We recently worked with a company doing over $20M a year. From the outside, they looked like a large, established operation. But once we stepped inside, it became clear they were still running the business the same way they did in the early days — through back of napkin systems, scattered notes, memory, long lost threads, and whatever someone happened to remember that day. As we analyzed how work actually flowed, the pattern was obvious: revenue had scaled, but their internal systems hadn’t. Nothing was consistent, repeatable, or easy for the team to follow. The business looked strong, but it functioned like a small shop that had never updated how it operated. The biggest takeaway was simple: growth will expose whatever systems you didn’t build. And if everything still relies on people remembering things, the business ends up operating with stress, confusion, and unnecessary inefficiency. Case Study Question: When transforming back-of-napkin style businesses, what are the main systems you think every business should have in place before scaling? Extra questions: Have you seen this before? Maybe in your own company or someone you know?How often do you think big businesses are still running on small-business systems behind the scenes?

Hey all, Happy Monday - lets post some wins either from today, this past week, or what you hope to win this week! What's something, big or small, that you got the win on - could be as simple as you made an outreach attempt to a new prospect, or as big as you put together your landing pages for your new marketing campaign. This is a perfect thread to get some support and build your momentum! Let’s go 👊

When you think about it — every system that's been engineered, no matter how well-designed, still depends on coordination, accountability, and sequencing to actually work. That’s project management. So is PM just a support function that organizes the work… or is it actually part of the system itself — the mechanism that turns design into operational flow? Curious how others see it: where does system design end and project management begin?

Brainstorming sesh

We’re kicking off yet another Coffee Collabs session at 12:00pm EST today. Jump in, meet other members, and share what you’re working on. Always a ton of value and good conversation with fellow business leaders. 👉🏽 Go to the Calendar tab > Click on zoom link. Apart from networking, drop a comment on what topic you’d like to chat about👇🏼