Building the company underneath 10× growth

The situation

I was the first full-time person brought in to help build a professional-services firm. The founder had created the opportunity and remained the primary commercial relationship. My job was to help build the company underneath it.

The problem

Within a month, we inherited most of the team supporting our principal client and grew to eight or nine people almost overnight. Growth was not the hard part. Making the growth survivable was.

What I found

The founder was carrying too much personally, and the firm needed consistent management, delivery, hiring, and reporting before the next wave of growth arrived.

The decision

I built a PMO and consistent delivery cadence, management structure across client teams, hiring and onboarding, reporting and automation, and operating routines that reduced how much the founder had to carry.

One of the systems I cared most about was extremely low-tech: a monthly one-on-one between the CEO and every employee. No status agenda. No project review. Just a protected conversation between two people.

The result

Across the firm, recognized revenue grew from roughly $200K to $2M in about a year. The team grew from one person to 15, and we retained 100% of the team during that period. When I left, those conversations were still happening as the company approached 20 people.

A business needs to grow without destroying the things that made it worth growing in the first place.