Scaling
For founders whose business has outgrown them doing everything, who need a plan for the team, the cash and the next three years.
From doing everything to leading a team
A three-year plan for the business, built from your own numbers, and support to carry it out. For founders whose business has outgrown them doing everything.
Every plan starts from your own numbers: by customer, service and segment.
The situation
In most owner-led businesses there's a point where the founder is the business. They sell, deliver, hire, chase invoices and sign off everything. It works until it doesn't: growth stalls, quality slips, and the founder can't take a week off.
The way out is a team. But hiring needs cash before it creates cash, and the founder is already stretched. Hire too early and the margin disappears. Hire the wrong person and you've bought another problem. Wait too long and the business stalls. It is the most uncomfortable stage of building a company, and the one where a plan matters most.
What the plan covers
- Where the business really makes money: by customer, service and segment
- Who the business is for, and who it should stop serving
- The organisation you need in one, two and three years, and the order to hire in
- The cash plan that makes those hires affordable
- Management structure, reporting and the few numbers to watch
- Your role at each stage: what you keep, and what you hand over
How it runs
- 01
Diagnose
The numbers, the customers, the team and where the founder's time goes.
- 02
Plan
The three-year plan, built with you and tested against the numbers.
- 03
Execute
Ongoing support as you carry it out: recruitment, forecasting, marketing and the hard conversations.
The case: a migration law practice
When we started working together in 2023, the practice was its principal and one assistant, and she couldn't take a break until she had a team. We built a full plan: who to serve, what sets the practice apart, who to hire and what it would cost. Then we carried it out together: job ads and interviews, offer structures, pricing and cashflow models, marketing and a new website. The team grew to six, revenue grew around two and a half times, and the principal moved from running every file to leading the firm. We're now rebuilding the practice to be AI-first.
As the CEO of a company, you're kind of the weather. If you come in stormy, you change the entire company dynamic.
The founder side
Founders at this stage tend to do everything themselves and take more on rather than hire. I call these patterns Hyper-Independent and Persevering. They built the business, and they are what keeps it small.
Questions
- Do you help with hiring?
- Yes. Recruitment, onboarding and forecasting are often part of the support once the plan is in place.
- What if I already have a plan?
- Then we start by testing it against the numbers. Often the plan is sound and the gap is in carrying it out.