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Key Takeaways When your business scales, you’ll likely receive exposure before your business processes can catch up. Then you have to choose between variability and consistency.
Effective leaders will redesign their businesses as needed during these periods of intentional growth.
Scale is neutral by default. In other words, it amplifies what already exists. If a business already has good systems in place, they have the opportunity to grow even stronger. And the reverse is true for bad operating systems — they only spread faster.
Clients don’t inherently experience “scale,” they experience service (i.e. response time, consistency, accuracy and follow-through). Things like employee headcount, asset under management and corporate offices are ultimately just inputs. Quality of execution, however, is the preeminent output that matters.
Growth creates exposure before it creates efficiency
When a company is growing quickly, it can conflate size with capability. Protocols that once held may begin to vary across locations. Teams might compensate in different ways — developing local workarounds that solve short-term problems but only mask a larger flaw in the system. Every new market, client and team adds a layer of complexity that demands more from both leaders and the operating systems currently in place. For leaders, the implication is not to slow growth, but rather to change how growth is managed.
It’s not a question of whether teams are capable or not, but whether the system they operate within makes consistent execution easier or harder as the organization grows. Scale requires senior leadership to pay closer attention to where decisions are being made, and which processes need to be consistent versus adaptable. Effective organizations treat this phase as a period of intentional growth.
Instead of ignoring friction caused by M&A or organic growth, smart organizations don’t shy away from identifying the business segments or functions creating new bottlenecks. By focusing on improving the systems within which people work, leaders can address the root causes of friction rather than problem-solve for the symptoms. This orientation of structure over workaround allows for substantial improvement of execution despite headwinds caused by rapid growth.
Scale forces organizations to choose between variability and consistency
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