The TL;DR: Level Up Your Team Without Selling a Kidney


A bi-weekly roundup of summertime strength
May 3 - May 16

The Summer of Strengths Has Begun

If you read the last TL;DR, you know that the Workforce Development Fund Express Grant program has suspended the $20K grant program until the next budget cycle.

For those of you who have been in the Learn to Scale orbit for a while, you may be aware that we provide grant-funded training. The lion's share of our customers used the Express Grant to fully fund our $9K Strengths program.

You heard that right: they got a $9,000 training program from Learn to Scale for free.

And, humblebrag, it was good. Here's what Krysta Van Ranst from Building PPL (yes, from last summer's webinar) had to say about her experience:

The entire process of the engagement: I absolutely loved it! My team was pleasantly surprised: they loved the 1-1 experience. The follow up documentation every time: we loved that. The workshop itself: the team was still on a high a week later. It was far greater than I ever could have imagined. It was tenfold what I thought it was going to be.

As of this spring, the grant program that made that Team Strenghts program a zero-cost investment is temporarily on hiatus.

This is a sign: grants for training services are becoming more competitive.

We've responded to the market.


When I accepted that training grants were not going to be a long-term emabler for our most popular program, I thought long and hard: How do we get the core magic – the teambuilding that actually makes teams click and perform – to more folks without requiring them to take out a second mortgage?

It’s like wanting everyone to experience the joy of a perfectly cooked steak, but not everyone needs (or wants to pay for) the private chef and the 17-course tasting menu that comes with it. Sometimes you just want the damn good steak, cooked right.

So, I did a thing.

Introducing: The Team Strengths Accelerator

This is my answer. It’s the concentrated, no-fluff, "get to the good part" version of our bigger team interventions. We’re still digging into what makes your team members awesome (and what makes them drive each other quietly insane). We’re still supercharging how they talk to each other (and, more importantly, hear each other). We’re still laying down a practical, actionable foundation for them to actually, you know, accelerate their strengths and get stuff done.

From June-August, this concentrated non-grant-funded version is $2,999. It's the Summer of Strenghts, baby.

You can see the official store listing here.

How And Why We Changed The Price

That $9,000 investment for the premium experience? It covered a ton of ground-up customization, endless hours of collaborative strategy sessions, and us basically becoming an extension of your leadership team.

Krysta and her team at Building PPL should know; they offer similar kinds of services. Here was her take on the price vs. value:

I think there are a lot of people that wouldn't want to spend nine grand on Strengths Finder.
I think there were 95% of employers that would have wanted to pay nine grand for what we got.

The Team Strengths Accelerator delivers the exact same foundational diagnostic and core workshop experience that’s always been the heart and soul of those bigger gigs. You get the same brainpower (mine, for better or worse), the same proven methodologies, the same focus on those critical "aha!" moments that unlock team potential.

To offer this experience at $2,999, I’ve streamlined the process. Think of it as getting the same potent ingredients and the master recipe, but with a more defined cooking class structure rather than a fully catered, weeks-long culinary retreat. This means we laser-focus on the core components, with less of the exhaustive, bespoke tailoring and a more concise set of strategic deep dives.

It’s about delivering that core transformative punch efficiently. It’s the essential "business broccoli" that actually tastes good and gets you the results you need without the side of "financial panic."

Who's This For?

This streamlined offering is a killer fit if your team:

  • Knows they’re capable of more but wants a focused, high-impact way to get there
  • Needs that expert, outside perspective to unlock their collective strengths but doesn't need (or want) a consultant living in their back pocket
  • Is ready for a "let's get this done and see results" approach to team development.

I'm genuinely excited about this. It feels like the right evolution to help more teams tap into that next level of performance and, dare I say, actually enjoy working together more.

If this sounds like it might be the thing your team needs, check out the full details while on the Summer of Strengths sale:

Want to skip the reading and just chat? Grab some time on my calendar. No pressure, no weird sales vibes (unless you're into that 🍑), just a conversation to see if it’s a good match:


A TL;DR from the CRO

Business before pleasure: how have your 1-1s been going lately?

-Roman Noodles, Chief Ruff Officer


Thank you to everyone who booked a birthday chat with me! I had SUCH a good time chatting with all of you.

Honestly, those conversations gave me the extra jujj to redevelop the Strengths program- it reminded me how much fun I have talking with people about what they want to achieve. Using the CliftonStrengths assessment to frame up those conversations is basically an erogenous zone for me.

As I was updating the website, I kept revisiting all the CliftonStrengths images I created and giggled far too much.

I'd love an excuse to make a new batch of 34 strengths-specific images. If that's something you'd like to see, reply back and tell me you'd be interested in that too.

Achiever, Activator, Learner, Strategic, Individualization,

Dan from Learn to Scale


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PS. A deep cut on sandwich meat

Dan Newman

Your agency doesn't have a sales problem. It has a people problem. I spent 15+ years building teams, from scrappy startups, to scaling tech companies, to huge agencies like GroupM and WPP. Now, I give small agency owners the SOPs, frameworks, and hard truths they need to build high-performance cultures that run without them.

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