We doubled our revenue in two years, and it was the most painful stretch of my career. $50 million to over $100 million. From the outside, that looks like winning. From the inside, we were throwing people at problems instead of fixing our processes, and it caught up with us. We had to let go of people who’d helped build the company. If you’re doing that right now, you’re outgrowing your systems, not your market.
@officialchadpetermanTranscript
2024 was one of the most painful years of my life. And as a business, we were growing the whole time. In 2024, we had just went from two years prior doing 50 million of revenue to over 100 million. What I know is that explosive growth can break a lot of companies. We had to make tough decisions. We had to let people go. It sucked. There were a lot of people that had worked here that had helped build what we had built and we had made the mistake of throwing people at problems. Never throw people at problems, regardless of how fast you're growing. If you find yourself throwing people at problems, you'll know you're growing too fast. You're outgrowing the process and procedure within your business.
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