Growing vs. Scaling — The Difference That Changes Everything | Ep 5

Most established business owners use the words growing and scaling interchangeably. They are not the same thing — and confusing them is one of the most common reasons owners end up exhausted, overwhelmed, and wondering why working harder isn't working. In this episode, Meagan breaks down the distinction and shares the three decisions that create the shift from one to the other.

Transcript

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Welcome back to Amplify and Act. I'm Megan Van Wort. Today we're talking about two words that most business owners use interchangeably and shouldn't. Those two words are growing and scaling. Getting this distinction right is one of the most important strategic decisions you'll make. And most owners don't realize they're confused about it until you feel exhausted and you're wondering why you are working harder. It's just not working for you. You're not seeing the results, and it doesn't feel right. You may feel tired. If you've ever pushed harder, done more, added clients, added revenue, and you still feel like you're losing ground, then this is probably why. By the end of this episode, you'll know exactly which category your business is in right now, growing or scaling, and then what you can do about it. So let's jump right in. Most business owners celebrate growth. Your revenue is up, you have more clients, you have more output, and that feels like winning. And for a while it is. What no one talks about is that growth without scale often means exhaustion, not more success. There's a ceiling that no one tells you about. If your growth requires proportionally more of you every year, then that's not a strategy. It's a trap. You growing and completely stuck at the same time. You can be doing both. And I've seen it over and over again, and I've actually personally lived it. More revenue, more clients, more complexity, and somehow there's less freedom than when you started. It's a really funny mix. And sometimes as a business owner, we recognize this that something is not quite right, or I could be doing something else, but we don't know exactly how to put our thumb on it, right? And that's the confusion versus growing as a business and scaling as a business. And what's the opportunity of doing both? How can you scale your business to grow your business or while you are growing your business? And that is the key that we're going to be talking about today. And we're going to fix it. Now let's talk about the core distinction between the two. It's really important. Some of you may know some of the distinctions, but let's talk briefly about the differences. When you are growing as an organization, there's more revenue, more clients, and more output. You are doing more things, the money's coming in the door, you're working with incredible clients, right? It also means there's more complexity. As businesses grow, processes should change and evolve. There are new things that come into your mix that you either know how to handle or you don't know how to handle. This is common for every single business. And there's more overhead and it takes more of your time. Growth also requires proportionally more of you every single year as a business owner. And it feels like you're working harder every year to just stay ahead. That is a growing business. Now let's talk a little bit about scaling. When a business is scaling, your revenue is growing faster than your efforts do. Hmm, how does that work? We can talk about that. There are systems, decisions, and structure in place that carry the load, not just about you. It's interesting how AI is helping us out these days with that. Very interesting. Growth does not require proportionally more of you. And it feels like the business can move forward even when you step back. So think about that. When you have systems, decisions, and structure in place that can help you with these things, there's less weight on your shoulders, your business can grow, you have the support you need. It's about having those other things in place to support your needs. So those are the differences between growing and scaling. Fairly simple. Now I just want to highlight: you don't need to be a $10 million company to think like this. You need to be honest about where your growth is coming from and whether it's sustainable without more of you. Now, here are three decisions that can create the shift for you. What stops when I stop? Think about that as a decision. If I stop doing something, then what else stops? If everything stops in your business when you step away, you're not scaling. You're the engine. The goal is to build the track, not keep running on it. Think about when you go away for the weekend or you take a week off because you've been working your tail off and you want to go on vacation. What are the things that you could have in place to help your business continue to move? Again, very simple example. What actually stops from a business side when you stop doing the work? Think about that for a moment. The second thing I want you to think about is what can I only do? And what am I doing that someone else could do better? Now there's a short list of things only you can do. We all know that. Your strategic thinking, your relationships, your vision. Everything else is a candidate for delegation, putting a system in place or removing something. And many owners have never actually made that list. Delegation is very scary for so many business owners if you don't know how to go about delegation. If you don't know how to think about, well, what are my resources? What are my options or systems that I could put in place to not do that work personally, to have someone or something help me do that work? And there are so many possibilities that can that are there for you. The third thing I want you to think about is what decisions am I making every week that should be a system instead? So think about it this way: every repeating decision you make manually is a tax on your attention, is a little weight on your attention. It's your time. Think about pricing, onboarding, follow-up, scheduling. If you are deciding these the same way every week, this should be a system. Systems can scale, and manual decisions do not scale. No, I want you to think about scanning your week and think about and maybe writing down recurring decisions that come up. And we're gonna go through, we'll go through more of an exercise at the end here. But these are three decisions, three things I want you to think about as you create the shift and you reflect on is your business growing? And what does it take to scale? Right? If you're not already scaling. And you can choose one or even two things. Start small, pick one thing, and say, what is something I'm doing every week that someone can help me do? Or I could create a system in place to help me complete this task. Now, I would like to get personal with you for a minute. Um, I've been an entrepreneur for over 20 years. I've worked with many businesses, many different sizes, and I can tell you this: running multiple businesses has taught me this distinction the hard way. There was a point where, well, actually, this has happened more than once, where I look at what I have built and I realized I really wasn't running a business. I was the business. Every important decision ran through me. Every client relationship lived with me. Every problem found its way back to me. And that's not a business. It's just a very complicated job that you gave yourself. And the moment that, you know, you realize you're the bottleneck and not just a participant, it's very uncomfortable. Makes it very difficult to grow and scale your business because fixing it means there's structural changes. It means letting go of things you're good at. And it means trusting other people with things you care about. And most owners resist that. I resisted it. And every month I resisted it, it costed me something. And I have gone through this friction in so many businesses I've created over the years, and it's created amazing visibility for me to be more clear and recognize this is something I need to let go. And this is something I can put a structure and system in place so I can do less. And it's about bringing this up for you as visibility based on my personal experiences, based on what I see through my clients, is that it is possible for you to identify that one thing that you do weekly or that you do every day that we could put a structure or system in place. Or you could say, I don't need to do this anymore, right? Those are the things that you get to decide. Now, what I'd love to share next that's really important is the owners who thrive long term make decisions that remove themselves from the critical path before they burn out, not after. Scaling isn't about size, it's about whether your business can move forward without you holding it up. Now, there is a ton of different size companies out there. There you may be a part of a company of you know one to two people, you may have you know 10 to 20 employees. There are so many different segments. I want you to think about the actions that we'll talk through next, about picking one of those one or two things for you to dive into to scale your business incrementally along the way and learn from it. And it will inspire and motivate you to do more. It will energize you, it will free up your time, it may free up other people's time as well. So here's your one question for the week, and I mean just one. And I want you to answer this honestly, and I want you to write it down. What stops in your business when you stop? And whatever the answer is, that is your next strategic decision. Not your next tactical fix, it is your next strategic decision. What stops your business when you stop? Write it down. That answer is your next strategic decision. And what do I mean when I say strategic decision? It means I want you to dig into how this is impacting your business today and what can you do about it to improve it, to make it better, to make it yes, let's move forward and let's make this better. Or no, I don't need to do this anymore. Or maybe I can improve this for these reasons. I want you to dig into that a little bit. And if you need any extra support, don't hesitate to reach out. But I hope you enjoyed this time today. Until next time, I encourage you to amplify your thinking and act on it. I'm Megan Van Wort, and next week we're going to be getting into one of my most favorite topics, gut instinct, and when to trust it. And there's a hint, trusting your gut is only half the advice. So I'll see you again. Thanks for your time, and I'll talk to y'all again soon.