“Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.” – Mike Tyson
Truer words have never been spoken, especially for founders, leaders, and anyone who’s ever tried to drive change inside an organisation.
In the beginning, it’s all neat roadmaps, highlighters, and colour-coded KPIs. You’ve got your 6-month go-to-market, your confident head nods, your beautiful pitch deck with its 3-year revenue projections… and then bam. Life ducks your jab and lands an uppercut right in the gut.
A market shift — like the GFC in 2008. A funding rejection — the kind where a term sheet gets pulled the day before signing. A team member burning out — your CTO says they need to step away, and you didn’t see it coming. A global pandemic — cue COVID, lockdowns, and calendars full of Zoom fatigue. Or worse, someone moves the budget to another department… without telling you.
Bonus points if your product was built in Flash. (RIP.)
I’ve been through all of these cycles. And every time, the lesson is the same: Suddenly, you’re no longer executing the plan. You’re fighting to stay on your feet.
Plans are useful. But agility is survival.
The best teams don’t just have plans. They have reflexes. They can absorb the shock, reassess, and pivot with purpose. They keep their eyes on the North Star but aren’t too proud to reroute when the terrain gets rough.
Because sometimes the boldest move isn’t sticking to the plan. It’s letting go of it, and trusting that your people, your purpose, and your product instincts will carry you through the fog.
So what does this look like in the real world? Let me tell you a little story.
We started Hoogly as a consumer app tackling loneliness. We genuinely believed (and still do) that human connection is a basic need, not a nice-to-have. We got the app off the ground, we were growing. And then… the punch landed.
Turns out, unless you go viral in Australia, you’re not getting funded as a consumer app. Minor problem: lonely people don’t know other lonely people. Not exactly a viral loop.
So, pivot one.
We moved to B2B. We thought, “Let’s help remote employees feel connected. Teams are struggling. Zoom fatigue is real. We can fix this.”
And then the return-to-office wave hit. Hard. Companies ditched fully remote. People got their two days at home and said, “Yeah, I’m good.” Connection still mattered, but the urgency was gone.
Another punch.
But we were listening. And in those B2B conversations, something else kept surfacing. Not just “our people feel disconnected”, but “we don’t know how they’re really feeling.” Not just “we need team bonding”, but “we’re struggling to build culture, and our surveys are too slow to help.” And even when the data did come in, the so-called “action plans” led to six months of planning meetings… and no actual action.
So, pivot two. And this time, it clicked.
We took everything we’d built — our AI chops, our behavioural science roots, our original mission to connect people more meaningfully — and we reimagined how companies could actually listen and lead.
We’re proud (and still slightly breathless) to say: Hoogly’s new product is LIVE. And more than that, we’ve been recognised for it.
🏆 We won the GSV Cup 50 in the Future of Work category in San Diego 🌍 We were named Best HR Technology at the HR Technologies show in London and 🦘 We won the People’s Choice award at the Startup World Cup in Sydney.
It’s not just validation. It’s a sign we’re building something that matters.
So, what kept us going? It wasn’t luck. It wasn’t perfect planning. It was team. It was culture. It was grit, humility, and an insane amount of belief. And above all, it was purpose.
Our North Star has always been connection. Originally, that meant peer-to-peer. A coffee chat, a message of encouragement, a moment of vulnerability between fellow humans.
But as we evolved, so did our understanding of what connection really means at work.
Now, it’s not just about peer-to-peer. It’s connection to your manager — feeling seen, heard, and supported. It’s connection to your company — believing in the mission, not just clocking in. And it’s connection to yourself — tuning into your wellbeing, setting boundaries, and knowing when you need support.
That clarity gave us something steady to hold on to, even when everything else was changing. We experiment. We fall flat. We laugh. We learn.
From Natalie’s sharp product instincts, to Mark’s calm-in-the-storm engineering leadership, to Anitta’s relentless drive to humanise work — and to Jodi, our advisory board member who backed us at every stage, reminded us of our ‘why’ when things got cloudy, and never once lost faith.
This wasn’t a solo fight. This was a team in the ring, gloves on, backing each other no matter what round we were in.
Because it’s not a cliché when it’s true: The journey is the destination. And every left hook just made us more dangerous in the ring.
If you’ve ever felt the sting of a pivot, the exhaustion of starting over, or the doubt that creeps in after the fifth version of a product demo — know this: it’s not the punch that defines you. It’s what you do next.
🧡 Team Hoogly
