Six years in public service, media, and business taught me one thing: clarity beats volume. Here’s what I learned and what comes next.
Beyond the Goal: Eliyahu Goldratt Speaks on the Theory of Constraints isn’t among my favorite listens of 2025, but it highlights a useful truth: every system has a primary constraint; until you identify and address it, progress drags. This blog post is a constraint. Until I write it, it impedes progress on several projects I’m working on. This blog post is a constraint. I’ve felt that until I write it , it’ll impede progress on several projects I’m working on.
Valuable lessons learned and put into action
The last six years taught me one simple truth: clarity beats volume. That’s true in politics, business, and community life.
Each summer since 2015, I’ve taken my daughters on a Daddy-Daughter trip. Two weeks, sometimes a month. We fish, swim, race on the beach, eat too late, and hate leaving. Those trips are joy—and they’ve also been my yearly audit. What matters? What lasts?
2018: The calling (Longboat Key, Fla.)
That summer the questions got loud. I woke before the girls, made coffee, and stared at the American flag outside the gatehouse, asking God for clarity. Five ideas kept circling: teach small business owners, support STEM access, bridge the digital divide, help people disrupt themselves into meaningful work, and strengthen support for police and military.
A line I live by wouldn’t let me go: If you can’t stop thinking about it, don’t stop working on it. So I called friends on friends for help, guidance, and input. (Thank you, Kane Jamison, AJ Kohn, Tim Wagner, David Kutcher, Joel Klettke, Sheena Schleicher.) Their words live on in my head, and in a lengthy Google Doc.
This insight stuck from one of those conversations: Most leaders don’t need more ideas. They need someone who can isolate the problem worth solving, locate the real constraint, and identify the decision, assumption, or narrative that’s slowing them down. From there, they need solutions that turn clarity into momentum. When the constraint is visible, alignment becomes possible, and progress finally feels inevitable.
What I didn’t know yet: building a winning campaign with no base, launching a news startup, and writing for a major metro would teach me that narrative isn’t decoration; it’s infrastructure.
Late 2018–2019: Service finds me
Two shocks followed. A friend mentioned, out of the blue, that I should run for local office. Then I spoke at a school board meeting after a divisive video roiled our town; the clip went everywhere. Within days, I was thrust into the spotlight and asked to run for city council by several members of the community.
I did. Fifty-one days later, I became the first Black person elected in my city.
The best part wasn’t the title. It was showing my daughters what stepping up looks like and learning, up close, how much clear, honest messaging matters once you’re actually responsible for outcomes.
2020–2021: Trial by fire
We were skiing in New Mexico when I first heard about the coronavirus. Days later we were dealing with shortages, mandates, and shutdowns. Then a diversity plan ignited a fight that split neighbors and friends. The national media arrived. A six-part podcast pegged our town as ground zero in the CRT wars.
This stretch taught me a lesson I repeat often: Until you run for office, you don’t understand the difference between the political, the personal, and the professional.
It also exposed a real gap in my community, not unlike many others in North Texas. People weren’t lacking news; they were drowning in performance. National outlets parachuted in with hot takes. Social media lit up with outrage. Local residents were bombarded with information but starved for clarity. What they needed was useful narrative—signal, not noise—that helped them act locally with confidence.
I tried to be that voice, but as an elected official, I was seen as part of the problem. It was like watching a house burn down while looking on, holding the fire hose.
2022–2024: Experiments in signal
In 2022, a business partner and I launched a local news startup for our city of 32,000. Support inside the city was lukewarm; interest across Texas was strong.
The startup failed as a business but succeeded as an education. I learned what it takes to deliver utility at the neighborhood level—that is, what makes news useful versus merely interesting. I found my people again: builders in local media who understood that trust is earned through consistency, not clicks. We ultimately sunset the project rather than chase a model we didn’t want to run, but I don’t lament the loss. The education alone was worth it.
I also won reelection in May 2022 and had a stark realization: both of my daughters would be off to college in 1,045 days. I wasn’t spending them on anyone else’s agenda. I began saying no to almost everything that wasn’t about family or meaningful work. Fewer meetings. Minimal social media. Less “should.” More stewardship—of time, attention, and relationships. I stopped attending meetings that were neither personally nor professionally valuable.
I declined advisory board requests from organizations I didn’t care deeply about. If it didn’t pass the “can-I-make-a-meaningful-difference” test, the answer was often no.
In 2023, my oldest daughter left for college. That transition clarified everything. By 2024, I was ready to focus on what came next. I’d been writing more frequently throughout my council tenure, sharpening my voice on the intersection of local governance and bigger cultural debates. I set a professional goal: write as a columnist for a major newspaper.
When the opportunity came to pitch The Dallas Morning News, I had a portfolio that showed I could translate complex political moments into clear, grounded analysis. Later that year, I joined as a contributing columnist covering politics, governance, business, culture, and community—i.e., how national debates land on North Texas streets.
2025: Choosing the work
By May, I was ready to leave office. I respect politics; I’m done with cowardice. When protecting your next election outranks doing what you know is right, that’s not leadership. One ending, one beginning: my city council term ended, and my youngest left for college. Only one of those made me sad.
One thing I will always appreciate about my time on council: It steeled my resolve, helping me gain clarity on what truly matters. Hint: it’s a short list.
These are the most durable lessons and where they apply.
1. Clarity beats volume.
Most “communication” is performance. The work is to name the problem, frame the stakes, and show the next step. Briefly. During the diversity plan firestorm, people weren’t lacking information; they were drowning in it. The national media arrived. A six-part podcast dropped. Everyone had opinions. What residents actually needed was a useful signal that helped them act locally with confidence, not more noise to (over)react to.
2. Small businesses need on-ramps, not textbooks.
When I started mentoring local businesses in 2017, I watched owners struggle not because good information didn’t exist, but because they couldn’t access it. They had blogs and videos at their fingertips—on local marketing, running ads, word-of-mouth—but no time to consume them. Short, targeted, outcome-specific guides beat hour-long webinars and 3,000-word posts every time.
3. Narrative is a strategic function.
It’s how you create trust, mobilize people, and make decisions under uncertainty. Running with no political base taught me this. I had to build an audience from scratch and craft a narrative compelling enough to help me get elected during a tumultuous time. I saw firsthand how narrative was infrastructure, not decoration.
4. Local power is underused.
A handful of engaged residents can change a city. The most depressing part of being a local politician was seeing how few people understood this. Politicians are thrilled that more people don’t realize it. We overestimate Washington and underestimate city hall, school boards, local boards, and citizen councils—even though local government plays an outsized role in our day-to-day lives.
5. Do work that’s big enough to be worth your life.
From 2017–2022, I worked with an enviable roster of clients, including one of the largest healthcare companies in the country and a social media platform we all use daily. It was eye-opening: I saw the disconnect between what companies need and will pay for, and what I enjoy most and am best at. The best work sits where my curiosity, competence, impact, and revenue overlap.
6. Plan the next role before you need it.
Career optionality is a discipline. Treat it like fitness: consistent reps beat last-minute sprints. Too many of us wait until the inevitable is upon us to prepare for what’s next. I started looking beyond politics in 2022, cleared the deck, and set a goal: write as a columnist for a major newspaper. Two years later, that goal became reality.
What’s next
I’m refocusing my priorities, taking my work in a new direction, based on what I learned over the last six years and the work I find most meaningful. I’ll share details soon.
The last six years taught me what matters; the next six are for building it.