A few days ago, I asked my former students before they registered for Planning classes with me—did you feel hesitant because I don't have an official title at any agency or client? Because not having a title seems like it wouldn't be very credible.
After receiving your answers, I'd like to tell you about how I've lived two contrasting professional lives, being both a Planner and a Founder, and how each role has shaped the other.
In short, I started my planning career 13 years ago, while my startup founder journey began 9 years ago, and by then the planner in me stepped back to watch the founder walk straight into a forest with no idea of the way out.
When I was at the agency, I planned with all my passion for creativity and always had to 'raise the bar'. I constantly tried to find unique frameworks, read and downloaded hundreds of case studies, always looked for novel execution possibilities, fiercely debated in internal meetings, and felt frustrated when a creative brief as pristine as Steve Jobs' got torn apart by the Creative team. My energy at that time was extremely positive, carefree, and naive.
Just as my Planning career was rising, I took that exact energy into entrepreneurship and confidently believed that if I was good at working for others, I'd do well working for myself. And I was a Planner—confident that good planning would lead to smooth operations and success.
At my first startup from 2017, right from the ideation phase, I spent a lot of time on planning—from market research, ideation, operational processes, recruitment, coaching, mentoring, team building, and many other small details. I learned all these from large companies and my previous company. These "plans" made me proud because I thought I had put the company on track, and I was even proud to think I was among the few startups with clear processes from the start like big companies. A Planner, after all.
But just a few months in, I realized that clear processes for an early-stage startup didn't produce clear results, or more broadly, planning didn't help much at this stage—it was just a nice-to-have. If the company couldn't survive, the plan became meaningless, and it was even a mask hiding the instability underneath. This is when I realized that execution is everything, and this was very different from being a Planner at an agency when I rarely dealt with execution. From then on, I threw myself into execution, trying everything to find product-market fit, while planning became something more timely and about prioritization.
I almost "reformatted my hard drive," forgetting everything I knew to learn how to be a founder over the past 9 years with many failures, a little success, but still no major breakthrough. I've simplified this founder story and only explored one aspect—if I went into details, I wouldn't know how to write it all.
Taking one step out of the MarCom world and jumping into being a Founder has changed a lot about how I do Planning in MarCom, both positively and not so positively.
The not-so-positive aspect is that I've become more pragmatic, my energy is no longer extremely positive, I worry less about the industry, and my passion for driving creativity isn't as high as before. I've become more "calculating" in my approach to planning, or as a joke, I've become more "Account" haha.
The positive aspect is that I empathize with clients more, I understand their business difficulties, budget constraints, office politics, and the pressure they face—things I didn't want to care about or know before. After all this time as a planner, this is the first time I feel I speak the same language as clients. I get to work directly with them like an internal team: visit markets together, meet other teams to understand insights from different stakeholders, give feedback on new packaging, write client briefs, and shortlist agencies for pitching.
In summary, being a Founder has given my Planner self better business acumen, a healthier mindset, and greater client empathy, but at the same time, it's also made me put creativity less at the forefront and calculate more.
Going back to my initial question to my students, fortunately all those who answered weren't bothered by my lack of a title—they mainly decided to register because they trusted the recommendations from my former students and those who know me. On this occasion, I'd also like to thank you for trusting me, and I hope the rest of 2026 is easier for all of you 🙇♂️
