On the nineteenth episode of Radically Honest, your host Dasom Lee sits down with Creative Entrepreneur, Founder and CEO of DesignCuts, and Host of Biz Buds and The Honest Designer Show Tom Ross. Fired up with entrepreneurial ambition pre-puberty, the only time he didn't work for himself was stocking shelves at a store. His adversity story is inspiring—lean in closer.

Growing up in England, a genius friend inspired him to code at age 12. An early adopter in the blogging space,  "sleazy" advice online led him to use vanity metrics to build a high-traffic site. This boasted over 50 million visitors. Oddly enough, he wasn't fulfilled. The bounce rate was high and what heavily lacked was engagement. He vowed to create the most engaged community of all time.

A multitude of design competitions later, he fell in love with creatives—being one himself. Viola! Design Cuts was born, but the rocky road to its 500,000+ users today was back-breaking. After working 18-hour days for too many months, Tom's health deteriorated rapidly. A surgery later, his painful condition seemed chronic. Although now manageable, he learned a serious lesson: the hustle mentality can be dangerous.

"[Without adversity], you wouldn't be a well-rounded, mature, and resilient character." - Tom Ross.

Bask in gratitude and respect your physical limitations. Be honest about your struggles. His brand? Relationship-building. He fondly recalls befriending Design Cuts' earliest users, as they chatted for hours. The gold mine? The precious feedback they gifted him with. Preaching the non-scalable relational business metric, he's a believer in the power of authenticity—as a business tool. So, how can you serve your audience? Listen to the episode to find out.

Join the movement.

Support: @tomrossmedia, @designcuts, and @honestdesigners on social media; designcuts.com, bizbudspodcast.com, and tomross.co; Tom Ross on LinkedIn