What is Growth? (Baby don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me, no more)
Have you ever seen a graph that goes something like this? 📈
If you’re in the startup world, you most likely have.
Even better: this infamous hockey stick growth curve is your obsession.
Because whatever your role is, your job is to actually contribute into generating one.
And it’s no easy job.
But have you ever stopped and analyzed what this curve is truly made of?
Let’s do a fun exercise.
Let’s deconstruct.
Look at the X axis and the Y axis.
Growth is a product of time per results.
Time x Results = Growth
Easy.
Now: let’s face it. Even though the elements on this graph are so clear, as an entrepreneur or a growth guy (and I am both) there is only so much you can do about them.
Growth.
Do you have control over growth as an entrepreneur?
No you don’t.
There is no “grow my company” button on your desk.
There is no way you can have a direct impact on growth.
Truth is, you do a series of actions that HOPEFULLY have an impact on this or that metric.
Facebook ads, Conversion Rate Optimization, Improving your Value Ladder, Cart Abandonment Retargeting and such.
But even if I gave you 5million $$$ today, there would be NO WAY for you to pour them on “growth”.
Heartbreaking, right?
Now let’s talk about Results.
As an entrepreneur do you have control over results?
Well, no.
You can have the best employees, the best performance, the best marketing tricks up your sleeve.
Heck, you could have Seth Godin himself within your team.
But this doesn’t stop Zucks or Google to suddenly decide your CTR is too low, change the algorithm and get more bling bling out of your AD spend.
Cambridge Analytica.
Rings a bell?
Within one week I had to give money back to one of my clients because of the Chatbot embargo and the Facebook Groups APIs being cut off.
No warning, no solution.
You can put all the talent you want in it.
But you do not control results.
Now we’re left with the X axis.
As an entrepreneur, do you have control over time?
The answer is: hell yes you do.
You do have control over how you invest your time and run your operations.
Which brings us to our epiphany.
Successfull entrepreneurs are better than others at sniffing out opportunities, prioritize them, and then executing quality work on them.
Aka investing work hours in the right things.
That’s it.
So if you’re struggling at growing your company, ask yourself these three questions:
1) Are you 100% sure A/B testing shades of green on a button is your n1 chance to improve overall ROI?
2) Do you have a system to identify and work on the 20% of the tasks that’s gonna bring 80% of results?
3) Are you sure you’re not sacrificing quality work for fast and cheap execution?
Because ultimately, doing these 3 things and doing them right, is the most important part of your job.
Forget about growth and results.
Those are inevitable consequences of investing your team work hours into improving the right stuff.
Think about it.
Hustle is unrelevant if you’re “hustling your way up” the wrong hill.
You want growth?
Then manage your company in a way that allows everyone to focus on what matters.
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