Three (Forcing Function) Steps to Scale
There are exactly three forcing functions for organizations to see explosive growth. At least that’s what these guys Benjamin Hardy and Blake Erickson believe. Their book, The Science of Scaling, is a book that I’d walk by a thousand times on a bookshelf without even the slightest inkling to pick it up.
Scaling gurus feel gross.
But, their concepts shocked me with their elegance and power to expand what we refer to in Leadership Lab as the Intuitive Fence. This is the limits of your perception of what is possible.
The only reason I dove into this material is that the book was given to me by a business man I respect and my ego won’t let me pass on a book in my possession.
What happened next surprised me.
Not only did I read (and enjoy) the text, everyone around me started reading it too, and what ensued was a healthy dose of so-what-are-you-doing-about-scale conversations.
Part of what makes this framework useful is that it forces dramatic action and divergent thinking. Here are the three part mechanics to growing your organization’s success:
SET A MASSIVE GOAL. Don’t even begin this exercise by trying to improve your revenue by fifty percent. Save your time with a desire to increase profits by 35% this quarter. We’re taking about six times revenue or ten times revenue here! Think: what would it look like to grow your company by 20X?
SHRINK THE TIME HORIZON. There’s nothing interesting about today if your big goal is set for ten years from now or even five. Do it in three years! That would change what you need to do today! This step is critically important, but not just to get things done faster. This time horizon is so things get done at all! Using time as a weapon to take action now is the secret sauce here.
RAISE THE FLOOR. The floor is the bottom, bare minimum initiatives that you will tolerate in your business. Raising the floor typically means that in order to accomplish the goal, you might as well not waste your time with low margin customers or fringe verticals that don’t have the ability to be an exponential factor for your organization. Raising the floor is about power (and sometimes) painful discernment to decide what is worth your time in this endeavor.
Don’t let the simplicity fool you.
Like anything that drives adaptation, pushing into the three steps above will certainly push you back.
Please don’t take this as an excuse to not grow your company by 600%, but I’ll give you a little secret. The magic is the forcing function of what happens in your mind when you set an insane goal like this and do the mental exercise of realizing that goal on a freakishly short timeline.
It narrows your focus and forces action.
The common faults here are with discussing. Beware of falling into these pitfalls when experimenting with this dramatic growth strategy.
UNREMARKABLE GROWTH GOAL. The problem with choosing realistic or small goals is that you’ll likely try to accomplish them with the same methods that got you where you are now. The point of a 6X, 10X, or 20X growth goal is it forces divergent thinking.
CHOOSING THE TIME HORIZON BASED ON HOW LONG YOU THINK YOU NEED. This isn’t a planning step. It’s instant creativity! The point of the time horizon is to force action that you can’t get away in a normal time expectation.
LET THERE BE LOSSES. Growth assumes attrition, loss, and some grief. So, you tell me: what will you give up to grow the way you want to grow?
Well, we can’t just talk about it forever. It’s time to do something about it. You’re up!
TAKE ACTION:
AUDIT. Decide what explosive growth you really want. Revenue isn’t everything, but it could be a good goal. Drill down and decide what needs 600 or 800% growth?
PRACTICE. Follow the steps! And, you need all three so don’t cut it short! Like any framework, it helps to share the concept and the language so the people around you can play along and support.