Becoming Radically Yourself

I had a huge a-ha moment when I interviewed my guest this week, Christopher Lochhead. Lochhead is known as “one of the best minds in marketing” – and now I know why. Lochhead told me he felt like he just never fit. He has dyslexia, dyscalculia, ADHD, and depression. 

He got kicked out of high school and left the system entirely for years until he returned as a CMO at a publicly traded company. 

But he understands something essential: his neurodivergent brain is his greatest asset. Lochhead unlocked how to soar in big jobs and make his difference work for him. Talking to him unlocked a crucial puzzle for me as an entrepreneur.  

Over more than a decade, the company I started, Women Online, became a successful small business and I sold it in 2021. But for the first five years of the company, I struggled to communicate our value in a way that inspired clients to sign on the dotted line. I was selling a new idea in a premature market (the market is the now multi-billion dollar influencer marketing industry) and many people found it both confusing and non-essential. The value wasn’t obvious enough to my client base, and I struggled with how to pitch it.

Own your difference. I didn’t own our company’s difference; instead I tried to fit into existing marketing models and the comparison didn’t work. If I had said to clients, “This idea is new and bold and you’re going to look really smart when you try this,” clients would have felt more confident and willing to take the leap. 

Thankfully enough people got it eventually, and I had a successful exit. But if I’d been able to figure out how to describe our work better, my business would have been larger and even more successful. 

Christopher Lochhead offers a powerful insight if you feel like you just can’t communicate what you want to at work: become radically yourself. Stop trying to fit into a comparison trap. You have to resist comparison and be different. We talked about it:

“A CEO would call and say’ I'd love to talk to you.’ And so I'd say, ‘Great, let's talk.’ And somewhere in the conversation I would say to her or him, ‘Well, what are you looking for in a CMO?’ And the CEO would say ‘Oh, you know, we want somebody who can build our brand and build demand and new product marketing,’ and go through the checklist of things that the marketing leader does. 

And I said, “Well, look, I, I do all those things, but if that's what you're looking for, I'm not your guy. So we can cut this conversation short. I can give you the rest of the hour back.’

And then the CEO says, ‘Well, hold on a minute. What do you mean that's not what you do?’ And Lochhead says ’Well, the basic blocking and tackling and marketing.. I could do all those things of course, but it's not my superpower.’ And of course the CEO asks ‘what's your superpower?’ and I say, ‘My superpower is, it turns out, if you study the way startup companies work, every startup faces a roughly 18 to 36 month period where there is an epic battle for who's going to be the winner in this category. And that company typically earns two thirds of the economics. I specialize in designing and winning that battle. But that's not what you're looking for. So, you know, good luck.’” 

And guess what happens: The CEO wants Lochhead.

Lochhead says when you refuse to be compared, when you know your difference will drive “exponential growth,” breakthroughs happen.

Try it and see!