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The TL;DR:

• Building in Public with SCALIS: The launch of our dinner series and why I am so bullish on building industry authority and in-person connections.

• What I’m Thinking about this Week: Being honest with where my time should go and ultimately reprioritizing.

• Let’s Chat D2C Let’s Chat Recruiting & TA: As a part of reprioritizing my time, I’m sunsetting the Let’s Chat D2C section and replacing it with Let’s Chat Recruiting & TA. This will be far more relevant for SCALIS.

• Upcoming Events: I’ll be in Arkansas until mid-May. Let me know if you’re in the area and want to connect!

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Building in Public with SCALIS: Dinners > Conferences

One of the most exciting things we’ve learned post-launch is just how powerful intimate, in-person gatherings can be. Conferences have their place, but they’re chaotic, impersonal, and often feel like a sea of surface-level conversations. That’s why we decided to go all-in on something different: the SCALIS “Hiring Shouldn’t Suck” Dinner Series.

We’re taking this across more than 10 cities in 2025, hosting curated dinners for talent acquisition and people operations leaders. These dinners are small, intentionally designed to spark honest conversations, and free of any pressure to “pitch.” Just a few hours of real talk around what’s broken in hiring and what people are actually excited about solving.

It’s also much easier to get someone to say yes to a meaningful dinner than to respond to cold outreach. And once they’re there, the insights are ten times more valuable than what you’d get from a 30-minute Zoom call. These dinners have already helped us shape our roadmap and understand the daily frustrations our users face.

At SCALIS, we’re not just building software. We’re building relationships and community. That’s what this series is about. And if we’re coming to your city, I’d love to see you at the table.

What I’m Thinking About This Week: Reorienting Where I’m Spending My Time

This week, I’ve been reflecting on how I spend my time and where I direct my content efforts. With SCALIS now being my full-time focus, I’ve had to take a hard look at what still aligns with my goals and what doesn’t. For example, the D2Z Podcast has been a great tool for connecting with the ecommerce world. But these days, it takes 2 to 3 hours a week to produce, and my role in that space is no longer central.

That time would be much better spent on TalentHack, our new podcast focused on hiring, recruiting, and everything happening behind the scenes in people ops. It’s more aligned with what I care about right now, and it serves the audience we’re building for with SCALIS.

Sunsetting something that helped build your brand is tough. But as entrepreneurs, we need to constantly evaluate whether our energy is going toward the things that move the needle today. Momentum is not the same as alignment. And just because something worked in the past doesn’t mean it’s what you should keep doing now.

I’m not cutting everything overnight. But I am making space for what’s next.

Let’s Chat D2C Let’s Chat Recruiting & TA: The Problem with ATS Match Scores

This is the first edition where I'm officially retiring the “Let’s Chat D2C” section. Ecommerce has been an incredible chapter of my life, but as I’ve transitioned into running SCALIS full-time, that world feels further and further behind me. I’m no longer deep in email flows, ad strategies, or Shopify builds. Now I’m immersed in conversations with talent leaders, building hiring infrastructure, and rethinking how companies scale their teams. So it only makes sense that this newsletter evolves with me.

From here on out, this section will dive into talent acquisition. And to kick it off, let’s talk about a growing issue that’s undermining the very purpose of recruiting software: match scores in applicant tracking systems (ATS).

Too many ATS platforms are rolling out match scores without the tech needed to back them up. Resumes that are keyword-stuffed are rising to the top, while great candidates are buried. The problem is that these systems are treating resumes like a game of word bingo. Mention "project management" five times and you rise to the top, even if you're unqualified.

These match scores are misleading and create a false sense of accuracy. At minimum, these systems need natural language processing and contextual understanding. Until that happens, recruiters and hiring managers should treat match scores as directional and not definitive. Use them to start a conversation, not end one.

Upcoming Events

I’ll be in Arkansas until mid-May. Let me know if you’re in the area and want to connect!