Behind The Scenes: Are you the Bottleneck to Growth?
When you are the bottleneck to growth, you have created processes and systems that make you the final say to completion of work in the business. The founders of fast-growth companies often face this after months — sometimes years — of struggling with being the bottleneck to growth. It comes with frustration as you want others to support the company to grow more, but you have not empowered them. To make the shift, you to have to transform your identity from Founder to the identity of the CEO. In today’s behind the scenes, you will get a closer look at being the bottleneck to growth so that you can determine if this is part of your problems.
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Bottleneck to Growth: The Transcript
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Disclaimer: This transcript was created using YouTube’s translator tool and that may mean that some of the words, grammar, and typos come from a misinterpretation of the video.
[00:00:00].590]
Well this is a behind the scenes look at many businesses that are in this fast-growth mode. I talked to a lot of CEOs and founders of fast-growth companies mostly from the INC 5000 and I hear this a lot or I ask this question. Are you the bottleneck of your business. The bottleneck of your business is not a good thing. Hi, my name is Gene Hammett. This is Growth Think Tank. This is a behind the scenes look at what does it really take to be the CEO and really be a leader instead of a fast-growth company.
[00:00:33].630]
If you feel like you’re the bottleneck. I get it. You probably feel stressed you feel frustrated you feel like you’re the one holding up the entire company. And it’s probably true. Because as a founder you have you know grown up with this great idea and created the team around you. But if you’re still reviewing the work if you’re still the bottleneck through the throughput of this you probably can’t grow as fast as you want to. Now I talked to a lot of leaders from the INC 5000 and this is really one of the conversations we have more often than not is are you the bottleneck.
[00:01:11].060]
Which means. Are you the person holding up the growth of the company. I love Coca-Cola. I love the hold that glass bottle. I love everything about it. But if you are the bottleneck you are really impacting the entire business. So what do you do about it. I think you’ve got to make a big shift from your identity as a founder to the CEO. Now, this whole identity thing may be new to you but let me explain to those that don’t really have heard me talk about identity before.
[00:01:44].500]
We associate ourselves and a deep soul level with our identity. I’m a father. I have a 12-year-old. You can’t convince me that I’m not a father because I have a 12-year-old and it is part of who I am. And that’s part of my identity. I also went to Georgia Tech and as bad as their football team is I’m still a Georgia Tech fan. And you may be laughing because you know how bad they are this year but. You our core identity becomes a part of us and it’s really hard to let go when we are a founder in a business that core identity is who we are.
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We help people with the projects we help them review the final output before it goes to the client. And all of those things become bottlenecks. And if you are a founder today and you are still reviewing all these things if you’re still people coming to you with questions and not answering them for themselves you are the bottleneck and you have to make the transition to CEO if you want to continue growing your company. Now I know as a founder you feel valued because people still need you that you’re the expert in that domain of service.
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You are the person that has the answers. It feels great. But. It also feels great to empower them to answer their own questions to push it back so that they have the confidence and courage over time so that they no longer have to come to you. That they just come to you with the really really tough ones. So you still get to be a part of that process but wouldn’t it be great if it were an option to you being a part of the process instead of being required. That’s the part of the bottleneck that you really have to address.
[00:03:23].380]
Are you want to make it optional to be able to jump in where needed not a requirement to you getting the work done. Making the transition from founder to CEO is an identity chef that is hard because you have to let go of who you were to become a new version of yourself a new leader. So you’re going from doer to leader.
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All of this is because I care about you I care about you as a leader and looking behind the scenes from all these fast growth companies many of them have not made this transition yet. Many of them are still struggling but you won’t make it to the top tiers of the list if you continue to be the bottleneck of the business and you won’t continue to create even modest levels of growth. If you insist on being the bottleneck. So I share this story with you because I’ve been that bottleneck before and I had to let go of that identity I had to empower my management team to be able to create their own ideas to be able to really source new customers and all the things that I was holding on to.
[00:04:28].410]
What are you holding on to that is causing you to be the bottleneck. I’m not going to dive deeper into this because I just want to let you think about this. If you have any questions about it make sure you reach out to me Jean at Jean Hemet dot com. Thanks for listening in here to Growth Think Tank. And as always lead with courage. We’ll see you next time.
Disclaimer: This transcript was created using YouTube’s translator tool and that may mean that some of the words, grammar, and typos come from a misinterpretation of the video.
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