How to nail your one-liner

Picture this: 

It’s Christmas time. You’re home for the holidays. Snow is falling, and your parents’ house is packed with relatives. 

At lunch, you’re seated next to your 58-year old aunt – a kind woman that’s always been interested in you and your passions. 

After a bit of smalltalk about the weather (after all, who has seen SNOW recently during Christmas time?), she asks the dreaded question: 

“What do you do these days?” 

You struggle for words. Because you’re a generalist, it’s difficult to wrap all that into one sentence. So you find the next best approximation.

“I, uh, … I work in startups.” 

This story played out in households all over the world over the last few weeks. 

I’ve faced this struggle a lot, and still do sometimes. It’s hard to describe what you do when you’re a wonderful, multi-faceted being like yourself, dear reader. 

So today, I want to give you a five-step process to nail that question next time. 

Let’s dive in. ⬇️

[1] List your activities 

First, write down everything that you do – all your professional and personal pursuits. This should include: 

• Full-time jobs
• Side hustles 
• Interests that you spend significant time on in your free time 
• Anything else that’s worth considering 

For example, I: 

• Run a recruiting agency for generalists 
• Write a weekly newsletter 
• Sell online courses 
• Occasionally consult on international expansion in the EdTech sector 
• Play Lacrosse at a high level 
• Have a broad range of interests, including language learning, understanding cultures, air & train travel, injury prevention, Magic: the Gathering, and overall self-improvement. 

(You see my struggle in answering “what do you do?” now, I hope.) 

[2] Find the common thread 

Next, think about what unites all these activities. Every person I’ve met so far has some sort of common thread that ties what they do together. 

In my case, that common thread is “empowerment” or “helping others unlock their potential”: 

• In recruiting, I help young professionals accelerate their careers and find their right job
• In writing, I hope to inspire all of you to pursue the things that you really want to do
• In my online course, I help others reclaim their time & energy 
• In international expansion, I … empower other companies to grow, I guess? 
• In sports, I act as a role model & leader for younger guys, and inspire others by pushing my own limits 

If you’re struggling to find the common thread, LLMs are quite helpful. Just use this prompt in the LLM of your choice (I like Perplexity): 

“I’m going to give you a list of activities that I do. If you had to identify one common thread among the things that I do, what would it be?

[paste your list]”

[3] Identify your unique angle 

Now, we’re going to borrow a bit from the concept of market positioning in business. Positioning has five components: 

1. Target Audience
2. Competitive Analysis
3. Value Proposition
4. Brand Identity
5. Messaging

(We’re not going to worry about the first 2, as we’re not building a competitive business.) 

In the last step, you’ve identified your value proposition: what you do, and what your benefits are. 

Now, by identifying your unique angle, we’ll work out your brand identity: what makes you truly unique. 

The beauty of being a generalist is that your competition is much lower: it’s hard to be among the top 1% of physicists; much easier to be among the top 1% of physicists who have an MBA and speak five languages.

By combining different disciplines, it’ll be hard to compete with you at the things you’re uniquely good at. 

Let’s identify that angle. You can use this prompt: 
“What’s the most interesting thing you’ve noticed about my activities? What would a unifying descriptor be?” 

This is what Perplexity gave me, and I think it’s beautiful: 

“The most fascinating aspect of your professional portfolio is how you're essentially creating a "human potential optimization ecosystem" - where each of your activities (recruiting, writing, athletics, consulting, fitness training) are different entry points for helping people or organizations unlock and expand their capabilities.

Your work doesn't just connect people to jobs; it connects people to their potential. You're not just consulting on expansion; you're expanding human and organizational capacity. You're not just an athlete; you're demonstrating what's possible through disciplined performance.

In essence, you're a "potential architect" - someone who designs pathways for growth across multiple domains, using your own multidimensional approach as a living blueprint.”

Potential Architect, huh? That sounds … cool.

(This is our “unifying descriptor”.)

It also sounds f**king pretentious when somebody asks you what you do, and you reply with: “Oh, I’m a Human Potential Architect.” 

So let’s work on our messaging.

[4] Use the Pyramid Principle to explain what you mean 

The Pyramid Principle means to start with the most important message first, then break it down to the supporting arguments – so that the reader can stop reading at any time having taken away the most important information:

Let’s take my example again:

“I'm a Human Potential Architect, focused on empowering people and organizations to reach their full potential.”

OK, but what does this mean? Let’s add three supporting points: 

“I do this through three main channels:

1. Talent connection: I run a recruiting company that matches great generalists with top startups.
2. Knowledge sharing: I write a weekly newsletter on personal and professional growth strategies.
3. Athletic performance: As a high-level Lacrosse player, I embody and explore human potential through competitive sports.”

Now, if someone wants to learn more about the recruiting business, I can dive deeper (or give you this link). If not, then they didn't receive any unnecessary information.

In Perplexity, you can use this prompt: 

“Based on the information I’ve provided, create a specific answer to the question “What do you do?”, using the term [unifying descriptor]. Use the Pyramid Principle to explain this.” 

[5] Craft a one-sentence, simplified description 

These unifying descriptors like “Human Potential Architect” still sound pretentious.

You can use this in contexts where you have more time to describe what you do (eg. in pitches, podcasts, or posts), but it won’t work in a cocktail-party setting. 

Since we don’t want to be pretentious assholes most of the time, it’s probably better to identify a simplified alternative. 

For example: 

“I run a recruiting company for generalists, write a weekly newsletter, and play high-level Lacrosse—all with the goal of helping others succeed.”

Neat. 

Even your 58-year old aunt would understand that. 

You can even take it one step further to explain it to your five-year old nephew: 

“I help people find cool jobs, write fun stories, play sports, and learn new awesome things - all while making the world a bit better!”

Again, Perplexity can help. Use these prompts: 

1. “Simplify this statement into a one-sentence description.” (You might have to work the output a bit.) 
2. “Now write it in a way that a five-year old would understand.” 

And that’s it! 

You’ve gone from being utterly confused about what you do to having clarity about your value proposition. And can explain it both to your aunt and your nephew. 

Might even have learned something in the process – I sure did. 

So, uh … what do you do, friend?

(Hit reply or send an email to newsletter@dominiknitsch.com, and let me know. I read every email.) 

Whenever you're ready, there are four ways I can help you:

[1] Reclaim up to 4 hours per day and find time to do the things you've always wanted to do by enrolling into Personal Productivity OS.

[2] Hire your next Founder's Associate or other business generalist position with my startup, Generalyst Recruiting.

[3] You could also find your next startup job in Europe by simply applying as a candidate.

[4] Learn how you can build your career as a generalist by subscribing to this newsletter. ⬇️