You’ve recognized that you are different. Not better, but different. While many of your colleagues are pursuing college degrees, securing “good” jobs, and settling into careers that culminate in a hopeful pension, a maxed-out 401K, or a retirement package, you realize you don’t want any part of that. You bristle at the thought of someone else determining your professional future. You want to be your own boss, control your destiny and finances, and make your own way. This is the epitome of what being an entrepreneur is all about.
I know who you are because you are me. The very idea that someone could control my income and tell me what I was worth based on the job I did was despicable. Even if I climbed the corporate ladder successfully, my destiny would always be in someone else’s hands, with my outcome determined by them. I hated the very idea of it, and every fiber of my being revolted at the thought of it.
Though I realized I was an entrepreneur at an early age, 11 to be exact, I had no idea what challenges lay ahead in realizing this dream. After failing forward through five failed businesses, I finally broke through in my sixth and, with my amazing partners, built a juggernaut of a company that has generated $1B+ in revenue over a 20-year period, completed a first-of-its-kind private equity transaction at over 9 figures, and consistently grosses well over $100M annually…and is still growing.
The truth of the matter is, I don’t think it’s that big of a deal.
Though our enterprise is measurably in the top 0.03% of all businesses globally, I measure success by one standard and one standard only… the very best. Currently, several of the most successful businesses of all time include Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, Walmart, Coca-Cola, and McDonald’s, to name a few. When comparing ourselves to those icons of excellence, we don’t even show up in their orbit.
There will be a point in the near future when we’ll reach the rarified air of a $1B+ valuation, but for now, we haven’t achieved this gold standard yet. It’s not a matter of “if” but “when”. I share this so those who are hungry enough to do what it takes to build a business that reaches $100M+ in annual gross revenues can learn from the insights of someone who’s done it, so you get the hack and don’t have to make the same mistakes we learned from.
You are part of my Impossible Dream and among the select 5,000 entrepreneurs who will succeed at < 0.03% globally. This week, let’s get started with you. You’ve started your own company or have a dream of doing so in the near future, and you’re in the early stages of business growth. You’ve faced some of the challenges of early-stage startups and, despite being excited about your future, are now confronting the reality that it’s only working because of you.
Early on, that’s true. Your hustle, work ethic, decision-making, urgency, relationships, and problem-solving ability carry your business through the early years. But eventually, you encounter challenges you couldn’t have foreseen, and something changes.
Growth and complexity expose dependencies. Suddenly, every important decision routes through you. Your team hesitates to make decisions without your approval, problems escalate faster than you can solve them, and execution slows as your company grows. At first, this feels normal and makes you feel invincible as you are the alpha and omega of your company…until it becomes exhausting.
As the founder, in short order, you become the decision-maker, the accountability system, the communication hub, the quality control department, and the organizational glue. That works (barely) up to $5M but breaks quickly after that.
The companies that scale successfully make a critical transition, and the founder stops “being” the operating system and starts “building” the operational system. This requires leadership depth, clear ownership, decision rights, accountability cadence, and scalable infrastructure. The challenge is whether you, as the founder, can see this – OR – have you become the proverbial Emperor with no clothes?
Your company will never outgrow the identity you haven’t yet become. The level of your leadership will be the level at which your company stalls. If everything runs through you, the operating system has reached capacity. As Einstein so powerfully stated, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
We need to think at a different level. Self-awareness and growth are the keys to unlocking your full potential. To do this successfully, you’ll need to recognize that you are the limit. If your growth has stalled, there’s only one place to look for the cause…a mirror.
For some, it’s unfathomable, regardless of the evidence. Entrapped in this mindset, their pursuit of business success is never driven by the desire to create something enduring or to leave a legacy. Instead, it serves as a vessel to feed their insatiable ego, enabling them to arrogantly proclaim to the world, “I am the founder and owner of my own business.”
This blog is for those who want to own their business rather than have the business own them, and to serve humanity long after their lifetimes. For you, recognizing that you are the limit is the beginning of exploring what you don’t know you don’t know, which opens up the unlimited possibilities that lie before you and your future of building a $100M+ business.
This is the essence of Principle #3: “Find Someone Who Has Already Done It.” See you next Monday!
Be Larger Than…
