§ press kit

Press kit,
in pieces.

Bios, photos, books, talks, and recent media coverage. Take what you need. Quote freely, attribute kindly. The page itself is the kit — print to PDF for the road, or email inquiries@MichaelDargie.com and we’ll send anything you can’t find here.

// updated April 25, 2026 · press & bookings: inquiries@MichaelDargie.com

01 //

Bios

Five lengths, in case you need to pick one. The “services-forward” version is the right pick for agency directories and freelance listings. The long bio is for features and back-of-book.

One-line

~16 words

Michael Dargie — writer, brand strategist, founder of Make More Creative. Author of BrandJitsu™ (Dundurn Press).

Short

~50 words

Michael Dargie is the author of BrandJitsu™ (Dundurn Press) and the founder of Make More Creative, a Canadian creative-intelligence agency. His forthcoming books include PitchJitsu™: Opening Minds and Wallets and the literary memoir Bubbles & Blood. He writes and speaks about creativity, work, and the strange side of a life built sideways.

Services-forward

~52 words

Calgary-based freelance writer and creative director with twenty-plus years of agency experience. Brand strategy, editorial, long-form writing, creative direction, AI-integrated content, event hosting, and speaking. Author of BrandJitsu™ (Dundurn Press), with PitchJitsu™ on the way. Host of the RebelRebel Podcast. Available for projects, retainers, and workshops.

Medium

~125 words

Michael Dargie is a Calgary-based writer, speaker, and founder of Make More Creative, a creative-intelligence agency he has run for more than twenty years. His first book, BrandJitsu™: Move Your Brand From ‘Meh’ To Memorable (Dundurn Press), distilled a decade of client work into a practical methodology for finding the truth about what you do and saying it out loud. He is at work on the follow-up, PitchJitsu™: Opening Minds and Wallets, and a literary memoir titled Bubbles & Blood. Michael has hosted more than 250 episodes of the RebelRebel Podcast, mentored with Calgary Economic Development, and speaks regularly on brand strategy, pitching, AI in creative work, and the art of the sideways career.

Long

~295 words

I taught myself to program at ten on a TRS-80 Colour Computer because I wanted to make pictures and music out of nothing. My mom was laying out newspaper pages on PageMaker in the next room. My dad told me stories about riding motorcycles across Africa in another life, and every Easter morning he’d disappear into the Bow River valley before dawn so my sister and I could spend the day hunting down clues hidden in eagle’s nests, beaver lodges, and the edges of cliffs.

Adventure has been the given, not the exception.

I’ve been saying yes to things ever since. Saying yes is how I ended up running a jiu-jitsu school, performing and directing at Loose Moose Theatre, hosting more than 250 episodes of the RebelRebel Podcast, co-writing a one-act play an adjudicator once called “the perfect little play,” certifying as an advanced scuba diver, and accidentally founding a creative agency that’s still running twenty years later.

BrandJitsu™: Move Your Brand From ‘Meh’ To Memorable (Dundurn Press) was a labour of love that took about a decade. It’s the methodology I developed at Make More Creative over twenty-plus years of helping founders, startups, and stubborn legacy brands find the truth about who they are. I’m at work on the follow-up, PitchJitsu™: Opening Minds and Wallets, and a literary memoir called Bubbles & Blood about learning to breathe underwater and, eventually, to stop being afraid of the dark parts of the ocean.

I call my approach flashing sideways — going deep into one craft, wide into everything next to it — and I’ve made a career out of it. I live between Calgary and Vancouver Island with my partner Jennifer, two cats, five motorcycles, and an evolving opinion about where octopuses rank in the hierarchy of earthly creatures.

02 //

Books

BrandJitsu™
Move Your Brand From ‘Meh’ To Memorable.
A practical guide to the discipline of building a brand that actually sticks — written for founders, marketers, and creatives who want to stop chasing trends and start leaving a mark.
Dundurn Press · 2025
Available now
Bubbles & Blood
A Memoir Mostly Underwater.
A literary memoir, in progress — on water, work, family, and the slow art of noticing what you almost didn't.
In progress
PitchJitsu™
Opening Minds and Wallets.
The follow-up to BrandJitsu™. You get three minutes and forty-four seconds to open a room's mind — and its wallet. Here's how to use every one of them.
Coming 2027
Dean Shield Series
Pacific Northwest crime fiction, mostly wet.
A wet ensemble and a long memory. Vancouver Island is the character; the ocean is the crime scene.
In progress

03 //

Ventures & platforms

Make More Creative
Founder, CEO
Canadian creative-intelligence agency. Brand, editorial, and AI-integrated content for founders and stubborn legacy brands.
FitNut.ai
Co-founder
AI-powered fitness platform.
niceCortex
Co-founder
Neural Intelligence for Connected Ecosystems.
PodDojo
Founder
Podcast hosting and production infrastructure.
The RebelRebel Podcast
Creator, Producer, Host
Two-hundred-and-fifty-plus episodes spent finding the creative rebels and entrepreneurs making their dreams come true.

04 //

Active talks

Keynotes, workshops, and lunch-and-learns. Formats from thirty-minute keynote to half-day workshop. The full speaking archive — including past panels, judging, and academic engagements — lives at /speaking.

Adventures in International Branding

Field notes from twenty years of helping Canadian founders translate themselves to rooms outside Canada — what travels, what dies on impact, and what nobody warns you about until you’re already on a stage in another time zone.

AI Quick Wins for Business and Life

A practical, opinionated tour of what AI is genuinely good at right now — for founders, marketers, and creative teams who don’t want a hype reel and don’t want to read another think piece.

From Idea to !ndigo

The unglamorous, useful version of how a book actually gets made — from notebook scrap to Indigo shelf — for writers who want the publishing road in plain language.

From Desk to Deep End

also delivered as Flash Sideways

A talk about non-linear careers, curiosity as engine, and the unexpected ways a creative life gets built. Delivered to graduating students, founders, and creative teams.

The Fine Art of Getting Sh*t Done

Less productivity theatre, more honest accounting. The systems, defaults, and conversations creative people actually use to ship work without flaming out.

BrandJitsu™: Move Your Brand From ‘Meh’ To Memorable

The keynote version of the book — a structured set of moves to find the truth about what you do, shape it, and say it out loud so the people who need to get it actually do.

PitchJitsu™: Opening Minds and Wallets

You get three minutes and forty-four seconds to open a room’s mind — and its wallet. This is how to use every one of them.

Give Your Story a Job

An engaging exploration of how stories are designed to lead to intentional action. Using live stagecraft, it reveals how attention and timing shape decisions, and how restraint — on stage and in story — creates momentum that words alone can’t.

05 //

Selected writing

A small selection from the archive. The full set lives at /articles.

06 //

Media & coverage

// podcasts

Shed Talk with Kevin Halliday — Episode 97 · 2025
Fueling Entrepreneurs — Founder, Author & Host Michael Dargie
How podcasting and brand strategy fuel an entrepreneurial voice — Make More Creative, BrandJitsu™, and the long arc of RebelRebel.
// Listen on iHeart ↗
Post Shift Podcast with Shawn Soole — #211 · 2026
Post Shift Podcast LIVE! with Michael Dargie, BrandJitsu™
A deep-dive on how brands are built, the philosophy behind BrandJitsu™, and practical applications for hospitality operators and founders.
// Episode page ↗
Suits & Sneakers: Leadership Unfiltered · 2024
Brand Jitsu Your Team with Michael Dargie
A leadership-focused interview on BrandJitsu™ principles, storytelling, and how leaders build memorable teams and cultures.
// Show on Apple Podcasts ↗
Better Human Dads · 2026
Better Human Dads: Tell your kids you love them
A short feature on being an intentional dad and saying the quiet parts out loud — under the Better Human Dads umbrella.

// news & features

CBC News — Calgary · 2021
Inside the isolation hotel: Blogger writes about his experience and finds an unlikely friend in a desk lamp
Reporting on the Camp Covid serial, written from inside Canada’s mandatory quarantine hotel programme.
Global News — Calgary · 2021
‘Sign me up!’ Calgary man staying in self-isolation hotel room calls it ‘kind of fun’
TV news segment featuring Michael’s mid-quarantine dispatch, including the now-infamous desk lamp named Brad.
cSPACE Marda Loop · 2023
MAKE MORE CREATIVE — The Dynamic Michael Dargie
A profile of Michael and the agency, written for cSPACE’s creative-community series.

07 //

Photos

A curated selection. Right-click or long-press to download. Cleared for editorial use with credit; please email for commercial licensing. Hero portrait by Ben Laird; book-launch and tour photographs by Make More Creative.