How to Scale Your Business Without Burning Out

by faye.eScale Smart, Grow Fast PodcastPosted on No Comments

How to Scale Your Business Without Burning Out

Key Lessons from the Executive Edge Live Panel on Sustainable Growth

Scaling a business is exciting—but for many founders, growth quietly turns into chaos, burnout, and stalled execution.

In this Executive Edge Live panel, hosted by Harley Green, Founder & CEO of Workergenix, four seasoned operators and advisors share what actually makes growth scalable, sustainable, and leadership-friendly.

If you’re a founder or CEO planning to scale in 2026, here’s what you need to know.

Preferred listening on the go? Catch the full podcast episode on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Vision Isn’t the Problem—Capacity Is

Most leaders don’t lack vision. They lack bandwidth.

When everything runs through the founder, growth plans collapse under calendar overload and decision fatigue. The panel emphasized planning around real capacity, not hope.

Takeaway: If your time is maxed out, your growth plan is fiction.

Leaders Consistently Underestimate Risk, Time, and Cost

Entrepreneurs are wired to take risks—but that strength is also a liability.

Philip Williams (The Numbers Advisors) shared that most leaders underestimate how long and how expensive scaling will be.

Rule of thumb: Add 50% more time and money to your growth plan.

Sustainable growth requires financial discipline, contingency planning, and advisors who will challenge assumptions.

Scaling Requires the Right People—Not Just More People

Growth exposes talent gaps fast.

Justin Janowski (Faith2Influence) highlighted one of the hardest leadership responsibilities: letting go of the wrong people, even when you care about them.

Holding on too long creates drag across the organization and limits who the company can become.

Hard truth: Protecting the future sometimes means making uncomfortable decisions today.

Simplicity Beats Complexity in Growth Planning

Many growth plans fail because they’re too complex to execute.

Bryan Boettger (Estate Four) introduced a powerful framework using fidelity levels:

Low fidelity for long-term vision (3–5 years)

Medium fidelity for near-term priorities

High fidelity for immediate execution

Clear milestones and stage gates matter more than detailed forecasts.

Execution Risk Is a People Problem, Not a Technology Problem

As businesses scale, leaders often underestimate change management.

Josh Santiago (Santiago & Company) explained that execution fails when teams aren’t prepared for new systems, processes, or expectations—even when the strategy is sound.

Key insight: If people don’t believe the plan is achievable, it won’t work.

Sustainable Growth Depends on Leadership Maturity

The panel closed with a simple but critical reminder:

Your leadership team must grow as fast as your business.

That means:

Delegating early

Building leadership pipelines

Valuing truth-seekers over yes-people

Using data to ground decisions

Designing a business that doesn’t rely on the founder for everything

Connect with the Panelists

Justin Janowski – Founder, Faith2Influence
High-integrity sales strategies for coaches and entrepreneurs
🌐https://www.faith2influence.com
🔗https://www.linkedin.com/in/justinjanowski/
🎁 Get his free 10-step sales process by texting SALES to 55444

Josh Santiago – Managing Partner, Santiago & Company
Management consulting focused on unlocking portfolio value
🌐https://www.santiagocompany.com
🔗https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshsantiagokc

Philip Williams – Principal, The Numbers Advisors
Bookkeeping clarity and value-driven exit planning
🌐https://www.thenumbersadvisors.com

Bryan Boettger – Principal & Lead Strategist, Estate Four
Strategy and execution for construction and industrial brands
🌐http://www.estatefour.com
🔗https://www.linkedin.com/in/bryanboettger/

Final Thought

Scaling isn’t about moving faster.
It’s about building the structure, leadership capacity, and clarity to grow without breaking what already works.

If scaling your business is stretching your time and focus, an Ultimate Executive Assistant from Workergenix can help you reclaim 15–30 hours a week and lead with clarity. 

Book a discovery call to see how the right executive support creates growth without chaos.

Like what you read? Get weekly insights on scaling, efficiency, and profitability—straight to your inbox. Click here to subscribe.

Transcript:

Harley Green:
 All right, welcome everyone to Executive Edge Live. I’m Harley Green, founder and CEO of Workergenix. Now at Workergenix, we help high-performing leaders reclaim time and focus by pairing them with Ultimate Executive Assistants who reduce operational drag and increase leadership bandwidth. These sessions are one way that we support the broader business community with real conversations about what actually works at scale.

Today’s conversation is going to be focused on vision and planning for scalable growth. Very appropriate here for the new year. A lot of leaders don’t really struggle with vision so much as they struggle with the bandwidth side of things. And when everything runs through you and your calendar is full, even strong plans and vision can stall.

So today we’re unpacking how leaders can set growth targets that are ambitious but executable, plan around real capacity, not just hope, and reduce leadership drag that quietly eats 15 to 30 hours a week so that you can build planning structures to support execution and not just strategy.

You’ll hear practical insights from real-world experiences and honest trade-offs from the leaders who’ve built growth plans that hold up under pressure, our amazing panelists. And a quick note before we begin, today’s session will also be featured on our podcast, Scale Smart, Grow Fast. So if something resonates with you today, you’ll be able to revisit again in the conversation later, wherever you get your podcasts.

So let’s go ahead and dive right in and get to know our panelists. Justin, let’s start with you. Go ahead and introduce yourself to our audience today.

Justin Janowski:
 Hey, thanks for having me. I’m Justin Janowski. I run a company called Faith to Influence, and I help Christian coaches and entrepreneurs as my primary target audience with high-integrity sales strategies. I know that many people who are building businesses are trying to figure out the right pricing, the right irresistible offer, and the right sales strategy to grow.

And for my audience specifically, sales is the thing they want to do the least, but they need the most. And so I help people do that really well in a way that feels good for them and their prospects, that has integrity, and makes it easy for the right people to say yes.

Harley Green:
 Thank you so much, Justin, for joining us. Josh, how about you?

Josh Santiago:
 Absolutely. Thank you so much. It’s a pleasure to be here. My name is Josh Santiago. I’m one of the managing partners and founder of a firm that I started called Santiago & Company. So we are a management consulting firm that specializes in helping mid-market enterprise companies isolate and identify portfolio value across the entire chain and then really dive into that.

So this is a conversation that’s near and dear to my heart because I spend a lot of time helping organizations, even at the very top, uncover these issues and really dial it back. So it’s nice to get back into the small business side of things and help give back there.

Harley Green:
 It’s great having you here today, Josh. All right, Philip, how about you? Can you introduce yourself?

Philip Williams:
 Good morning. Thank you for having me, Harley. I appreciate the invitation. Super cool to be on the panel with all these cool chaps here. I run an advisory firm that handles bookkeeping so that business leaders can get their numbers on time. Massive frustration for a lot of us.

And then on the backside, we also do exit planning advising, which deals a lot with building value in the business and expanding the valuation on the company before an owner decides to exit.

Harley Green:
 Thank you so much, Philip. And last but certainly not least, Bryan, go ahead and introduce yourself to the audience.

Bryan Boettger:
 Thank you. Brian from Estate Four. I’m the principal and lead strategist. I’ve been in the agency and consultant space for like 25 years now and worked across a variety of spots. American Express, Google, YouTube, Toyota, all kinds of things, but also smaller companies as well.

And I focus now predominantly on the construction and industrial space. So that’s kind of where I found my home at this point in time.

Harley Green:
 As you can see, we’ve got a power-packed panel here today. So let’s just dive right in with the first question here. This is open to everyone. So if you’ve got something you want to share, please just jump right in.

And the first question today we’re going to focus on is scalable growth. When you think about scalable growth, what do you see leaders most often getting wrong in their planning?

Philip Williams:
 I’ll jump in. The number one thing is they think it’s going to happen faster and less expensively than it really is. Whatever your number is, probably you should add 50 percent on time and money.

Josh Santiago:
 I think the other thing too that I see is capacity. I think planning around capacity to hit scalability is another one. It’s a huge underinvestment. Everybody thinks they’ve got unlimited bandwidth and we all love the five to nine, but it’s one of those things that you’ve got to balance capacity as well across the organization.

Bryan Boettger:
 If we’re looking at leaders, and I think a lot of what you’re focusing on is leadership, I think it’s important to identify the difference between leadership and management and what role you’re filling within that. And too often people focus on the what and the how instead of the why and the where.

And as a true leader, if you focus on where we’re going and why we want to get there, and then you either offload or collaborate with your team for the what and how, that’s the only way it’ll work in the long term.

Justin Janowski:
 For me, I’ll add that sustainability is one of the key components leaders need to think about. How can we grow in a way that’s sustainable, a way that feels good long term, that supports the lifestyle we want, the business we want, the culture and values of the business?

And so it’s about having the right people in place, the right systems and processes so that the scaling isn’t just an exciting moment, but something that’s lasting and done the right way.

Harley Green:
 I heard you.

Bryan Boettger:
 Also, the scaling aspect, it’s not like a final destination either. One of the problems is people just look at what’s that end goal instead of looking at what are the milestones to get there.

And people try to do goal setting or don’t even do goal setting at all. It’s crazy how often people don’t set goals. They just say, “We’re going to grow, we’re going to do whatever,” but not only setting an end goal, but what are the stage gates to get there so you can do quality checks as you go.

Harley Green:
 One of the things that I’ve heard here in this discussion was that sometimes leaders can underestimate the amount of effort or resources that it’ll take. Why do you guys think that is? Especially people who’ve been in business more than a year and understand that things are harder than they often look on the surface. Why do leaders continually fall into that trap, and what tips or strategies would you offer for them to be more realistic?

Justin Janowski:
 A lot of leaders are visionary types. They see the big goal, the big picture, and where they want to go. They’re great at communicating that, and there’s often a charisma around their ability to sell people on it and get people excited.

But many leaders are missing the integrator, the down-to-earth analytics of what it’s actually going to take to make that vision come alive. And so partnering with team members and trusted advisors, coaches, mentors, and others who can see what actually has to happen to bring the vision to life is really important.

Many visionaries just have the big idea and they start sharing it before the path is clear.

Josh Santiago:
 I think Justin brings up a great point. It’s the marriage between the visionary and the integrator. If you look at a lot of great companies throughout history, Apple with Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, Microsoft with Bill Gates and Paul Allen, there was always a strong visionary and an equally strong executor.

And I think that becomes such a hard thing to do sometimes when you’re just getting started or even when you’ve been in business for a few years, finding somebody you can tie yourself to who’s not only going to help push the vision forward, but also bring you back to reality.

You’re like, “Yeah, we’re going to grow 40 percent next year,” and it’s like, “Well, we don’t even have the staff to do that. Hold on just a second.” Finding the two is super helpful.

Philip Williams:
 I’ll just add that as an entrepreneur, the fundamental thing that allows us to do what we do is also an Achilles heel. And that is this: entrepreneurs are like adolescents in their inability to assess risk.

We are willing to leave the house without a bunch of guaranteed green lights to get across town. There are other people that need to know every light is going to be green when they get there. So you need somebody to help compensate for your positive success wiring.

Josh Santiago:
 Well said.

Philip Williams:
 As you’re saying, you need somebody to help compensate for your positive success wiring.

Bryan Boettger:
 I think one way to mitigate against that, and I totally agree one hundred percent, is something I actually did when I started this company from my last one. I did a lot of self-assessment around what my risk level was and how I protect myself from myself.

But in general, looking at the companies we work with, you have to ask whether your success is because your company is reactive to customer needs or proactive to customer needs. If you’re reactive, scalability and growth are going to be harder. If you’re proactive, that usually means you’re more ready.

Another way to look at that is people versus process. Are you successful because of your people solely, or are you successful because you have process? If you actually have that foundational process piece, then that’s something you might be able to grow and sustain.

Philip Williams:
 And do you have a process for finding people?

Josh Santiago:
 Yeah.

Bryan Boettger:
 Yeah.

Harley Green:
 Absolutely. Brian, back to you. You touched on this a little bit. You’ve spent your career helping organizations simplify their strategies. Where do growth plans usually become too complex to execute? And how can leaders create clarity without oversimplifying?

Bryan Boettger:
 A great visual that helps a ton is thinking about fidelity levels, like looking at a picture and how pixelated it is. If you look at a billboard up close, it’s totally pixelated, but from far away it has clarity even with low fidelity.

As you get closer, you need higher fidelity. Our phones are high fidelity because they’re right in front of our faces. Strategy should work the same way. Start with low fidelity for three to five years. Personally, I think anything beyond five years is a fool’s quest.

Then bring it in two-thirds for medium fidelity. Then bring it in another third for high fidelity. You increase fidelity as you get closer to execution.

Harley Green:
 Josh, any input on the fidelity piece of goal strategy?

Josh Santiago:
 Yeah, I love this because we practice it at the corporate level, and I like bringing it back down. I’ve done a lot of work with nonprofits. McKinsey developed the Three Horizons model years ago.

Horizon One is where you’re at today, the core business sustaining the organization. Horizon Two has commercial viability but isn’t widespread yet. Horizon Three is where visionaries love to play. No EBITDA impact yet, just ideas.

Where people get out of sorts is sequencing. You should spend about seventy percent of your time in Horizon One, high fidelity, what you’re working on today. Thirty percent in Horizon Two. And ten percent in Horizon Three so visionaries don’t feel stifled.

That balance keeps execution moving while allowing innovation.

Harley Green:
 That’s a great breakdown of time and resource allocation. Justin, you work closely with founders setting ambitious income and impact goals. How do you help leaders stretch without overwhelming capacity or values?

Justin Janowski:
 We want goals that stretch us but stay in the realm of possibility. Some people advocate setting unachievable goals so you land somewhere good. I prefer something we actually believe we can achieve.

Belief changes behavior. When the leader and team believe the goal is achievable, they act differently. The goal should require a new version of you, but still feel possible.

It’s different for everyone. Sometimes it’s a smell test. Does it feel true? One of my mentors would say, “I hear what you’re saying, but I don’t believe it yet.” Sometimes asking the question multiple times gets to a truer answer.

Philip Williams:
 Hey Justin, have you ever heard of Edwin Locke and Gary Latham?

Justin Janowski:
 I haven’t.

Philip Williams:
 They published a paper in 2002 on self-belief and goal achievement. In corporate settings, you’ve probably heard someone in the back of the room say, “That’ll never happen,” when leadership announces a big goal. That’s lack of belief.

I actually helped put a company on the Inc. 5000 using that theory. Self-belief matters. If the team doesn’t believe they can do it, that’s the first gap.

Josh Santiago:
 I love asking the question, “What has to be true for us to get here?” It balances vision with execution. If you want forty percent growth, what has to change? More staff, new systems, new processes?

As you hit small milestones, belief accelerates.

Philip Williams:
 When you give someone a goal they’ve never achieved, and they don’t know anyone who has, you’ve lost most of the battle. There’s a physiological response that says, “I can’t do this.” You have to address that.

Justin Janowski:
 That’s why breaking goals into the smallest actions matters. Whether the goal is one hundred thousand or ten million, break it into sales, calls, messages.

Often, what it takes is smaller than people think. Many solopreneurs would hit goals just by sending ten messages a day consistently.

Philip Williams:
 And the complement to that is asking, what three things do you do that shoot yourself in the foot? Write them down and stop doing them.

Sometimes winning is just not losing. People delay calls, delay proposals, and let momentum slip. Stop doing those three things and results improve.

Bryan Boettger:
 Parallel to that is distraction. The Eisenhower Matrix of urgent versus important is powerful. It helps you decide what to focus on, what to delegate, and what to ignore.

Josh Santiago:
 Delegation is one of the biggest challenges as businesses grow. Learning to hand things off early accelerates everything.

Philip, on the exit side, when owners delegate well, does exiting become easier?

Philip Williams:
 Absolutely. If you want a good multiple, you better delegate well and have a team worth delegating to. If you have those things, you might not even want to exit.

Bryan Boettger:
 That theme of identifying the next generation of leaders keeps coming up. Whether exiting or not, scale requires new leaders.

If you plan to grow fast, start interviewing now. It takes time.

Philip Williams:
 And investors consistently say business owners struggle to identify and develop good talent. That needs to be top of mind.

Josh Santiago:
 Yeah, such a good point. I spend a lot of time coaching leaders on building that pipeline. Brian, to your point, building that next generation of leaders is so important. Not only is it expensive to hire people, but it’s even more expensive to rehire. When you bring someone along on the journey, they’re bought into the vision and running at the same pace.

It also gives them a stake in the organization. Retention goes up. Beyond that, building a runway or pipeline of talent is critical because it takes time to develop these skill sets. Leaders need to think ahead. If we’re going to grow from X to Y, what skills will people need to support that?

Many people entering the workforce want to know what the next role looks like and how to get there. Smaller organizations struggle to bridge that gap and lose people because they don’t provide a path forward. If you can show someone how to go from a junior role to the next level with a clear roadmap, they stay and buy into the vision.

Philip Williams:
 And how many business owners don’t do that in the hiring conversation?

Bryan Boettger:
 Especially when someone has a growth mindset, entrepreneurs often think, “I figured it out, so they should too.” But there’s that old saying: what if you don’t train them and they stay? Then you have untrained people working for you.

Sometimes training people contributes to the greater good, and hopefully you support them enough that they want to stay.

Josh Santiago:
 Yeah.

Harley Green:
 You’ve made some excellent points. Philip, I want to go back to you because your work focuses a lot on momentum and planning with the end in mind. What signals tell you early that someone’s growth plan won’t hold up operationally?

Philip Williams:
 The first thing I look at is anecdotal. When I do an onsite for the first time, I don’t show up at 9 a.m. I meet them around 5:45 p.m. the night before and tour the office.

I look at how many desks are missing personal effects, pictures of kids, dogs, vacations. Then I look at whether the business owner understands the informal processes and communication flows. If they don’t understand that informal network, that’s a problem.

Then I look at the money. I want to see the budget, the contingency, whether credit lines are maxed out. Something will go wrong, and you’ll need a well to dip into.

Third, do they control their pipeline? If you don’t know how or why the phone rings and you’re trying to scale, that’s another issue. Culture, budget, pipeline. Those are my first three checks.

Harley Green:
 Those are three critical checklist items. Josh, you’ve led large-scale transformations across industries. Where do leaders most underestimate execution risk, especially with complexity and technology?

Josh Santiago:
 It’s the change management side. It’s the people side. ERP implementations are a great example. They’re critical, but they fail constantly. Accounting teams have workarounds in Excel they’ve used for years.

You try to digitize everything, nobody knows how it works, and it all breaks. There’s fear of displacement, resistance, and lack of participation. You get months in and realize processes don’t work because no one bought in.

There are usually three groups: people who fear losing their jobs, people who think technology will replace them, and people who want the change but don’t understand it. Without addressing all three, execution fails.

Bryan Boettger:
 Modernization always requires good data. If data isn’t normalized, execution becomes nearly impossible. You could have great data, but if everything is one-off, it takes years to fix.

This ties back to people versus process and reactive versus proactive businesses. Normalized data allows execution without constant thinking.

Philip Williams:
 I love what you’re saying, Josh. That’s where owners don’t actually know how things get done. Informal processes change after the owner leaves the room. Then a new system gets dropped in and breaks everything because leadership doesn’t understand reality on the ground.

Entrepreneurs make decisions quickly. A new idea on Friday becomes policy Monday morning. Half the team is terrified.

Josh Santiago:
 So true.

Bryan Boettger:
 All of this scales to large corporations too. Whether it’s one person to ten, or a department growing, these concepts repeat at every level.

Josh Santiago:
 Absolutely.

Harley Green:
 What strategies should leaders keep in mind when introducing new goals or plans? What should they do before presenting changes to ensure buy-in?

Justin Janowski:
 One thing that helps tremendously is a quarterly deep dive focused mostly on celebrating what was accomplished. It builds trust. Every quarter, I’m surprised by how much progress we’ve made when we stop and reflect.

When teams feel seen and celebrated, they’re more willing to embrace change and make mistakes in a safe environment.

Bryan Boettger:
 From a safety standpoint, a freeing question is, “What if everything we’re doing is wrong?” Truly embracing that opens up honesty. It allows people to say the uncomfortable truths because you’re asking them to.

Harley Green:
 That’s a great point. Opening the floor shows you don’t have all the answers and welcome feedback. I’m listening to a book right now called Thanks for the Feedback, which covers this well.

Let’s move to a trade-off question. What’s one hard decision you’ve made or advised on that protected long-term scalability even though it was uncomfortable?

Justin Janowski:
 Letting the wrong person go. I tend to hold on too long because I care. But recognizing who we need to be and whether we have the right people in the seats is critical. The sooner you make the decision, the better.

It never feels good, but it’s part of leadership. Ending things honorably matters, but avoiding it causes more damage.

Philip Williams:
 I’ve had to tell owners not to scale. If you can’t take two weeks off, you’re not ready. You’ll just replicate chaos somewhere else.

Josh Santiago:
 I’ve had to kill pet projects. Ideas that look good on paper but don’t align with brand or capability. Focus is hard, but necessary.

Bryan Boettger:
 One hard decision I made was doubling our office space even though we weren’t using it most of the time. It created a home base and culture anchor.

Also, on letting people go, one person often affects five others. Keeping them harms more people than releasing them.

Justin Janowski:
 That’s great wisdom.

Josh Santiago:
 I’ve seen that too. Once a toxic high performer leaves, the culture improves instantly.

Harley Green:
 We have covered some amazing topics and extracted a huge amount of wisdom from you guys today. One final lightning round question, just a couple of sentences. What’s the most important principle leaders should remember when planning to be scalable for growth this year?

Philip Williams:
 I’ll go. You and your team, your leadership team, better be able to grow and learn as fast as you want your business to grow.

Justin Janowski:
 Hmm.

Harley Green:
 Anyone else who wants to jump in, go for it.

Bryan Boettger:
 I’d say value the truth seekers. The people who challenge you and question you. Get rid of the sycophants and value the truth seekers, because that’s the only way you’re actually going to be able to grow and achieve.

Josh Santiago:
 I’d say force data into every conversation. Every time you have an idea, try to find the data within the organization or within the market to back it up so you can make a qualitative and quantitative decision.

Justin Janowski:
 Thanks.

Justin Janowski:
 For me, I’m thinking about two things. One is building the simplest outcome-focused plan possible. The more complexity, the more things that can go wrong. Some businesses require complexity, but as simple as it can be and as outcome-focused as it can be, the better.

And for me as a sales guy, we have to have the right salespeople and the right sales process in place. Philip talked earlier about making sure the phone is ringing. What’s our process for leads and sales, and who’s going to handle them? That’s critically important to every company.

Harley Green:
 So thank you again for joining us, guys. If people want to continue the conversation with you or connect with you online, we’d love to give everyone the opportunity to share the best way to connect, starting with you, Josh.

Josh Santiago:
 Yeah, just visit us at santiagocompany.com. That’s the easiest way to find out what we do and get ahold of us. Or you can find me on LinkedIn at Josh Santiago KC.

Philip Williams:
 You can find me online at thenumbersadvisors.com. That’s the best place to see how our advisory firm operates. And then on LinkedIn, you can look me up at Your Goals Achieved.

Harley Green:
 Awesome. Bryan, you.

Bryan Boettger:
 You can find us at estatefour.com, spelled out. A picture’s worth a thousand words. And feel free to hit me up on LinkedIn as well.

Justin Janowski:
 Mm-hmm.

Harley Green:
 And Justin.

Justin Janowski:
 I’m easy to find online and on social media, but the best way to connect is actually to accept a gift I’d like to give everyone. It’s a free PDF of our 10-step sales process that’s been effective for us and our clients.

You can get that by texting the word SALES to 55444. It’ll give you the free gift, put you on our email list, and myself or someone from my team will text you. If you want to talk with me personally, just reply and say you want to talk to Justin, and we’ll get on a call and get to know each other.

Harley Green:
 Thank you so much to our panelists today for the clarity and real-world insight you’ve shared with our audience. And thank you to everyone who joined us live.

Remember, scale isn’t just about growing faster. It’s about building the structure and leadership capacity to support that growth without breaking what matters.

We’ll see you all next time on Executive Edge Live and on the Scale Smart, Grow Fast podcast. Have a great rest of your day, everybody. Thank you.

How to Scale Your Business Without Burning Out: Lessons from the Executive Edge Live Panel

by faye.eScale Smart, Grow Fast PodcastPosted on Comments are Disabled

How to Scale Your Business Without Burning Out: Lessons from the Executive Edge Live Panel

Fast growth is exciting—until it starts to cost you your health, your team, or your culture.
If you’re a founder or executive scaling quickly, this blog is your wake-up call and roadmap rolled into one.

Preferred listening on the go? Catch the full podcast episode on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Harley Green hosted a powerhouse session on the Scale Smart Grow Fast podcast:
🎙️ Executive Edge Live Panel, featuring:

  • Bethany LaFlam – Author of The Power of OPE, Investor, & Attorney
  • Christopher Filipiak – Sales Strategist & CEO Coach
  • Alyshia Kisor-Madlem – VP of People & Systems, Found Search Marketing
  • Saima Geelani – Core Energy Coach, Founder of Talent Edge World

🔥 The Core Takeaways for High-Growth Leaders

1. Growth Without Alignment = Guaranteed Burnout

Bethany LaFlam emphasizes that scaling without clearly defined goals, values, and personal alignment results in setbacks, misdirection, and emotional drain. “If it feels misaligned, it probably is.”

2. Your Energy Is Your Biggest Asset

Saima Geelani explains how invisible drains like unclear boundaries and internal “gremlins” (self-limiting beliefs) lead to burnout. She recommends core energy leadership and micro-recovery practices to maintain momentum.

3. Letting Go Is a Leadership Superpower

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem shares real-life experience from scaling agency teams. The difference between heroic contributors and sustainable systems? Documentation, delegation, and trusting your team before you hit crisis mode.

4. Sales Starts with the CEO—But Shouldn’t End There

Christopher Filipiak reframes sales as a leadership responsibility rooted in mindset, not just tactics. When CEOs align with sales emotionally and operationally, they stop being bottlenecks—and start leading scalable systems.

5. Protect Team Morale with Transparency

Your team isn’t just watching what you say—they’re filling in the blanks when you don’t say anything. Clear, consistent communication protects morale and builds buy-in.

💡 Real Growth Feels Energizing—Not Exhausting

Whether you’re a solopreneur adding your first team member or a CEO managing multiple departments, these insights are a must-know.

This isn’t just about growth—it’s about building something that lasts without losing yourself or your people along the way.

📬 Connect with the Panelists:

 📈 Bonus: Access our masterclass on sustainable scaling:https://workergenix.com/bonus-masterclass

✅ Ready to Scale Without the Stress?

If you’re serious about scaling smart—not just fast—your next move isn’t another 12-hour workday. It’s getting the right support system behind you.

Book a free discovery call with Workergenix to get matched with your Ultimate Executive Assistant—so you can scale faster without burning out.

Like what you read? Get weekly insights on scaling, efficiency, and profitability—straight to your inbox. Click here to subscribe.

Transcript

Harley Green: All right, everybody, welcome to the Executive Edge live panel. I’m Harley Green, founder and CEO of Workergenix, where we help business leaders scale faster and smarter with the very best AI-leveraged executive assistants. This month’s panel is all about one of the biggest challenges business leaders face, growing fast without sacrificing your health, your team, and your culture. Sustainable growth, it’s not just a strategy, it’s really a leadership test. And today we’re gonna dive deep into the real mechanics of scale.

You’ll hear strategies, honest stories, and tangible frameworks from leaders who have been there and done that without the burnout. And a quick heads up, today’s session is also going to be featured on our podcast, Scale Smart Grow Fast. So if you hear something that hits home, you’ll be able to replay it later on Apple, Spotify, and YouTube. So today, let’s go ahead and dive in and meet today’s incredible panel.

First, we’ve got Bethany LaFlam, an attorney, investor, and bestselling author. Bethany helps entrepreneurs scale their wealth and freedom through strategic leverage, not burnout. She’s the author of The Power of OPE and leads a global movement to build aligned extraordinary lives.

Christopher Filipiak, sales consultant and coach. He works with CEOs of expert-based businesses to 12x growth through mindset and sales alignment. His integrated approach helps leaders add over a million dollars in revenue without losing control or energy.

We also have Alyshia Madlem, the VP of People and Systems, Found Search Marketing. With over 20 years in marketing agency leadership, Alyshia has scaled teams through acquisition and built operational systems that protect culture while driving performance.

And finally, last but not least, we’ve got Saima Geelani, founder of Talent Edge World. Saima is a globally experienced coach and HR leader who helps executives lead with clarity, energy, and purpose. Her core energy coaching framework builds leadership that sustains both performance and well-being. Welcome, everyone, to the panel.

Let’s start here. What does sustainable scale mean to you? And why do so many leaders get it wrong?

Saima Geelani: For me, sustainable scale is really like increasing the productivity of the organization while not losing focus on the energy, on the clarity and above all, the well-being of the people. What happens mostly when leaders get it wrong is when they primarily focus on the productivity, they focus on the numbers, they focus on the metrics. That’s absolutely fine, there is nothing wrong about it. But the problem is while doing so, they lose focus primarily on the well-being of the people.

Recently, I had gone through this book, Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek, where he says that when we ask the CEO what is your priority, they usually say customers. That might be true for small companies, but as the companies scale up, they grow bigger and that connection becomes smaller and eventually it becomes zero. So what is the truth here? The truth is CEOs or the leaders are responsible for the people and people eventually take care of your customers. So you really have to start backwards. That is where leaders really get it wrong.

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: I think to build on that, often the focus is on numbers where people say, “I want to grow margin to something,” or “I want to grow year over year.” They lose the purpose. They lose who they are. They lose the connection to mission, vision and values. That’s what drives purpose and why. That’s what gets people to put in the time it takes to achieve those new margins and growth.

It starts to be this focus on hitting a numerical value instead of looking at the full growth journey—growing people or growing services or whatever it is you provide. You lose the connection to why you started or what you’re doing. People get disengaged and you start to see that downtrend very quickly.

Bethany LaFlam: I love that we’re having this conversation because I think too often we focus on the numbers and not on the people who get us there. The biggest thing for scaling, of course, is to leverage other people. I wrote a whole book on it. I specifically say leverage and not use because we want to make sure that we’re building up those people. It’s only sustainable if it’s a win for everybody. Everyone that’s helping you get to your vision and your dream—it has to help them get to theirs. It’s got to work for everybody. We lose sight of that when we focus just on the numerical metrics.

Christopher Filipiak: When you’re thinking about doing something sustainably, it means you can do it for a long time and it doesn’t eat away at your base-level resources. As you grow your company, or grow anything or grow yourself, you have more of something, not less. That’s the kind of growth we want.

It’s about developing the skill sets in your organization around change and growth. How can you build a culture that embraces and has the skills required to continually change and grow? When you develop that as a competency, that’s going to create sustainability in the people and in the organization as a whole.

Harley Green: Great insights there. I’m excited to dive into some of the things you all said. Bethany, you write about Aligned Living. What’s the cost when founders scale misaligned and how can they catch that early?

Bethany LaFlam: I think the biggest cost is misalignment in your business, which could mean a number of things. If it’s not driving toward a stated goal or big vision, that’s a problem. People get this wrong a lot. They don’t state the goal. They’re busy running a business and they’ll figure it out later. But if you’re just working to work and you don’t really know where you’re headed, that’s going to lead to misalignment.

You end up growing for the sake of growth, but it’s not scalable or sustainable. Then you find yourself being pulled back—one step forward, two steps back. If you’re not aligned, you are going to backslide. It’ll take longer to get to your goal. Either you haven’t identified it, or you have people outside their lanes. Entrepreneurs are notorious for trying to do all the things.

How can you catch it early? Stop quieting that voice, that inner knowing. I know it doesn’t seem logical, and it seems really soft. But especially as women, we’ve been conditioned to quiet that voice down. If it feels misaligned, it probably is. Trust that. Recalibrate. That feeling is just as important as the data. If something is painful, your job is to figure out how to make it not painful. Anyone who says it just has to suck for a really long time—don’t listen to that. It doesn’t. Your job is to get through the suck as fast as possible and actually enjoy your life.

Christopher Filipiak: That’s a really interesting awareness. As you grow your business and yourself, there’s good and bad in everything. One person’s “suck” could be another person’s passion. Alignment comes from being aware of that and choosing where to put your focus. If you’re not in love with your work or your business, you’re going to self-sabotage. You’ll spend more time in the suck than in the love.

Bethany LaFlam: The biggest obstacle is our mindset. I’ve spent hundreds of thousands on coaching just to shift my mindset and remind myself—I get to do the things I love because I said so.

Saima Geelani: I agree. From a coaching perspective, it’s about listening to your inner self—your inner “who.” That’s where the magic happens. That’s where you find your passion and energy.

Harley Green: Christopher, you coach CEOs through high-stakes sales growth. How do you help them expand revenue without becoming the bottleneck?

Christopher Filipiak: It’s about understanding what sales really is. You started a business, and sales is a part of that. But sales is also an expression of love and service. There’s a mindset component to it: mastering your own sales work as the CEO. No resistance to strangers, no resistance to sales, no limiting beliefs around money. You need awareness around those things so they don’t stop you.

Once you’re aligned with sales and money, you start selecting strategies, behaviors, and teammates based on cause and effect—not fear, worry, or doubt. That creates flow. And that frees you up from being the bottleneck.

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: I’d add to that. As operators, we help visionary CEOs get what’s in their head out into the world. Once you start selling, you need others to understand what you do so you’re not the only person who can do the job. At some point, someone else has to get it too. CEOs need to figure out what only they can do, what they can train others to do, and what they can let go of.

Sometimes, it’s about having trusted people around you—employees or advisors—who can say, “You can’t keep doing it all.” Let go. Build trust. Surround yourself with people who can scale the mission without making it all about you.

Christopher Filipiak: Exactly. Build the skills and strategies into the business, not just into one person. As you do that, the CEO is free to do what they love most. Every CEO is different, so the goal is to build a system that doesn’t rely on one personality.

Saima Geelani: I love that Alicia mentioned letting go. It’s like parenting. You let your kids do things on their own, trusting them even if they fail at first. That’s how they learn. Same with teams. Trust them. Be there to support them. That’s how trust grows, and so does your business.

Harley Green: Great answers. Alyshia, you’ve led teams through growth and acquisition. What were some breaking points you had to solve, and what did you learn about scaling people—not just processes?

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: The biggest thing I’ve seen is the difference between heroic contributors and operationalization. Small companies often start with one or two heroic contributors—they do everything. But you can’t scale if you’re dependent on a few people. You have to get the information out of their heads and operationalize it.

If you don’t, you create single points of failure and even “unfireable” people. Maybe they don’t fit anymore, but you’re shackled to them because no one else knows what they know. You need to build training, documentation, and backups early on. If not, you get stuck in a cycle: grow, lose something, grow again, lose again. You never really get ahead.

Bethany LaFlam: That still comes back to letting go. If the CEO can’t let go, you can’t put systems in place. And that’s often a mindset issue—feeling like you have to prove your worth. But your team wants you out of the weeds. They want to run in their lane while you stay in yours.

Saima Geelani: Exactly. It’s about trusting yourself and the team. Clear vision, clear direction. Otherwise, your team is just doing tasks, not driving toward a shared destination.

Harley Green: Saima, your work focuses on leadership energy. What are the invisible drains leaders often overlook, and how can they recover momentum before burnout?

Saima Geelani: The invisible drains are your internal narratives. In coaching, we call them gremlins. They’re meant to keep you safe, but really they make you smaller. One example: “I can’t stop. I have to keep going.” Even on vacation, some leaders keep checking in. That sends the wrong message—it says you don’t trust your team.

There’s a book, Taming Your Gremlins by Rick Carson, that helps with this. It starts with self-awareness. Then you embrace the gremlin, and start to overcome it. Also, you need clear boundaries. When roles aren’t clear, leaders end up doing everything—strategy, ops, admin—and burn out. Good leadership requires boundaries, trust, and space to breathe.

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: I love that energy came up. Energy is a finite resource, just like time or money. You need to track what tasks give or drain your energy. That can shape how you design your day, price your services, and build your team. It’s not fluff—it’s vital.

Bethany LaFlam: We use something from Dan Martell’s Buy Back Your Time—a time and energy audit. Not just what takes time, but what drains bandwidth. If someone’s dragging, we ask: Are you working outside your lane? Are you stuck in tasks that drain you? Maybe someone else loves that work. It’s all about fit.

Harley Green: Let’s talk about trade-offs. What’s one hard decision you made to protect your energy or your team’s, and how did you make peace with it?

Saima Geelani: Maybe I can speak to that. Two years ago, I moved from France to the United States. I was fortunate to get a leadership role within a month. My background is in talent development—the soft side of HR. Over time, I realized my work wasn’t aligned with my values. My role was meant to support well-being programs, but the leadership was only focused on productivity and metrics. Both approaches have merit, but we weren’t aligned.

Eventually, I decided to resign. That was tough. I still remember how hard it was to press that send button on my resignation email. But I listened to my inner voice. I paused, reflected, and discovered coaching. That was my passion all along. Now, I get to work with anyone I want. I’m free to do the work that lights me up. I believe life is not a game to win or lose—it’s meant to be played. So enjoy the journey.

Bethany LaFlam: I want to add to that. At one point, we had a high-paying client who had the power to refer us—or not. But they were abusive to my team. I made the hard call to fire them. I wanted my team to know that I’d protect them over the money. Sure, it was risky—they could’ve trashed our reputation. But I did it respectfully. That move told my team: I’ve got your back, and your well-being matters more than any client.

Harley Green: That ties into a live question from our audience. Kedra asked: Can you talk about the importance of team morale and what leaders can do to inspire and encourage their teams?

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: Great question. As leaders, we have a lot of behind-the-scenes conversations. And we don’t always share those with the team. But your team craves information—they want to know what’s going on. You have to define what transparency looks like in your company, and then commit to it. Let people in. Show them that you’re in this too—not just barking orders from the top.

Whether things are going well or you’re facing challenges, acknowledge it. Let them know what’s changing and why. That level of communication and buy-in directly impacts morale. Especially in tough times, the message should be: We see it, we’re working on it, and we’re in this together.

Saima Geelani: I couldn’t agree more. Lack of clear communication causes chaos. In energy leadership, we talk about seven levels of energy. When communication is unclear, people drop into Level 2—frustration and anger. Even your best people start to burn out.

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: And you can’t stop DMs—whether on Slack, Teams, whatever. If you’re not communicating, people will fill in the blanks. They’ll start creating their own narratives, and those usually aren’t friendly to leadership. You need to get ahead of it. Share information openly and often to control the story.

Bethany LaFlam: Yes.

Saima Geelani: Absolutely.

Christopher Filipiak: As leaders, we have to model the attitude and culture we want to see. Everything in business has cycles—ups and downs. If your emotions are controlled by the circumstances, the whole organization becomes reactive. Instead, model emotional stability. Teach it as a skill. Hire people who want to participate in that kind of culture.

Morale, culture, and mindset are choices we get to make every day. And it’s easier to choose a better attitude when you’re aligned with your purpose. If you’re just chasing numbers, you burn out. But if you love what you do, you expand your energy and see more opportunities.

Harley Green: Excellent. Now, to wrap things up, I’ve got a lightning round question for everyone. What’s your best advice for a business leader who wants to scale without burnout? And as you answer, please share the best way for our audience to connect with you.

Christopher Filipiak: Think of scaling without burnout as a skill set. Ask yourself: What’s the skill set I need to develop around burnout? That starts with learning to feel your emotions and move through them to gain clarity. Also, have someone in your corner—a coach or mentor—who can help you see blind spots like overworking or poor hiring choices. Best way to connect:christopherfilipiak.com or LinkedIn.

Bethany LaFlam: Know your lane and stay in it. Your lane is where three things overlap: what you’re amazing at, what lights you up, and what moves you toward your life goals. Do only what lives in that lane and build a team to handle the rest. You get to do that. Find support to make it happen. Best way to reach me is on Instagram:@bethany_laflam.

Saima Geelani: Lead with your anabolic energy—that’s high-vibration, trust-based leadership. Energy is contagious. If you show up with purpose and positivity, your team will reflect that. It’s the best path to scale without stress. Connect with me at talentedgeworld.com or LinkedIn: Saima Geelani.

Alyshia Kisor-Madlem: Be solid in your mission, vision, values, and purpose. Build from that foundation. It’s what keeps people aligned and energized, especially when things get hard. Connect with me on LinkedIn: Alyshia Kisor-Madlem.

Harley Green: Thank you to all of our panelists for sharing real strategies, honest insights, and leadership wisdom. And thank you to everyone who joined us live. Remember—scaling isn’t just about growth. It’s about protecting what makes that growth worth it. If you’re ready to scale with the right support, check out our free masterclass atworkergenix.com/bonus-masterclass. We’ll see you at the next Executive Edge Live.

All: Thank you!

People, Profits, and Progress: A Business Owner’s Framework for Sustainable Growth

by Harley GreenScale Smart, Grow Fast PodcastPosted on Comments are Disabled

People, Profits, and Progress: A Business Owner’s Framework for Sustainable Growth

Growing a business isn’t just about increasing revenue—it’s about building the right foundation to support it. In this episode of the Scale Smart, Grow Fast podcast, host Harley Green sits down with Cameron Montgomery, Principal Consultant at Equipricity, to talk about how successful leaders scale without compromising team alignment, profitability, or execution.

🎧 Prefer to listen on the go? Catch this episode on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Cameron’s 3-part framework—Align People, Amplify Profits, Accelerate Execution—is built for businesses that want to grow with intention.

Here are the key takeaways for business owners ready to scale:

1. Align the Right People

Your growth depends on the people you hire. Surround yourself with team members who believe in the mission and bring skills you don’t have. Hire for strengths. Don’t wait to find the “perfect” candidate—start by identifying passion and potential. Interns, apprentices, or fractional help can be a powerful way to delegate as you grow.

2. Amplify Your Profits by Expanding Your Market

Too many entrepreneurs get stuck selling to just one segment. Instead, look at the multiple levels where your product or service solves a problem—B2C, B2B, and even government. Diversify your revenue streams and make your offer work harder without adding complexity.

3. Accelerate Execution with Systems & Automation

Don’t let the work bury your vision. Use tools like CRMs, automated dialers, and AI (strategically) to simplify operations. Cameron warns: automation should support your quality, not replace the human element. Know when to lean into tools, and when to delegate to a real person.

4. Revisit Your Business Plan Quarterly

Scaling requires regular recalibration. Cameron recommends reviewing your business plan every quarter to stay aligned with your mission and performance goals. What worked 6 months ago may no longer serve your direction. Don’t wait until things break to optimize.

5. Don’t Burn Out Trying to Do It All

Leaders who try to be everything to everyone eventually stall. Delegation is a growth strategy, not a luxury. Whether it’s sales, admin, or client onboarding, outsource the right tasks so you can focus on high-impact decisions.

Final Thought:

If you’re stuck in the grind and not sure how to scale without burning out, it may be time to rethink your people, your systems, and your execution. Cameron’s approach is simple, strategic, and actionable—exactly what growth-minded entrepreneurs need to hear.

Ready to build a people-first, profit-smart business that runs with clarity and purpose? Schedule a discovery call to see how our Ultimate Executive Assistants can help you scale without the burnout.

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Scaling Without the Burnout: Secrets to Simplify and Delegate for Sustainable Growth

by Harley GreenScale Smart, Grow Fast PodcastPosted on Comments are Disabled

Scaling Without the Burnout: Secrets to Simplify and Delegate for Sustainable Growth

Scaling your business is supposed to bring freedom—not overwhelm. Yet, for many entrepreneurs, the more successful they become, the more they’re bogged down with operations, burnout, and constant stress. If that’s you, it might be time to rethink your approach.

In this episode of the Scale Smart, Grow Fast Podcast, host Harley Green speaks with business strategist Pamela Dale, who shares her expertise on scaling businesses without sacrificing time, energy, and profit. Pamela, creator of the Client Code, dives into the myths surrounding business growth and explains how strategic delegation and simplifying offers can lead to more revenue with less work.

Listen to the full episode on your favorite platform to dive deeper into these strategies and start scaling your business smarter.
👉 Spotify | Apple Podcasts

Key Takeaways:

1. Stop Overcomplicating Your Offers

A common mistake that many business owners make is overcomplicating their offers. Instead of trying to create multiple packages or chasing every new trend, Pamela advises focusing on one offer, one channel, to one person. Mastering one offer allows you to refine and perfect it, leading to higher conversions. “Simplify and focus,” Pamela says. When you target the right client with a specific, well-defined offer, you’ll see higher value clients flock to you, ready to invest.

2. Delegate to Scale

Most entrepreneurs are stuck in the day-to-day grind because they haven’t figured out how to delegate effectively. Pamela highlights how delegation is key to breaking free from the bottleneck of business operations. Entrepreneurs should stop trying to do everything themselves. Instead, they should invest in building the right team and leveraging their expertise. When you delegate, you free yourself up to focus on higher-level tasks, like strategy and growth, instead of bogging yourself down with admin.

3. The Fear That Holds Us Back

It’s natural to feel overwhelmed when scaling. However, Pamela calls out that the feeling of overwhelm is often rooted in fear. Fear of failure, fear of making mistakes, and fear of letting go. Yet, as Pamela points out, growth happens when you step into discomfort and push through the fear. Business owners must learn to face those fears, stop procrastinating, and take action, even when the next step seems daunting.

4. Understand Your Client

Pamela’s method for attracting high-value clients boils down to knowing who they are and what they truly need. The first step in growing your business is talking to your customers. Understand what they want, what problems they’re solving, and what solutions they value most. This clarity allows you to craft offers that resonate deeply with your target audience and lead to sustainable growth.

5. Leverage Technology and Automation

Another crucial aspect of scaling is leveraging technology. Pamela emphasizes the importance of systems and automation in business operations. Whether it’s automating your lead generation or using tools to streamline your workflows, embracing technology can multiply your output without requiring more time and effort. By investing in the right software and automating processes, you can work smarter—not harder.

The Bottom Line: Focus on Systems, People, and Simplicity

Scaling doesn’t have to be overwhelming. By simplifying your offers, delegating effectively, addressing your fears, and embracing technology, you can build a business that grows with ease. Whether you’re a solopreneur or a growing business, Pamela’s insights are crucial for avoiding burnout and accelerating growth without losing your freedom.

Want to learn more about scaling smartly without the burnout? Tune into the full episode of the Scale Smart, Grow Fast Podcast with Harley Green and Pamela Dale to hear more actionable insights for scaling your business the right way.

Ready to scale without the overwhelm? Book a discovery call today and let us help you delegate, streamline, and grow faster!

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How High-Performing Entrepreneurs Scale Without Burning Out

by Harley GreenScale Smart, Grow Fast PodcastPosted on Comments are Disabled

How High-Performing Entrepreneurs Scale Without Burning Out

What if scaling didn’t mean sacrificing your health, sanity, or time?

That’s the question Nathan Baws—entrepreneur, Shark Tank Australia alum, and Guinness World Record holder—answers in his conversation with Harley Green on the Scale Smart, Grow Fast podcast. After building and scaling 15+ businesses (many to 7 figures), Nathan shares how business owners can grow sustainably by mastering two core disciplines: smart delegation and dopamine-driven leadership.

Listen to the full episode on your favorite platform:
👉 Spotify | Apple Podcasts

Here’s what stood out for growth-minded entrepreneurs and business leaders looking to scale without burnout:

1. Growth Follows Energy—Not Just Strategy

Most entrepreneurs burn out because they obsess over revenue and neglect their energy. Nathan breaks his day into two categories:

  • Business Growth Activities (3+ hours/day): Lead generation, PR, team building.
  • Dopamine-Boosting Habits: Ice baths, fasting, gym, sun exposure—designed to optimize energy, focus, and execution.

High performance is a function of health. If your body and mind are depleted, your business will be too.

2. The First Hire? Someone Who Frees Up Your Energy

One of Nathan’s biggest turning points came from hiring team members he could trust to take ownership. But he emphasized that delegation only works if you:

  • Hire people with proven performance and the right attitude.
  • Let go of perfection and micromanagement.
  • Focus on building systems and structure so your team can succeed without constant oversight.

Workergenix’s Ultimate Executive Assistants were built for this exact challenge: giving founders back time without compromising quality.

3. AI & Automation Are Not Job Killers—They’re Force Multipliers

Nathan is clear: he didn’t replace his team with AI—he empowered them. With automation handling repetitive tasks (like LinkedIn outreach or email follow-ups), his team can focus on high-value work. Result? More output, less cost, and no burnout.

4. Stop Hiding Behind Product Development—Start Selling

One of Nathan’s biggest mistakes early on? Spending too much time perfecting his product and not enough on marketing. Revenue solves most business problems—so focus on sales, lead generation, and consistent outreach.

5. Leadership is Contagious

High-performing leaders create high-performing teams. When Nathan optimized his own lifestyle and mindset, his team followed. As he puts it: “Leadership by example wins every time.”

If you’re a business owner stuck working in the weeds, overwhelmed with day-to-day operations, and ready to scale without sacrificing your life—this episode is a masterclass in what it takes.

Ready to scale without burning out? Schedule a discovery call today and let’s build the systems and support your business needs to grow smarter.

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Fractional COOs: The Key to Scaling Your Business Without Burnout

by Harley GreenScale Smart, Grow Fast PodcastPosted on Comments are Disabled

Fractional COOs: The Key to Scaling Your Business Without Burnout

As a CEO, founder, or business owner, you understand the constant challenge of balancing daily operations with big-picture growth. You didn’t build your business to get stuck in the weeds—but without the right operational support, that’s exactly where you can end up. Enter the fractional COO: the strategic solution for leaders ready to scale without burnout.

Mallory Smith, entrepreneur and fractional COO, shared her journey on the Scale Smart, Grow Fast Podcast. With experience in biotech, cosmetic chemistry, sales, and entrepreneurship—where she built and sold a seven-figure sign company—Mallory now helps seven-figure businesses streamline operations and scale sustainably.

🎧 Prefer to listen on the go?

✅ How a Fractional COO Helps You Scale – Spotify

✅ How a Fractional COO Helps You Scale – Apple Podcasts

What is a Fractional COO?

A fractional COO (Chief Operating Officer) provides high-level operational leadership on a part-time basis. Instead of hiring a full-time executive, you get access to experienced leadership without the long-term commitment or cost.

Who Needs a Fractional COO?

Fractional COOs aren’t for startups still finding their footing. They’re ideal for:

  1. Seven-Figure Businesses in Growth Mode: Struggling to manage rapid expansion? A fractional COO brings structure and systems so you can keep scaling without chaos.
  2. Owners Preparing to Step Back: If you’re ready to reduce hands-on involvement or planning an exit, a fractional COO ensures your business runs smoothly and remains valuable to future buyers.

How a Fractional COO Adds Value

  • Operational Clarity: They assess your operations, identify inefficiencies, and implement systems that scale.
  • Employee Alignment: They ensure your team is aligned with the company’s vision and processes, creating a self-sustaining operation.
  • Strategic Delegation: They help you delegate effectively, freeing up your time to focus on growth and leadership.
  • Business Scalability: They implement processes that allow your business to grow without the bottlenecks caused by owner dependency.

What the Engagement Looks Like

According to Mallory, fractional COOs typically work 5–8 hours per week with business owners. The relationship is designed for long-term transformation—most engagements last around two years. The goal? Build a business that no longer depends on the owner’s daily involvement.

Overcoming Common Challenges

The biggest obstacle? Mindset. Business owners are often deeply attached to how things have always been done. A fractional COO challenges these norms, bringing fresh perspectives and new strategies. While change can be uncomfortable, it’s necessary for growth. As Mallory puts it, “You’ll never get somewhere new by doing the same old things.”

Advice for Businesses Not Ready for a Fractional COO

Not quite at the seven-figure mark? Start here:

  • Master Your Financials: Know your profit and loss statements inside out. Look for ways to cut costs and improve profit margins.
  • Identify Your Worth: Understand your hourly value. Delegate tasks that don’t meet that rate—a skilled virtual assistant can handle bookkeeping and admin work.
  • Clarify Your Vision: Define where you want your business to go. What are your core values? How do you want your business to feel and function? Vision guides operations.

Real Results: A Success Story

Mallory shared the story of a business owner who couldn’t step away, overwhelmed with manual payroll and daily operations. After implementing automation and delegating low-value tasks, the owner finally took a stress-free vacation to Hawaii—with the business running smoothly in her absence.

Conclusion: Is a Fractional COO Right for You?

If you’re running a seven-figure business, losing sleep over operational challenges, or dreaming of scaling without sacrificing your time, a fractional COO might be the solution. They help you reclaim your time, streamline operations, and position your business for sustainable growth—or a profitable exit.

At Workergenix, we believe in scaling smarter, not harder. If you’re ready to stop managing and start leading, explore how our solutions can help you find the right operational support.

If you’re ready to scale smarter, streamline operations, and step back from the daily grind, schedule a discovery call with Workergenix today and see how the right operational support can take your business to the next level—without the burnout.

Like what you read? Get weekly insights on scaling, efficiency, and profitability—straight to your inbox. Click here to subscribe.