Real results from applying First Principles methodologies to complex product challenges. These case studies and testimonials showcase how our AI-first approach and battle-tested frameworks deliver measurable impact for ambitious companies.
Working with First Principles through their AI-First Design Sprint was a game-changer. The pace and quality of delivery were exceptional -- something that's rare to find. The prototypes were consistently clear, high-fidelity, and grounded in user needs, giving our team immediately actionable outputs. They helped us transform early ideas for our AI product in learning and workplace collaboration into user-tested, tangible solutions. Their ability to listen, ask the right questions, and execute quickly with deep AI expertise gave us the clarity and conviction to move forward. It's been high-leverage collaboration from start to finish, and we’re grateful for the momentum they created.
-Arthur Michel, COO @ Trilogy
The growing trend of companies fulfilling core business functionalities "as-a-service" has made its way to product! With First Principles, we instantly got a team of veteran product experts taking full ownership of managing our new product development, from strategy to execution. It is difficult to understate the amount of friction that First Principles has reduced in our product dev process, not to mention the tremendous value their experience has added to our effort. As CEO, there is nothing more reassuring to know than your product dev is in good hands!
-Martin Kurucz, CEO @ Sterling Data Company
First Principles' coaching was instrumental in our journey from early-stage startup to market leadership in satellite software. Our coach helped us evolve from having great technology but struggling with market traction, to securing 13 enterprise customers and becoming the go-to solution in our space. Their guidance spanned from tactical improvements in customer conversations to strategic realignment of our market focus, while simultaneously helping our engineering leaders develop into effective product leaders. Over our two-year partnership, we raised a significant funding round, grew from 7 to over 20 employees, and built robust internal product capabilities. We ultimately 'graduated' from needing external product coaching - a testament to how effectively they helped us build these competencies in-house. Their blend of strategic insight and hands-on guidance was exactly what we needed at this critical stage of our growth.
- CEO at a Space Technology Company
Working with Adam is fantastic! He brings a high level of professionalism and experience to our organization and mutual clients. He rolls up his sleeves and works alongside us, even joining us on client visits. He helped us structure and implement a massive value-based redesign of a complex AI product, including conducting interviews and leadership workshops, resulting in a successful new flow in just eight days. Additionally, he assisted a joint client in acquiring its first users after a year of stagnation by refining its strategy and implementing fresh tactics. His strategic leadership has also helped our organization mature and I am excited about the next phases of our collaboration.
-James Sullivan, CEO @ OneSeven
Adam's product coaching has been immensely helpful and led to significant value creation for our business. The most impactful outcome was the manner in which it helped us systematically concentrate on the most important factors driving our business results while giving us the courage to ignore the noise we face on a day-to- day basis. As we are two co-founders, it's wonderful to have a joint weekly session with an expert, who is objective and asks us the hard questions which forces us to think from first principles. With Adam's support, we've succeeded in finding numerous opportunities to reduce burn and increase product leverage in our two-sided marketplace. Furthermore. we've come up with numerous ways to refine our value proposition for the ICP within a clear target market. In addition, we developed the metrics that inform our strategic decision making. Lastly, he has been a driving force in crafting the experiments we ran to identify the best product developments.
-Max Willert and Luca Lallopizzi, Co-Founders & CEO/CPO @ Hyre Talents
We accelerated from ideas to value for end-customers in record time by tapping into expert-level AI+geospatial+space product talent from First Principles. Together we closed millions in contracts in record time and two strong fundraising rounds. Adam has continuously worked to elevate our vision for the product while simultaneously ensuring that highly complex features deliver their intended value on numerous occasions. Thanks to the fractional support model, we've earned strong traction in government and early demand signal for commercial use cases in record time, giving us the opportunity to be deliberate about how we build our product team from a place of strength.
-Jesse Kallman (CEO) and Martice Nicks (CTO) at Danti.ai
"Thanks to Adam's valuable insights and recommendations, we were able to make informed decisions about our product strategy. Thanks to his analysis, we were able to optimize our product and improve our overall business performance."
-Jaden Risner, CEO @ Family Proud
First Principles expertly and efficiently helped us refine our product value hypothesis by first exploring all the possible options for solving our customer problems. We rigorously prioritized our ideas based on real signal from the market, and then validated the pain points with real customers. Finally FP built us a concierge system to test these, and Adam helped me as a coach to craft strategies for finding our first users. Now we're part of Techstars!
-Marcus Collins, Founder/CEO @ NestedFunds
"Adam is phenomenal! His background in leading product teams allows him to immediately dissect and understand the strengths and weaknesses of a company's value propositions and team. Adam provided us with excellent direction around properly defining Jobs-to-be-Done and helped us identify the common thread among our customer conversations. By working with Adam we have a better understanding of our customers, our value propositions, and the way forward, if you have the opportunity to work with Adam, I highly recommend taking advantage of it!"
-Aarik Gulaya, CEO @ SAFA.ai
"The workshop on forward deployed engineering was a great investment. The presenter was deeply knowledgeable and able to tailor the content to our specific context and objectives. In addition to deepening our understanding of FDE and how we can use it effectively, the workshop left us with strategies and frameworks that we could apply broadly in our product development work. Highly recommended."
-Raleigh, Innovation Leader @ $30B Multinational Firm
Adam is an outstanding CEO coach. He’s helped us take the momentum we generated through our Series B and channel it into strategy and vision refinements as well as stronger product-led growth initiatives and features. He magically blends knowledge of product, engineering, and marketing functions with knowledge of running complex businesses and distills these lessons into bite-sized, actionable guidance even for the most difficult situations. He’s a real human who admits when he doesn’t know and can reflect on his own wins and misses to extract meaningful lessons. He knows when to ask questions I wasn’t thinking about, how to re-frame tough decisions so they feel winnable, and is generally a great person to have in my corner.
-Jin Stedge, CEO @ TrueNorth
Adam’s coaching was foundational in helping me develop a clear and rigorous product strategy. He consistently reviewed my work, pushed my thinking, and brought a thoughtful lens to every brainstorming session. Beyond strategy, Adam helped me navigate complex dynamics at a public company—showing his rare ability to operate across both early-stage startups and scaled environments. His breadth, insight, and judgment made him an invaluable partner.
- Marina Miller, VP of Product @ Etsy
Learn about our work with other clients.