A Job. An Epiphany. A Referral.

By Ben Henry, Founder of tryneedl.ai

Six weeks ago I published a piece about why resumes and interviews are broken, and what I was building to fix it. Since then, people have started using the product I'd spent describing in the abstract.

A product idea is a theory until someone uses it. This post is about three people who did — and what happened on the other side.

The first is mine. The other two are Drew and Eva. All three stories lead to the same place: an answer to the question I've been getting all week, which is how does needl actually help someone, and who is it for?

At the end, I'll introduce the referral program. You can skip there if you want. But I'd share the stories first.

A job

I'll start with my own, because it goes beyond the why and is focused on an actual outcome.

I built needl because I kept seeing a problem in hiring that I couldn't un-see — but also because I was looking for a job myself, and I was tired of going through the same broken process I'd put candidates through for ten years. So I used it on me first.

I did the coaching workflow end-to-end. I built the persona. I generated the "resume superset" — the richer representation of my working history that needl uses instead of a one-page PDF.

Then I was testing the JD readiness-score feature. I found a job description on LinkedIn — Head of TPM — and ran it against my persona. It came back 4.8 out of 5.0.

So I used needl to build a custom resume and cover letter for that role. I sent them. I got a recruiter call.

Then I used needl to coach me for the recruiter call. Then for the two phone interviews. Then for each round of the loop, including with the CTO and CFO. I researched the people I was meeting. I asked the coach to tailor the prep to the specific interviewer, the specific stage, the specific concerns that were surfacing in the conversation. At 11pm on a Tuesday when I needed another pass, needl was there. My human coach — who is excellent (hey, Doug!) — could not be.

What I noticed, and what surprised me: needl's read on my strengths and gaps wasn't generic. Because it graded me against a coaching-rich persona rather than a one-page resume, the positioning advice came back actionable, coachable, and high-leverage in a way no static tool can reach. It told me, concretely, how to frame a gap. It told me, concretely, which strength to lead with for this interviewer at this stage. I'd never had that in prep before.

I landed the job. It's Head of TPM at a company I respect. It's a stretch role — just enough that I'm uncomfortable, but it's everything I know I can do and more. The team is one I loved meeting with.

Here's the part I find hard to say: I built the tool to help other people, and it helped me first. There's a version of that story that sounds like marketing. But the truth is that building needl pushed me into the search I'd been putting off, and using needl gave me the coaching infrastructure I'd needed for years and hadn't been able to afford at the intensity I actually wanted. I got to the other side of it changed.

An epiphany

Drew was the first person I ever talked to about this idea. Before there was a product, before there was a domain name, before there was anything — there was Drew, and a conversation.

He helped shape some of needl's earliest features. When the product was finally usable, he was one of the first people I asked to kick the tires.

The first thing he said back to me, after using it for a while, was this: "20 minutes of dialog later and we're only at $0.48."

Drew was using needl with his own Anthropic API key — one of the paths we support, designed to keep the underlying coaching cost as close to model cost as possible. The point he was making is that the kind of deep coaching a human executive coach charges hundreds of dollars an hour for is, with the right architecture, cents. This matters. I'll come back to it.

Then, after more use, Drew said two things I keep thinking about.

First: "The coaching engine context that you defined pressed me on why I decided to change what I was pursuing."

Drew had already made a decision — to pivot what he was going after professionally. He'd talked about it with friends. He'd gotten support and validation. What he hadn't had, until needl, was something that pressed back. The coaching engine asked him the question his friends wouldn't ask him, which was: okay, but why? And again. And again. Until the answer he got from himself was one he trusted.

Second, and this is the line I haven't been able to stop thinking about:

"Your tool basically told me to get serious in a way none of my friends would."

This is the thing I keep coming back to. Friends love you. That's their job. A good coach, a good tool, a good structured self-inquiry — those will press you in ways the people who love you sometimes aren't willing to do.

needl is trying to help you see yourself clearly enough to go do the thing you actually want to do.

A referral

Eva's story is the one that prompted this post.

I don't know Eva. I've never worked with her. A former colleague of mine saw my original LinkedIn post about needl and shared it with Eva, who they know professionally. She tried the product. A few hours later, she posted this to her own network, unprompted:

Have you been looking for the right job and company for a while? Have you been questioning whether you are actually good at what you do because you have gotten nothing but rejections? Do you need a reset? Real help to allow you to focus on what you really want and then go out and get it?

Ben Henry has built something beautiful with AI. I never thought I'd say this, and it's the first AI tool I can fully get behind.

I started with wanting some help rewriting my resume and within a few hours it had me believe in myself again and got me energized to go after the role I really want. tryneedl.ai today and you will not be disappointed.

#OpenToWork #ResumeCoach #LookingForWork

I read that and had a physical reaction. A stranger had used the thing I built — a thing I worried wasn't going to matter to anyone — and within a few hours, she felt better about herself. Not because needl told her what she wanted to hear. Because needl helped her see what was already true.

We've stayed in touch since. A few things have happened:

She used the coach to rewrite her LinkedIn summary. Within days, two real recruiters — not the scammy ones — reached out. More have come in since, and the conversations are now about leadership and executive-level roles, which is a meaningful shift upward in the ceiling of her search.

She's been using the Job Match feature. Her phrasing: "a lot less work for candidates."

And she's been pushing me on what needl should become. Interview prep should go deeper. There should be an on-demand executive coach tier for people who land the role, priced per session. There's a whole version of needl that could serve recruiting firms — basically doing what they do, at scale. And — this is the one that's changed my roadmap — I should build the ATS side of the product.

She convinced me of that last one. I pushed back at first. She was right.

What I want you to notice is this: Eva was referred to needl by someone who hadn't even used the product themselves. They didn't refer her because they were going to get something for it. They referred her because she was someone they knew, in a position where they thought it could help. That's the quietest, strongest kind of endorsement there is — and it's the thing a referral program, done right, exists to multiply.

The referral program

Here's what's new, and why I'm telling you about it now.

Every existing user has 5 referral invites, available in Settings.

If you send one to someone and they sign up, they get needl free for a year. And you get an extra year added to your own plan, on us, for every friend who joins. Five referrals, fully converted, equals five bonus years. Every year someone spends with needl because you brought them in, you get a year too.

A badge for referred users is coming soon. Eva, Drew, and everyone who has someone sign up using their referral link will have a visible signal in the product that they helped build this thing. More on that in a future post.

One more thing on timing. April 30 is the last day that anyone can sign up directly and get a year free. If you're reading this before then, you don't need a referral at all — you can just go. After the 30th, the referral program becomes the primary path to a free year. So if you've been thinking about it, this week is the easiest moment to come in through the front door. And if you're already in, this is the moment to bring someone with you.

Why this matters to me

I spent the last six weeks watching three people — me, Drew, and Eva — each use needl for a completely different reason. I landed a job. Drew got pressed on the real reason he was doing what he was doing. Eva was given the tool by someone she trusted, believed in herself again, and then gave it to her network in turn.

These are three faces of the same argument. needl isn't a resume tool. It isn't an interview tool. It's a structured way of getting at what's actually true about you — and then doing something with it.

If that resonates: try needl. Before April 30, you can come in through the front door. After that, ask someone you know to send you a link. And if you're already in — check your Settings. You have five invites. Use them well.

Questions, feedback, or a story of your own: ben@tryneedl.ai.

Beyond the resume. Find your one.

— Ben