New month, new role, new realizations

What a ride.

February already. What a crazy start to 2026.

I’ve just hit six months full time, and in the last few weeks we’ve launched our rebrand, released a huge industry report (The Admin Burden Index) and spent a lot of time exploring what 2026 needs to look like.

And to top it off, I’ve stepped into a new role as Head of Product and UX 🫨 🫨 🫨 WHAT.

It’s a role I’m so, so excited about, and one that feels like a natural next step as we head into a new phase for the product.

What I didn’t expect was the knock-on effect: a career epiphany that helped me connect the dots on my last ten years of work.

And it came from one conversation that completely changed how I think about my skills.

Find what you’re excellent at, not just ‘quite’ good at.

It’s rare that career chats are transformational, but this one really was.

I was co-working with my friend Daphne who shared a framework with me from The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks.

In our careers, we often know what we dislike, and we know what we love (most of the time), but the middle? That’s where you end up taking on things that don’t give you energy.

When that happens, you stall in what’s called ‘the Zone of Excellence’. The key takeaway, in brief, is if you can shift into the ‘Zone of Genius’, work stops feeling like work.

There are two axes to this idea:

1. Passion: how motivated does this work make you? How fast does time go? How energized do you feel? How aligned are you?

2. Skill: what are you uniquely good at? What can you pick up quickly and execute better than everyone else in the room? What’s your leverage?

Each of the four areas are zones you can find yourself in throughout your career:

1. The Zone of Incompetence

Low skill, low energy

Work that drains you and slows everything down. This work feels heavy and frustrating. You’re not great at it, progress is slow, and it takes more effort than it should. If you stay here too long, it eats away at your confidence and momentum.

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2. The Zone of Competence

Moderate skill, mixed energy

Work you can do well, but others can do just as well. You’re capable and reliable, but you’re not uniquely valuable. Some of this work can be enjoyable, but it rarely feels like the best use of your time. This is often a default zone, not a destination.

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3. The Zone of Excellence

High skill, low energy

Work you’re known for, but that doesn’t light you up.

You do this better than most people and often get praised for it. It looks impressive from the outside but it doesn’t feel deeply satisfying.

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4. The Zone of Genius

High skill, high energy

Work that fits how your brain works. You are unusually good at this, it feels natural, and time passes quickly when you’re doing it. The impact is high and the work gives you energy rather than taking it. This is where you should spend as much time as possible.

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I’ve found myself in all four zones over the past ten years 🫠

At first glance, you might think the zone of incompetence is the biggest risk.

And, from personal experience, it is bad.

Very bad.

I was once in a role where I wasn’t a fit. They hired the wrong person, and I had joined the wrong place. I needed to be highly technical and excellent at delivery without asking too many questions. I needed to play games, stay under the radar, get on the right side of people without being too noisy.

Safe to say, I didn’t last long.

In a weird way, that’s why ‘the Zone of Incompetence’ is not the worst zone. There are more triggers for you to leave this zone.

You either leave, get fired, don’t make it past probation. Whatever it is, this is ultimately better for you in the long run (whilst very painful in the short run, I know).

The most dangerous zone for your career is the one you can sit in for ages.

The danger of being excellent.

Stalling.

That is the ‘Zone of Excellence’.

Why?

Because it is okay. And that is exactly why it is risky.

You can stay there forever. It feels good enough. There is nothing obviously wrong. People want you to stay, because you are doing well.

There’s no external triggers for you to leave this zone. And that’s why it’s called the Danger Zone. Moving from the danger zone, to the zone of genius is the hardest move to make in your career, but the most worthwhile.

For me, a sequence of five moments led me to move between these two zones in the past half year:

1. Wearing so many hats at Fyxer, bouncing around all parts of the business (lifecycle CRM, product marketing, lead generation and GTM, SEO, user research)

2. An audience question at a talk I did at Trainline’s HQ: ‘what’s your super power?’. which made me really think. I answered ‘enthusiasm and diagramming’ jokingly, but the last part had something to it…

3. A chat with my wise friend Daphne, where she shared the zones framework

4. A 1-1 with our CEO, where he shared why me moving into my new role made sense for the business

5. A virtual coffee with a new friend in UX, where we went deeper on the idea that we get put in boxes in our career, and as soon as you get out your box, you can become excellent

From these five moments, I came to realize my value is:

• Seeing the shape of a system before it is fully formed

• Turning ambiguity into something others can understand and act on

• Bridging product, growth, UX, brand, and strategy

• Making complex ideas feel simple

• Creating clarity that speeds people up

• Bringing people along (though still working on this one)

In a nutshell, I am good at turning messy problems into clear systems that people can build from.

Ten years later, I now know my zones of genius. Feels… late? But it makes so much sense - always drawing on the walls in my childhood, how I studied for school through mind maps, why some early jobs felt boring, why freelancing works so well for me, why I love this newsletter and drawing my deep dives.

And it made sense why I felt the urge to move on from past roles where I was either incompetent, competent or excellent.

Still working on this, and it’s all relative

With this new clarity, there’s only one final puzzle piece I’ve yet to mention.

The final piece: work-role-zone fit.

The missing piece here is where you are working.

What do they need? If it’s not your zone of genius, there’s likely not a workplace-career fit long term. You’ll likely be unable to move into your genius, as staying in your excellence is what’s best for the business.

That’s also OK: when I worked with a career coach in 2024, the biggest thing that remains with me is the notion of walking and running in your career. Different seasons call for different paces. Right now, I’m running.

When you’re moving house, raising kids, caring for family, have a health bump or just need stability, a different zone can be exactly what you need. You might choose to walk.

If a role is 70 percent working for you, that can be enough. Most important is just to be intentional about why you’re there.

I’m also very aware that I didn’t get here alone. People saw things in me before I could articulate them myself, had that space for me to grow and moved me into it. So thank you to those people.

Now, onwards! 🐎 I’m excited to see where it goes.

Yours,

Rosie, Head of product & UX woop!

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P.S. This week why not try it out? I hereby set you a task for the very first time in this newsletter 😈

Map your zones:

• What zone are you in now?

• What skills sit in each zone?

If it’s useful, literally map it out (here’s a Figma template for you to duplicate), and let me know how it goes in the comments 💬

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P.S.S. Shout out to the (perhaps zero) people who got the Pride and Prejudice reference