January saw the worst month of layoffs since Lehman brothers took a big fat sh%t and blew up the global housing market in 2008/2009

Layoffs.fyi shows how many tech and startups jobs are being cut - Jan was 25k, thats so agreesive, its only 8% of the year but if you compare to 2025 numbers its already at 26% of the total layoffs for the year!

only 92% of the year left to go lol - 2023 was the worst year of layoffs - almost double the year prior or after - and even 2023 didnt start off so bad

Side note before you jump into the post

Ok so after writing this blog post, im coming back here to let you know, this will sound like im bragging here, but i promise, its to inspire, and to give evidence that doing what I do, pays off, it just might take some time!

And of course, i will leave you with a good conclusion!

First, I dont want to make you scared or fearful, this actually ties back to my last post about turning pro.

The job market is still in free fall, even though we’ve actually hired quite a number of people already ending Dec 2025 and starting Jan 2026. So there are companies growing, and i’m proud that we are one of them.

You never know though - now that I said we are growing, the gods of comedy might come through and turn things around

ANYWAY

I’ve been doing this since 2010 basically - sometimes more improvement, sometimes less improvement

But always improving - and what did I get from this?

In 2012 from Macedonia - I got a full scholarship to one of the best universities in America - that scholarship was worth around 1.5 Million ZAR

With only 3 years experience - I went freelancing and made over 100k ZAR per month

COVID hit - I travelled the world: Mexico, Germany, Switzerland, France, Italy, Croatia, Greece, Portugal, UK, Indonesia, Singapore, Turkey, Dubai, South Africa, Romania - this list actually goes on im sure, cause actually, Macedonia, Albania, Serbia, i forgot about those, Monetenegro, forgot about that one too. Im off to USA in 4 weeks - first stop Miami.

4 years ago - I started a business that’s done well over 10 million ZAR in revenue

Cant show proof of this, you will just have to trust me here (and most of my business is employee cost 70- 80%, so i would love that revenue to be profit, but unfortunately it’s not - that being said, we are growing and we are more profitable than EVER

Today - i’ve done business in Brazil, USA, UK, EU, Middle East, South Africa, Angola and Nigeria - more to come im sure!

Because this didnt just HAPPEN - I put in the work,

All this only makes sense in hindsight - working out, studying, learning new skills, working longer hours, making and growing my network.

Now its obvious, back then, had no clue

Now im learning new things, trying out Automation ideas, studying AI, learning new marketing channels - Linkedin, Cold Calling, Reddit etc

Even this newsletter is brand new, its only a year old!

Im still doing things today, that I have no idea exactly how they will benefit me in the future - but I am confident they will

What are you doing today, that will help you in some distant tomorrow?

If you dont have a good answer for this, you gotta really sit down and take some accountability - its okay to not be putting in the time and effort, but its not okay to be disappointed with the world when that lack of input leads to a lack of output

I lost my first client because I hired an incompetent developer, well, lets not be that harsh, he was smart, he was determined, but he was also immature and sensitive - that immaturity lead to a huge fights 14 months into the project with the client and his team, and it was a phone call, the client fired us that same day…

Never got the client back, fired the developer the same day - it was stressful as all hell and I lost a lot of money (probably around 400k ZAR in profit)

But it wasnt just my hiring that was the mistake

My pricing was also the mistake - I took the client for a ride, made up some BS about VAT and how we charge (because i was scared to price higher, so I said the pricing higher was because of taxes - taxes that I made up and the client could never claim back)

Yes that was the real booboo - I mispriced the client completely, so they were never happy with rates and anything that went poorly, they immedaitely told me, so had to work hard to keep everyone happy

Still, i lost 400k, messed up pricing completely, messed up hiring completely and it was my VERY FIRST DAM CLIENT lol

But do you see me sitting and crying at night? No

But if you could, you would, cause i do 😛

Just kidding - i dont, i made the mistake, i own it, life goes on

Another mistake I made, I hired a dev, that actually had so little work to do, they took a second job and made me have meetings around that schedule

This is a mistake i really hate that i made - cost wise, wasnt so bad, probably only 150-200k ZAR

But the real problem is some dam dev took me for a ride, making me (the boss (apparently)) work around his (the employees) schedule - this pissed me off so much, I remember the day, I went for a run around london in the evening - called the dev that night - told him to either quit immediately or im firing him

I let him do this because the other dev on our team was good friends, and I wanted him to save face and not cause some drama for me later.

Even recently, like 3 weeks ago - I made a mistake, probably cost me about 200K -250K ZAR

I was hiring a second AI engineer, i couldnt find someone, i called a dev i recently hired in November 2025, cause he said he knows people - he hooked me up - i stopped looking for devs

That dev was absolutely useless, i shouldnt have trusted a dev to do my job, i should have interviewed the dev before sending them to the client, and i should have kept looking for devs just in case this one didnt work out

BUT I WAS LAZY!!! Im annoyed that I was - first i shat out my dev, yes its my fault, but he gave me someone useless, he needs to respect me enough to not do stupid shit like that again

second, i went hard core on looking for another person, found two really amazing people, and now im ready for them and for new opportunities

My question to you is - what mistake have you made recently?

If you haven’t you’re not risking enough and you’re not trying - which again, its fine, but no risk no reward my friend

Im getting into crazy great shape again - some days i even go twice to the gym - and its been awesome, really happy with the progress

But this is taking my time away from other things I could be doing, and I cant expect to have such a great change happen in the space of 3 weeks

This will take time, and effort and commitment

Every accomplishment i’ve had - even if it seems it happened quickly eg: making 100K a month in 3 years

So it kinda took me 8 years to make 100k a month

Now i dont make anywhere near 100k a month - the below is in Macedonian - but that last sentence basically says i make about 2000 euro a month or 38000 ZAR per month - GROSS, not NETT lol

So yeah, most of you and basically every single employee of mine, bar the juniors, makes more money than I do… I used to make 2000 euro in about 6 working days 7 years ago lol - now it takes me 21 working days, and i work WAYYYY more hours and I work weekends…

Moral of the story? I will make bank, and i’ll send you screenshots 😉 BUT its going to take time, its not going to happen soon - i am doing things NOW and will CONTINUE to do things for a LONG period of time - YEARS and YEARS - and then I will reap the rewards

What does this mean for you? Well, what are you doing today and what are you going to continue to do, so that, you do well in the future? What is future you going to thank you for?

Anyway, thats it, thats the post - I want you to become serious, and take yourself seriously and taking things seriously doesnt happen overnight

im only going to be writing these longer format posts, I dont want short, meaningless stuff, especially with all this AI slop

I want good connections, good networks, good relationships and that takes time

See you next week!!

This was a different kind of post - it was a long ass story, so I want to know what you think about it

Reply here and let me know - do you prefer these kinds of stories that then tie in advice? do you think i grew my balls or just acted emotionally? do you miss the old format? should I combine the old with the new? etc….

ANY HOW!

Let me know if you like this and as usual: