human expertise is like choosing between your left and right eye.

You can function with one. But depth perception requires both.

That mix is why our clients are still growing while others complain about “SEO being dead.”

If you want to see what this combo could do for your site, let’s go for it.

Book an audit with us.

Worst case, you walk away knowing exactly what’s blocking your growth.

I'm 39, Serbian Turned American and run a 100% remote web development agency and a 20-people team.

December 2025, our client secured $13,000,000 VC-funded exit.

But it wasn't always like this.

I started from the bottom…

• Came with $3,000 to my name
• To infamous South Side Chicago
• Picked up a job at the grocery store for minimum wage

Fast forward to today, and here's exactly what we sell (steal this if you want):

• Local SEO packages: $2,000/mo+
• Content marketing and SEO writing
• Meta ads management: retainer + performance
• Website complete builds and optimization: $20,000-$84,000

And here's how we keep the pipeline full:

• Referrals
• YouTube Videos
• Post on X/Twitter daily
• Post on LinkedIn 5x/week
• Publish on Substack weekly
• Warm outbound via HubSpot intent data
• DM prospects who comment on competitor's posts

All run on this stack:

• Meta Ads Manager
• CallRail (call tracking)
• Claude + ChatGPT (AI)
• HubSpot (CRM and pipeline)
• Notion (operations and SOPs)
• Google Drive (Our workspace & reports)

The result?

Complete location freedom, 100% of work done from my iPhone while enjoying 
Versailles, Ibiza, and visiting family in Belgrade.

Build the right systems, nail the right offers, and you can scale past $500K with a lean team while driving 7-figure results for your clients.

I break it all down in my newsletter.

Weekly drops on (sign up via the link under my profile name):

• AI
• SEO
• Sales
• Marketing

63 minutes ago someone called to tell me I was dead.

Not metaphorically.

They had already filed an official Google support case claiming I had passed away, and they wanted everything:

• My Google Workspace account
• My entire digital presence
• My business domain
• My emails

The caller introduced himself as David Odza from Google Support.

Professional voice. Palo Alto phone number. A legitimate Google confirmation email sitting right in my inbox.

Everything checked out.

Except one thing.

I knew it was a scam.

Here's where it gets interesting.

He kept asking about my email address. Fishing. Guessing. Circling back to it repeatedly, trying to confirm which account was actually mine.

Then he landed on an old Gmail address.

He asked me directly, "Is this your email?"

I said yes.

What he didn't know was that he'd just found my honeypot.

A honeypot is a fake account that looks real, set up specifically to attract attackers. No real data. No connections to anything important. No value whatsoever.

A trap dressed up as a target.

I keep one precisely for moments like this — an old Gmail address I've never used for anything real, sitting there waiting for exactly this kind of situation.

He thought he'd struck gold.

I let him think that.

Because I had a reason.

I needed his IP address for the fraud report.

He initiated account recovery. Walked me through approving it on the phone — a classic social engineering move where they get you to authorize your own account takeover in real time.

I played along.

Then I watched it unfold in real time:

• He logged in from Massachusetts
• Changed the password trying to lock me out permanently
• I changed it back first
• Kicked him off a Windows machine he had no business being on

And walked away with his IP addresses, phone number, and fake identities

They spent hours planning a sophisticated deceased account takeover.

They got into an empty trap.

Got absolutely nothing.

Now everything, the IPs, the phone number, the fake identities "David Odza" and "Timothy Casper", is sitting in a fraud report heading straight to Google's security team.

The lesson?

These attacks are becoming more sophisticated every day. They use:

• Real confirmation emails
• Real Google infrastructure
• Real support case numbers

Set up a honeypot. Trust your instincts. And if someone calls to tell you that you're dead, maybe don't take their word for it.

This month I'll be running a workshop on how to use AI to protect yourself and your business from phishing attacks.

Sign up to the newsletter (link under my name) to learn when it goes live.

I typed twitter . com into my browser today.

Or so I thought. My screen went black. Then full screen. My keyboard stopped responding. Every key I pressed did nothing...

For about three seconds, I felt that cold drop in my stomach. The one that says: *you've been hacked.*

My mind raced. Passwords. Bank accounts. Client data. Fifteen people depend on systems I manage.

Then I did the only thing I could think of.

Cmd + Option + Escape. Force quit Chrome.

It worked. I was out.

My next hour was spent researching what happened. Scanning for malware. Checking extensions. Reviewing DNS settings. Preparing for the worst.

The diagnosis?

I missed one letter.

I typed `.cm` instead of `.com`. That's it. One missing "o."

Turns out `.cm` is Cameroon's country code. And someone bought `http://twitter . cm` (DO NOT TYPE IT INTO YOUR COMPUTER) years ago for one reason: to catch people who type too fast.

That domain redirected me through an ad-tracking network. The full-screen lockout was just JavaScript on a webpage. Not malware. Not a hack. A scare tactic designed to make you panic and do something stupid.

Like calling a fake tech support number. Or clicking a button that *actually* installs malware.

Here's what stuck with me.

I run a digital agency. I live in browsers all day. I know better. And I still almost fell for it.

Now imagine someone on your team who doesn't know what force quit is.

That's the real danger. Not the scam itself. It's that it only needs to work once on the wrong person.

Three things worth doing today:

1. Show your team how to force quit a frozen browser (Cmd+Option+Escape on Mac, Ctrl+Shift+Escape on Windows)
2. Tell them to never call a number displayed on a "your computer is infected" screen
3. Remind them that the scariest-looking attacks are often the least dangerous, and the quiet ones are what actually get you

One missing letter almost ruined my afternoon.

Don't let it ruin yours.

Landed in USA 13 years ago (photo from THE Chicago South Side)

Cracked laptop...
Rented room
Zero safety

As if that wasn't hard enough:

No investors
No agency mastermind
Just wifi and the decision to figure it out

Fast forward.
Last quarter my agency helped clients lock in 8 figure exits.

Concrete wins, not theory:

• Around $2,000,000 in revenue for a disability law firm
• Over $4,000,000 in revenue for a home improvement company
• Enterprise grade web development shipped for a major non profit

None of that happened by accident.

Here is the operating system behind it:

Pick a painful problem

• I focused on local service providers
• When their leads stop, payroll hurts hard
• Solve that consistently and they remember your name and birthday

Sell the real wins

Not a massive “done for you everything” promise.
Just one clear outcome: Website + Local SEO sprint.

Easy yes.

Once they see it working, bigger checks make sense.

Create proof in public

• Hundreds of positive reviews on Upwork
• Daily posts on X and LinkedIn
• Documenting what works

The content brings people in already half sold.

Let systems do the follow up

HubSpot workflows, intent data, and simple pipelines.
No “just checking in” energy.

Prospects move through a process whether I am online or not.

Stack rare skills

• AI, technical SEO, CRO, local search
• Enough depth to solve hard problems
• Enough range to connect the whole funnel

Treat cash like oxygen

• Profit targets
• Weekly money reviews
• I built for boring predictability instead of viral spikes

Borrow other people’s trust

• Partner with vendors who already serve attorneys.
• They send us their clients.
• We send them better performing websites.

Everyone wins.

If you are in a new city, with no network and nothing but a laptop, you do not need permission.

Steal one of these.
Stack all seven.

Then let the internet do what it does best:

Turn specific skills into an agency that quietly prints results.

You want to get more details how I've done it? Sign up for my newsletter by clicking the link under my profile.

Your pal, Brian

P.S. I'm getting that hairline BACK.

I analyzed 3,000 websites across ChatGPT, Copilot, and Perplexity over 90 days.

What I found should terrify every marketer sleeping on backlinks.

Here's Sam Atlman’s dirty secret:

Google spent 25 years building a spam filter. These AI platforms are trying to do it in 25 months.

And they're losing. Badly.

ChatGPT and Perplexity were built on top of Bing's index. 

Bing has always been the bouncer who lets everyone into the club. 

• No ID check
• No dress code
• Just vibes

So now you've got AI tools confidently citing websites with fake authors, 100K random product pages, and thousands of AI-generated articles about nothing.

It's like building a library and filling it with phonebooks.

Meanwhile, Reddit became the golden child of Google's algorithm. Why? 

Because Reddit has something these AI crawlers don't: an army of angry moderators with zero spam tolerance.

Reddit is basically a self-cleaning oven. Post garbage, get downvoted into oblivion in 11 minutes.

But here's where it gets interesting for you.

These AI platforms are STARVING for quality signals. They need a way to separate real brands from digital ghosts.

And the #1 signal they're borrowing from Google's playbook?

Backlinks.

Backlinks are the passport into ChatGPT. The entry ticket into Claude. The skeleton key to Grok.

Every legit site linking to you is a vote of confidence these AI models actually understand.

While everyone is obsessing over prompt engineering and AI wrappers, the real power move is dead simple: get other websites to point at yours.

Same game. New arena.

The brands building backlink moats right now will own AI search for the next decade.

The ones ignoring it will wonder why ChatGPT recommends their competitor every single time.

The window is wide open. These platforms haven't figured out spam filtering yet. That's why our clients pay us big money to help them break into AI citations.

Which means right now, quality stands out like a lighthouse in a sea of fog.

• Build links
• Earn citations
• Own the answer

My backlink playbook on how to earn authoritative links is coming up on my newsletter. Link under my name. Sign up before I hit send.

You can be the one learning how to use the AI, or you can be the one influencing people who believe in it like gospel.

Which one are you?

I work 3-4 hours a day. While traveling. While running a 100% remote agency.

I’ve lived in places like Paris, Ibiza and Belgrade.

All while immigrating to United States.

It took me 10 years to build a system that runs without me standing over it.

• While holding a job
• While dealing with immigration paperwork

The secret?

I stopped being the bottleneck.

I built a business where every person owns their role, every task has a home, and the machine moves whether I'm online or not.

• No single point of failure
• No permission needed
• It just does things

This system has survived AI disruptions, algorithm changes, software migrations, and actual wars.

It's robust precisely because no one person holds the keys.

Most agency owners I talk to work 10-12 hours a day and still feel behind.

I used to be one of them.

But now, my lean system powers 8-figure exits for clients and multiple 7-figures of new top-line revenue.

The shift happened when I stopped managing tasks and started building systems that manage themselves.

If you're running a service business and feel chained to it, you don't have a work ethic problem.

You have an architecture problem.

I write about how to fix that every week. Link under my name.

The World is on fire. Your attention doesn't have to be.

News cycle hijacked your mind while AI is unbothered & keeps marching forward.

This is the most expensive time in history to drift.

In this bloody conflict the biggest casualty is your focus. 

And its consequences will reach you whether you pay attention or not.

• Oil prices will climb
• The economy will slow
• AI is already reshaping every industry

Stack a war on top of all that, and suddenly it feels like the ground is shifting under your feet.

You feel it as anxiety. That low hum in the background. The compulsive news checking. The sense that you should be doing something but you're not sure what.

Here's what I want to tell you: that anxiety is not a signal to panic. It's a signal to focus.

I've been here before...

I grew up with bombs over my head. I know what real chaos sounds like.

And I know that the people who came out the other side weren't the ones who froze or spiraled. They were the ones who got quiet, got clear, and moved.

This morning I woke up grateful.

• I have food in my fridge
• I have a roof over my head
• My internet connection is strong

That's more than enough. And whatever the world brings, I will meet it. 

With focus

Focus is the antidote to anxiety

Anxiety thrives on scattered attention. It feeds on doom scrolling, reactive decisions, and an endless loop of "what if."

Focus kills all of that. 

When you sit down with one clear task and give it everything, the noise disappears. The war doesn't stop. The economy doesn't magically recover. But you stop suffering from it, because you're building instead of drifting.

The last time I activated this level of focus was during COVID. 

Everything felt uncertain. I locked in anyway. 

It changed the trajectory of my business. Then I cleared $250,000 in 2020.

Just because the world is on fire, you shouldn't start feeling apologetic for building great things.

This moment feels the same. 

The next 12 to 18 months will be mission critical.

But this time we have two forces reshaping everything: war and AI.

One of them will work for you, if you play your cards right.

The playbook: focus in 3 moves

- Shrink your inputs.

Stop consuming news like it's your job. Set one 15-minute window per day. Outside that window, your attention belongs to your work and the people you love. Anxiety drops the moment your information diet gets intentional.

- Automate what drains you.

Every repetitive task you still do manually is stealing focus from the work that matters. Tools are evolving fast. 

• My Mac Mini runs localized agents
• My Notion is becoming an AI automation engine 
• Things that used to take hundreds of hours are now handled by machine

You don't need a massive budget. You need the willingness to experiment.

- Build one thing every day.

Not ten things. One. A paragraph. A system. A conversation that moves a project forward.

When the world gets chaotic, most people become reactive.

That's your advantage

"Overdelivering" may sound hard. Until you realize how small customer expectations in fact are...

And then you realize that 95% of your competitors can't deliver on basic promises they make. Let alone extras...

That is the mindset of customer service.

Things that are easy to you, and client loves, that's the middle ground you're looking for.

That's what drives positive reviews.

That's what increases your LTV.

And it is your job as an entrepreneur to figure out what that is.

Pinyerd Disability Law clients need a website that makes law information easy to find and navigate.

Our design emphasizes:

Accessibility for all users.
Intuitive navigation.
Clean, consistent layout.
Fast performance.

The results? 

Higher Google rankings, dramatically faster load times, lower cost per acquisition, and more relevant visitors.

Experience it.

I don't post Alpha Efficiency work often enough.

Client had an exceptional multiple 7 figure year.

Good design is great return on investment.

Your AI-created site is a lot like a template.

It loads in 4.23 seconds. Our clients' sites load in 0.8.

That gap matters more than you think.

Because a split second, literally, decides whether you're #1 or #2 on Google.

And #1 gets roughly 50% more traffic than #2.

• Not 5%
• Not 10%
• FIFTY

Do you know how fast your site actually loads?

Not "pretty fast." Not "it seems fine on my laptop."

The actual number.

Here's the thing about AI-generated code:

It's trained to write code that works. Not code that performs.

And those are two very different things.

Your site can function perfectly and still load in 4.2 seconds while your competitor loads in 0.8.

Google doesn't care who wrote the code. It doesn't care if it was Cursor, 

Claude, or a junior dev in a basement.

It cares about one thing: how fast that page reaches the user.

That's the part that should keep you up at night.

Not that you're losing money. That you can't tell you're losing money.

There's no invoice for the leads that never arrived. No alert for the customers who bounced at 3.1 seconds. No dashboard showing what your competitor
captured because their site was 400 milliseconds faster.

It's an invisible bleed.

And AI made it easier to bleed without noticing, because the code looks clean, ships fast, and passes every automated test.

But automated tests don't measure what Google measures.

We've built over 500 sites. The ones that rank aren't only the prettiest. They're the fastest.

And the fastest sites aren't built with the newest tools.

They're built by people who know what to strip away.

Right now your site has a load time.

You either know the number, or someone else ranks #1.

WordPress vs. Webflow for SEO:

One is proprietary.
Other one is open source.

One makes you pay $60,000 per year when you reach the limits...
The other one has no limits.

One dominates 42% of the web.
Other one doesn't let you create robotsLLM.txt file without making you pay more.

Choose wisely.

People have all the knowledge of the world and computing power in their pocket.

Yet they decide to scroll.

Make it make sense.

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