Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business

Episode 942: Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business, with Paul Jarvis

Risks of rapid growth in a business, a podcast with Paul Jarvis. Learn about all the risks of rapid growth in a business.

Paul Jarvis is a writer and designer who has had his own company of one for the last two decades. His latest book, Company of One, explores why bigger isn’t always better and the risks of rapid growth in a business.

He’s worked with professional athletes like Steve Nash and Shaquille O’Neal, corporate giants like Microsoft and Mercedes-Benz, and entrepreneurs with online empires like Danielle LaPorte and Marie Forleo.

Currently, he teaches popular online courses taken by over 14,00 students, hosts several podcasts, and develops small but mighty software solutions.

What you will learn from this episode about the risks of rapid growth in a business:

• How Paul’s career started in boutique web design before shifting to creating products like books, courses, and software
• How Paul made the transition between web design and thought leadership over the course of 2 1/2 years
• Why giving up working with long term clients was challenging for Paul, and how he realized that the changing nature of his business required saying goodbye
• How the first product Paul decided to offer was a cookbook that did surprisingly well in sales, helping him enter the product lane
• How Paul listens to his established audience and then designs products such as courses that answer their questions and address their needs and problems
• How Paul was able to use response data from his mailing list to prove the value of his book Company of One to a publisher
• What key concepts Paul’s book shares with readers about why “growth for the sake of growth” isn’t always the best way to run a business
• Why up to 70% of businesses fail because they don’t understand the risks of rapid growth in a business
• Why prioritizing growth can often cause you to make poor decisions for the long term health of your business
• Why every business has an “organic size” that they need to be to operate, and why staying at the organic size of your business is critically important
• How to avoid the risks of rapid growth in a business and let everything flow smoothly

Resources:

• Websites:
  • https://ofone.co/
  • https://usefathom.com/
• Company of One by Paul Jarvis: https://amzn.to/2XioA30
• Twitter: @pjrvs
• Read more about the risks of rapid growth in a business from Paul’s website

Additional Resources:

• Sell With Authority by Drew McLellan and Stephen Woessner: https://amzn.to/39y7x13
• Predictive ROI Free Resource Library: https://predictiveroi.com/resources/
• Stephen Woessner’s LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/stephenwoessner/
• Learn how to avoid the risks of rapid growth in a business and just grow through adversity

 

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Full Episode Transcript

 

Get ready to find your recipe for success and in learning the risks of rapid growth in a business from America’s top business owners here at Onward Nation with your host, Stephen Woessner.

 

Good morning. I’m Stephen Woessner, CEO of Predictive ROI and your host for Onward Nation. Where I interview today’s top business owners so we can learn their recipe for success, how they built and how they scaled their business. My team at Predictive ROI constantly rebuilt and scaled. Our free resources section really is becoming more of a library. So you can download free and practical tactical guides for everything from search engine optimization to building out a Trojan horse of sales, to using LinkedIn to generate leads.

 

I think in the last several months, if I’m not mistaken, we’ve added seven new ebooks, and a whole bunch of checklists. All of them are free. And these are things that we have learned from the brilliant insights shared by our very generous guest, so compiled right here for you. So if you go to PredictiveROI.com/Resources, is it is all there for you all free. Whatever you request, we will send it right to your inbox. 

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Paul Jarvis’ Introduction

 

Before we welcome today’s guest, Paul Jarvis. I just want to share some additional insights. And in Cate Stillman, if you happen to be listening right now, thanks very much for making the introduction so that Paul and I can have this great conversation for Onward Nation’s benefit.

 

And I’m really looking forward to learning from Paul in and this is why I was so excited when Paul said yes, onward. Why I was so excited that this was a conversation that we all needed to have. So Paul is done. He’s walking that walk. He has accomplished that goal. That most business owners have is like the pinnacle of their career, the pinnacle of owning a business, selling their company.

 

Okay. But he’s not only done it once, not only done it twice, he’s done it three times. He has sold three software companies Onward Nation and currently still operates two. He’s also built online courses that not only that, he has sold to that have been popular. Lots of registrations, but it’s talked about building a community of over 15,000 students.

 

That doesn’t happen without being really intentional. It does not happen by accident. And maybe you’ve created some courses in your business to leverage some of your thought leadership and know that that number really takes some hard work. And he’s done it. And then he walked down the path of writing a book. He’s never thought of himself as a quote unquote writer, per se, but wrote the first one.

 

Now he’s written five, and it’s because his audience has reached out to him and said no we want this too. And so there’s an incredible story in here. Onward about building a business so it serves you in your lifestyle, building a business that you can then sell using your thought leadership, leveraging that correctly in order to accomplish all of your goals.

 

So that’s why I am so excited, Paul, for you to join us here at Onward Nation. Welcome to Onward Nation, my friend. 

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Quitting The Job And Starting The Business

 

Thank you very much for having me, Steve, and I appreciate it. Oh my gosh, thank you for saying yes. And so before we dive in with the litany of questions that I want to ask you, my mind is just buzzing right now with possibilities.

 

Before we do that, take us behind the curtain, because obviously you’ve accomplished a lot in your business career. Take us behind the curtain. Tell us more about you, your path, your journey. And then we’ll dive in. Yeah. So I started, I guess a bit over 20 years ago. I was working at an agency in Toronto doing design and creative direction.

 

And I love the work. I love the clients. I didn’t like the company, so I quit, and I was going to go find a job somewhere else. And the day that I quit started to get calls from the client saying that they actually like working with me more than the agency. So where am I going? And they’ll take their business there.

 

And after I had a few calls like that, I was like, I guess I could just work for myself and be able to control the quality and the relationship that I have with these people. And so I didn’t look back, I guess I’ve had that business now it’s morphed into a different type of work, but it’s still basically the same business because it’s been my business for the last almost 21 years or 21 years, depending on when this year.

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Shifting the Business

 

Wow. Okay. So that’s impressive. In and of itself. So what came first for you is as far as sort of a I don’t say necessarily on a linear path, but was a book a course, was it creating software companies? I mean, you’re doing so many interesting things. So kind of put it into a timeline for us.

 

Yeah. So in the beginning I was doing web design and online consulting for clients, like for everything from fortune 100 companies to professional athletes. And I did that up until about six, seven years ago. And at that point I kind of shifted from service based, kind of very custom boutique style work into products. And so now I kind of, there needs to be more volume because I can’t when I was doing service work, I only needed 10, 15 clients a year.

 

Now I can’t sell 10 or 15 bucks a year and still make a living. So I had to kind of shift in volume there. But yeah, it started with books, then moved to courses, then moved to software. Okay. So fundamentally, what were you seeing in the business that caused you to first think of the shift and then have the discipline to execute the shift?

 

I mean, that’s a big shift. What you made it is and it was at the height of me doing the best that I had ever done in my business. So a lot of it was thinking like, is this a good idea? Because I’m in demand, my waiting list is 6 to 8 months long. Is this a good idea?

 

But, I guess a few things are at play. The first was I had done it for so long and I wanted something different. It didn’t necessarily mean it was the smartest decision. It was just a decision that was right for me because I wanted to try other things. And the other thing at play was I didn’t want to grow my business.

 

I didn’t want my business. I didn’t want to have to manage other people. My business has always been myself and a partner, myself and a few freelancers. So I never wanted to move from a role of doing the work to managing other people, doing the work that I wish I was doing. So there are some people who are amazing managers.

 

I’m not one of those people, so I just kept seeing that there was more and more demands on my time and my expertise, and I figured, okay, well, if I’m not working one on one with people, if I change the relationship from one to one to one to many, I can effectively reach and help more people. And so that’s why I started in on things like books and courses and software, because I felt like there were so many people who wanted input for me or my time or my expertise and all of that, that I couldn’t do that with one to one relationships that had to move to one too many.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Transitioning to Full-Time Product Business

 

Okay, so take us inside. So you’ve given us some, some a good lens into why you made the decision. Now take us into like, the timeline. I assume this isn’t. You woke up one day and said, you know what, I’m going to be a product person. And then throw away the business. So there was a transition.

 

So take us into the transition, how you did it and the timing of it to make sure that you were doing it smartly and all of that. Yeah. So I’m very risk averse. I don’t I don’t like to do things that are inherently big risks. I’m happy to take little risks where the worst outcome is just that it sucks or it hurts my ego a little bit.

 

Or maybe I lost a tiny bit of money. I never want to take a risk where the worst outcome would be my business. I lost my money. I lost my house, that kind of thing. So it was it took probably it took two and a half years for me to go from full time client services business to full time product business, and during that time it was always, okay, I’m going to release one product at a time very slowly because I still had a full client side and as my product and then products started to make money, then I would ratchet down the clients that I was working with.

 

So each time a product would make more money for more than just a few days, like it would have to be months at a time to prove that it was valid revenue as opposed to just like a blip. Then I would scale down, and then I would scale up products a little bit and add something else to the mix, and then take on one last time and then add a bit more products.

 

And then until it was basically none. But it was actually, Stephen, really, really difficult because at the time I really liked working with the clients, and I was working with some of them I worked with for 12 years. Some of them I felt like I didn’t own any of their business, because that’s not the business model that I had or wanted to have, but I felt like I felt ownership in there and I wanted them to have continued success.

 

I wanted them to continue to do really, really well, and I felt like it was really fun to be a small part of that. So it was really, really challenging to give up a couple of like a handful of those clients. I didn’t really want to give up, but I eventually had to because I was like, well, if this is that kind of the path that I’m going on, I can’t just go half in and have doubled the work.

 

I wanted to have about the same amount or less work for about the same amount of money. So I had to completely shut that off. And I found a bunch of homes for some of my long term, really special clients. I found other people that could take over. But yeah, it took a while.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Letting Go of Some Clients

 

Well, that’s admirable that you did that because you probably felt compelled to do that because in a very real way. You’re saying goodbye to some friends and you’ve developed really deep relationships with these clients over the years, and they’ve relied on you and you’ve relied on them and that is a deep, deep bond.

 

And then to be able to have the conversation of don’t want to do this anymore, I mean, that’s that’s hard. Yeah, it’s really hard, especially because my sales pitch for those 15 years was that I’m not some fly by night web shop, like, I had been in business for a long time. I have no plans for that to change.

 

I’ve learned not to say that anymore because I know what the future holds. But it definitely, yeah, it was really, really tight, luckily. So talk to, quite a few of them are still friends with quite a few of them like that. That side of the relationship hasn’t changed. And I always like to look in on them to see what’s going on with their brands and be pleased when I see their success.

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: What Went on for 2 and a Half Years

 

Well, I’m not surprised that you still maintain those relationships because it sounds like you really were intentional on how you’re going to walk that out and make sure that you’re walking alongside them so that they don’t feel stranded. So, good on you for doing it that way. So what went during this period. So a two and a half year timeline?

 

Okay. And you know, building up the products, drawing down the clients. Totally get that. So what was the first product that you decided to introduce as a vegan cookbook? Really neither here nor there. I’ve never written about vegan cooking or recipes since then, but it was. Yeah, I was just posting a lot of photos of the meals that I was making, and I was living so remote that I had to make every meal from scratch.

 

Okay. And people just kept asking, well, when’s the recipe book coming out? So, you know, there was one and now there’s going to be one. And that was phenomenal, to be honest. Like that. That book sold really, really well. And kind of gave me a taste, to use a horrible pun for that. But it gave me a taste of the product world, and I was pretty stoked on it.

 

So, yeah. Then I moved back into talking about online business, creativity, entrepreneurship. And that’s kind of the lane that I have stayed in since. Okay. And so then, you know, systematically, you know, introducing more products and I think if I heard you correctly, although maybe I have this written in my notes incorrectly, I think you had said courses, books, software.

 

Do I have that backwards? Was ebooks then courses, books, courses, software. Okay, great. So then when I asked you the first product about vegan and that kind of tipped me off that I may have my notes wrong. Okay. So books first, then courses in software. So how did it stand out to you when you had written books that there would be an opportunity for courses like what was it?

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Listening to Customer Feedback

 

Was it your audience saying, hey, could you develop a course around that? Because we’d like to learn from you on this topic. Like what was the sort of litmus test for you? Yeah. So I really think that there’s two ways to start a business. You make something and then you find somebody to buy it, or you find somebody, listen to them and then make what they want.

 

And the latter is kind of the way that I have. The only way that I know how to start a company or make a product is by listening to the audience that I already have, and then just making things they want. So with courses, it wasn’t necessarily people asking about a course that I could make.

 

It was more that my inbox was filled. My first course was a course on freelance business called Creative Class. It still actually exists as one of the one of the two courses that I still teach. And I had a dozen or two dozen emails a week from people saying, hey, I’ve seen that you’ve had this design business for 15 years and you’ve done well with it.

 

Like, I have this specific question and this specific question, and they were all on the same thing. They’re all, I’m running a freelance business. Wow. It’s like, wow, this seems like there’s a market here. And just in thinking about it, books don’t sell for that much. Courses do. It seemed like a valid experiment to try.

 

Like if I just do a little bit more work and do like video and live video and all of that, then maybe I can charge a couple hundred dollars or the book is 15, 25 bucks at the most. So I figured, let’s, let’s just give this a shot. And I like the idea, with courses that there could be a community component and the community for creative class has been going for, I guess probably 4 or 5 years now.

 

There’s a lot of people in that course that still talk, and there’s people who. The best part about the community for me is seeing some of the freelancers hire other students. So I build this kind of mini economy inside the course where people are hiring each other, collaborating with each other, working with each other. And to be honest, that’s probably the coolest part.

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Building an Audience

 

That’s got to feel awesome. Yeah. Wow. Really inspiring. Okay, so as you’re building out, so books and then that moves to courses. So tell us a little bit more about how you were building an audience because, you know, obviously building courses, but having nobody to share that with and to sell to is not so awesome.

 

So you were you but you obviously had been building an audience. So did the early books help you build an audience? Was that guest on maybe other podcasts? I know that you host today. So what you were using for building the community is a strategy. As soon as I realized that, hey, products are potentially a viable direction for my business to go in, I started a mailing list and that I’ve never missed a site.

 

It’s called the Sunday Dispatch, as I named it that on purpose because it forced me to send an email once a week on Sunday to Sunday Dispatch. The Sunday Dispatch is. Yeah. And that, I sent a long message. But it’s not for people who don’t like to read and I send a long form article, every single Sunday.

 

And outside of breaks, I take two breaks a year. So I think everybody should take a break. I’ve never missed a Sunday. And the first email I think went out, in November, I think it was 2012. Okay. So I’ve been absolutely consistent with that, no exception since I started. And I think the cadence of that has shown my audience that, hey, I really, really care about this thing.

 

You don’t even have to pay for it. You just I don’t even care if you buy anything if you want to be on the list. Awesome. If you don’t, that’s awesome too. And it’s just been a way for me to both engage with my audience, but also listen to them. I hear, like, the reason my latest book is a book is because I wrote an article on the subject.

 

I typically get a couple hundred email replies from each newsletter that I got 1200-1300 replies. Wow. Immediate indicator. Like oh okay, this is something that people are interested in. And that was actually part of the sales pitch, the positioning that I use to get to the agent that I got and then sell the book to the publisher that I have.

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Allow Your Audience to Make the Content

 

So I’ve used my mailing list as my primary tool for audience building and audience connection. Since pretty much day one. Okay, so some really, really huge nuggets there. And in the first one being one that you pitch the book to a literary agent, that literary agent then helps you sell that through to a publisher. But it sounds like if I’m tracking with you here, 1200 email replies-ish, and probably more than that, you were able to use that as look, everybody look at the data that I have.

 

Which, by the way, Onward Nation, most authors don’t have any sort of quantifiable data. They have an idea and want to write a book around. Paul, you had data that proved that, hey, people want this, right? Yeah. I mean, inside scoop on traditional publishing is no, no agent. An agent only wants to work with you if they think they can sell the book to a publisher, because that’s how they make money.

 

That’s the business that makes sense. Publishers aren’t going to sign nonfiction authors for the most part, unless they have a proven audience who is engaged with their work. So things like how many people are on my mailing list, how much revenue I generate from them. We’re all things that had to go into the book proposal before they signed me.

 

So all of the business side of things had to be they wouldn’t have signed me if they didn’t think that they could sell my book. They would not have signed me for sure. Right? Yeah. So such a smart way to approach it. And you made yourself easy to sign. Exactly right. Which is really, really smart.

 

Whereas most business owners who think of having an idea are like, well, I’m going to write out a poorly written maybe chapter or two, then try to beg, borrow and steal an agent to represent me. And then that’s a difficult conversation if it’s even successful. And then no publisher wants an unnamed or no named author because this is what we’re the publishing world is changing the responsibility to sell the books.

 

That’s on the author. Exactly. Yeah. For sure. So, Paul did it the really, really smart way Onward Nation. Not only did he focus on adding value in a very consistent way to his audience, but then he asked them what they wanted. You have the data. So then it’s a really easy decision for a publisher. It’s like, hey, wait a minute.

 

Not only does he represent good content, but he has an audience. I think we do want him to be our author, right? Yeah, yeah. For sure. Wow. Okay, so take us inside. Company of one. This is your latest book. So. Sounds like there is good demand for it. Awesome. You wrote it. Give us from your perspective, or, I guess, the perspective of a business owner.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Growth For the Sake of Growth

 

What are some of the biggest nuggets that you’d want Onward Nation business owners to know about? Yeah, I mean, the book really centers around the premise that Edward Abbey came up with in 1978. And that’s growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of a cancer cell. And so the book really hits kind of deep.

 

And the book isn’t that deep, but the book really centers around the thesis that growth is definitely beneficial and good in some instances. But they’re actually, a tremendous number of instances and tons and reasons for a business not to grow or for a business to not focus on growth and see growth as a side effect instead of a main thing to focus on or like the top KPI to pay attention to month over month.

 

And so that’s really the book that more is better. Wow. Okay. So I had never heard the analogy before of growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of cancer. So, that hit me like a ton of bricks and really made me think. So why did you decide to really base sort of the foundation of the book around that philosophy?

 

Yeah. I mean, it’s one that has served me for 20 years where I definitely, I’m a business. I like making money. I’m not anti-capitalism by any means. I think money gives us freedom, and I think it’s a great thing. But I think if we don’t kind of think about that, the top end of things, if we just do more.

 

How do you define more, Steve? And it’s like, yeah, it’s like running towards the horizon. It feels like you’re making progress. You’re probably sweating and getting tired, but like, you’re not actually going to get there. And so I started to think about upper limits and upper bounds and really centered around the term enough or the word enough, right.

 

Like what is enough? And if we don’t define that, then we’re just going to keep chasing more. And it could be we’re chasing more, and forsaking our business or our existing customers or even our profits and myself. My own journey really ties into the book, but it’s too small a data set to be relevant, and one doesn’t mean anything.

 

It’s a statistical blip. Right? So I started to look for research. I started to look for other people’s stories. I started to look for, like a larger sense that this was something that existed, that people just weren’t talking about or writing about. And luckily I found that, there’s actually been a lot of studies where data and facts don’t always line up with this advice that if you’re not growing, you’re dying sort of thing.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Sustaining Resources for Growth

 

So the two studies that I really looked at, and there’s a lot of studies in the form of stories in the book, but the first was a sort of Genome Project that looked at over 3000 startups. 75% of them failed because they scaled up too quickly, not because of competition or bad products. Corp and Foundation looked at the Inc 5000 list that a lot of businesses want to be on, but they looked at those companies 5 to 8 years later and found the same thing as the first study, that about 70% of them failed because they couldn’t sustain the resources required for their rapid growth.

 

Wow. I was like, there’s something like, it’s not just me and the quirky way that I run a business. There’s something big here that people aren’t considering, that people are talking about that isn’t kind of making the news on TechCrunch or wherever you get your news real. Okay. So that’s a staggering statistic. I thought where you were going to, go with the Inc 5000 list, was that they’re not on the list anymore.

 

But it’s worse than that. Yeah, they’re not on the list because they don’t exist. Wow. Okay. So is it because they grew too fast going back to the cancer cell that the cancer ended up taking over the body, in this case the company. And then the company died. Is it that they, that they all burned out, or is it that they had the.

 

Hey, we’re not going to go for or not go for 5000, we want to be on 500 and then we want to be on this list. qAnd then it just was never enough. So what was sort of the causation behind that? Or is it just that maybe there’s just too many factors. Yeah.

 

I mean there’s definitely a lot of factors. And it’s not as simplistic as, hey, it was this one thing, but a lot of it comes down to the fact that once you put growth at the top of your list for things that you want your business to do, then you start to do things. One of the best examples of this, and I think you have to be a little bit older, but not too much to get it.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Not Making Risky Bets

 

There used to be some big ol Pets.com they advertised in the Super Bowl that were covered. I remember spending, yeah, they were spending millions of dollars on advertising to get customers right. And they were selling the pet products, the low cost, right. They’re selling them for less than they were paying for them. How this is a good business model.

 

Like it baffles my mind. But that’s how a lot of businesses, especially once they start to take funding or once they start to consider growth above all else, start to spend based on potential future revenue versus actual revenue and actual profits. And I think a lot of times companies will do this because they’re like, well, we have this opportunity to be huge or we have this opportunity to dominate the market and it can pay off, but it doesn’t always pay off.

 

And it’s more than likely not going to pay off. It’s more like playing the lottery. And like I said, I’m very risk averse, so I would rather not make risky bets even though, I’m sorry, one more stat. I’m such a statistic, but, was it the S&P 500? Yes. Average lifespan of companies on that list.

 

And that’s the list of businesses that have done quite well for 15 years. The average lifespan of companies on that list is 15 years. Wow. Right. I don’t want to run a business for 15 years. I want to run a business until I basically don’t want to do business anymore. And I’ve run my businesses for 21 years, so 6 years higher.

 

Obviously I don’t make the revenue, but the point and the point of the book is that I don’t need to like my business because it is so small. The margins are good, I’m profitable, I make enough to sustain my life and support my family. Why would I want more if more would mean I would have to work a lot more hours in the day?

 

When people see my family as much or I would be that much more stressed, or I would be doing a job that I don’t want to do, because I would be managing other people, because my business would be so big. So I think a lot of times we get stuck in the weeds of running our business and don’t think about it. Is this a business I actually want to run?

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Small Companies Are More Profitable

 

Yeah, there are so many instances where smaller companies are actually more profitable. And I don’t mean just by a percentage basis. Onward Nation actually has more money to the bottom line than companies that might be 4 or 5 times their size. And I know many agents or excuse me, business owners, who happen to own agencies who are in niche industries.

 

And on the surface, they’re running small teams and small companies working for a handful of clients. And other owners will look at that and say, oh, you know, a small business. What could they possibly be doing until they see the financials? And then inevitably, the answer out of the owner of a larger company will say, oh, oh, because it happens to be this smaller company, more nimble company, less stress is making a lot more profit in real dollars, not just percentages, but actual more money is hitting the bottom line than a much larger company because it’s run correctly doing the things that Paul is talking about.

 

Yeah, it’s a lot of it. I think you touched on this if it is ego like it looks better to our peers or it looks better to the press if we have a larger company. But I don’t. I’ve never wanted to run a business that hurts me, but looks good to other people that seem. That seems like a pretty awful life, right?

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Every Business Must Have an Organic Size for the Team

 

When I go to conferences and events and, you know, Predictive ROI. Paul is a virtual company. We always have been. We have 18 people and we’ve done some really cool things. And but whenever I go to a conference or an event or something and somebody asks me, tell me, it always goes right to the so where are you headquartered?

 

Well, you know, in tiny little lacrosse Wisconsin. Oh, so how many employees do you have? Well, we have 18 people, but we’re spread throughout the United States. We’re a virtual company. What? And then all of a sudden, it’s like, is that like a hobby business? And I’m like, no. And then they’ll ask me questions about, you know, some revenue and that kind of stuff.

 

And then when I share that, then inevitably the question is, wait a minute, how do you do that? How do you do unlimited vacation time and all of that for your employee, and flexible schedules and like, how are you doing that? Like, so you don’t have to be 50 or 60 people Onward Nation to pulse.

 

It is creating a business that serves you and your family. Right? Right, Paul. For sure. And I think that every business has an organic size, that it should be. Right. Like Airbnb could never be a one person business because you couldn’t just have like Bob’s Guest House in Boise, Idaho and have Airbnb make any kind of revenue, like so a business like that does need to have that the size that it does, well, probably about half the size that it does.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here

 

Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Being Ego-Driven

 

But businesses really only need to be the size that they need to be. And any bigger a lot of the time, like we’re talking about I think, is ego driven, where ego makes so much sense because we all started our business because of ego, because we all thought that we could do better than the market.

 

Yeah, ego in that case, perfectly valid. And it’s a good reason. But then our ego can get the best of us when we’re like, okay, well, this sounds better to other people or to our peers or to the press. Then I need to grow for this, or I need to be a quote unquote legitimate business owner. So I have to have an office.

 

I have to have employees, I have to have a virtual assistant. So if you need those things, great. But maybe you don’t, right? This has been such a great, great conversation. I know that we’re quickly running out of time, Paul. And I’m just grateful that you took the time out of your compressed schedule to come on to the show and share your insights.

 

But before we go, before we close out and say goodbye, my friend, is there any final advice you’d like to share? Anything you think we might have missed on the risks of rapid growth in a business? And then please tell Onward Nation business owners the best way to connect with you. 

 

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Risks of Rapid Growth in a Business: Final Advice and How to Connect with Paul 

 

I like that you didn’t say my busy schedule because I don’t have a busy schedule.

 

I have a very intentional schedule, but I don’t think that we do our best work when we are busy and stressed out or overworked. So I work 4 or 5 hours a day at the most. And that’s enough work for me that that gets me to where I need to go. I don’t set unreasonable deadlines or expectations of myself.

 

So I think that’s a good point to make. Is that it? It seems like it’s a medal of honor that is like, oh, I’m so busy or it makes you sound so important in such a busy year. My work is so busy. I work 16 hours a day like nobody’s giving out medals of honor for that badge of honor for that.

 

It’s just hurting you. Like it’s honestly just hurting you mentally, physically and all the rest. So I think that that’s always something to keep in mind, like, what’s the long term? Even in my 20s I did that. I can apply like I would work like 16 hours a day. And it wasn’t it wasn’t beneficial.

 

It didn’t it didn’t actually help my business. I feel like I can get more work done now, now that I prioritize better. So I think that’s probably one of the most valid points to make as far as finding me. I’m not really on social media except for Twitter and on Twitter. I’m really just there for sarcasm.

 

So the best place to, follow along with what I do or to read the ideas that I have is my mailing list Society Dispatches, and that is at my website, PJ Bascomb okay, Onward Nation, no matter how many notes you took or how often you go back and re-listen to Paul’s words of wisdom, which I sure hope that you do the key is to take the smarts that he so generously shared with you, take them and apply them into your business right away, and accelerate your results.

 

And Paul, we all have the same 86,400 seconds in a day, and I am grateful that you shared some of your time with us to come on to the show, to be our mentor and guide, to help us move our businesses onward to the next level in the right way. Thank you so much, Paul. Yeah, no, it’s my absolute pleasure to chat today, Stephen. Thank you. 

 

This episode is complete. So head over to OnwardNation.com for show notes and more food to fuel your ambition. Continue to find your recipe for success here at Onward Nation.

 

Learn more about the other risks of rapid growth in a business here