Business growth must be intentional and serve your intended end goal.
Many of you have heard and even used the phrase “grow or die” as a motivational call to continued growth in business. It has been used to inspire and motivate our quest to continued progress, to never letting up, to heading always onward and upward.
In recent conversations, I’ve had numerous people call this perspective into question. Is it a truth reflected in reality, or is it a myth? Well, let’s explore it further.
The term “grow or die” has no doubt been used in many forms throughout human history. It was widely popularized in organizational development by George T. Ainsworth-Land’s 1973 book Grow or Die, in which he explains growth as one of the unifying themes of the human story.
This work has become foundational for businesses and organizations in their strategic planning. It has found its way into material developed by many motivational and leadership speakers and writers (Tony Robbins, John Maxwell, Dave Ramsey to name a few) in such a way that we could say it’s part of the wallpaper in contemporary business culture.
The question that needs to be addressed is quite simply, “Is it true?” Do people and organizations really grow or die? Is it impossible to have a healthy organization that “stays the same” year after year?
Most of the critiques I hear about the term come from people who have no desire to see continued revenue growth in their companies. They currently have a business that they like. It is performing to acceptable standards, and the very idea that it should keep growing in revenue and complexity year after year is quite simply outside of their scope of desire. They “want a life, not just a business.”
This is a valid critique. It points to a common understanding of growth—that it’s all about the size of the company measured in revenue, number of widgets, or employee count. Let’s dive in further on growth.
Growth is most easily measured in revenue, widgets, or people. But these are far from being the only areas of growth that we ought to pay attention to. Growth occurs in many other aspects of life—maturity, insight, wisdom, well-being, efficiency, profitability, etc.
If a child is not developing, we note the lack of growth. Sometimes this is physical and thus easily observed. Physical benchmarks of growth roughly parallel business markers of revenue, employee counts, and number of widgets produced. But children also must develop in other ways—in speech, insight, skills, relational wisdom, self-management, and a host of other areas. The same is true for businesses and organizations.
In business, however, these types of growth are just a bit more difficult to discern. Frequently they are not evaluated until they are lagging so far that even the casual observer will take note.
Let’s address the aspect of revenue growth first, since it is so easy to measure. Does a business that continually grows its revenue year after year actually start dying? Is grow or die true at this most basic level?
In short, I believe the answer is “yes.” Let’s unpack that a bit.
A company that made $5 million in sales this past year but continues to do $5 million in sales for the coming years is seeing an actual decline in revenue against CPI (consumer price index) because we have averaged an annualized inflation rate of 3.8 percent. That means that merely maintaining your revenue year after year will mean an on-paper decline of 3.8 percent since you are not keeping up with inflation.
If everything else in the business remains static as well, profits will decline more quickly. Why? Not only do the products you are offering for sale cost more to purchase and produce, but labor costs rise in alignment with inflation. “Grow or die” is true at this most basic level. Absence of revenue growth most commonly indicates the beginning of a “dying trend.”
Sometimes, however, declining revenue is actually desirable in order to focus on growth in a different area.
To create greater focus in a business, some companies will cut product lines, reduce store counts, and take other strategic cutting measures in order to “grow” in a different aspect of the business. Efficiencies are often lost during constant revenue growth. Cultures can erode quickly when stressed by constant revenue growth. Leaders can outgrow their leadership skills in seasons of continued growth; this can result in them having a negative impact on culture and performance in the whole company or their individual departments.
In order to actually “grow” in those significant areas, sometimes the best thing business managers can do is slow down revenue growth. In some cases, they may even cut revenue forecasts in order to gain margin for other areas of need.
What I want to take note of here is that growth and the grow or die concept apply not only to revenue, employee, or widget counts, but also to such things as leadership, efficiency, quality, culture, and myriad other aspects of business. Growth in revenue merely for “growth’s sake” is a poor business model—it represents only one small facet of a great business.
Growth for growth’s sake alone, with no compelling vision for why growth is important, is a recipe for burnout, employee disillusionment, and cultural implosion.
One of the early signs of a dying company is often seen in its inability to retain growth-oriented people. Absence of growth, with an absence of a plan for growth and continuous improvement in some aspect of the business, activates the death cycle. Your company will begin dying. And as we know from observing the human story, not all who begin dying are dead yet. The signs are not always obvious at first, and even once they are, a dying person can linger on life-support for a long time.
In short, I believe the axiom “Grow or Die” is more than a myth. It is a reality embedded in the life of each human being as well as in the organizations we build and lead. Growth does not and should not be limited to growth in revenue, profits, widgets, or employee counts. We must also focus on growth as continual learning, constant improvement, prioritization, disciplined focus, skill development and mastery, cultural health, employee development, community impact, and a host of other potential areas.
Sometimes growth is disruptive. It challenges our leadership and management skills at every level of the company. A great manager who served well in one season of business may not be suited for the next season. Someone must address this before it becomes painfully obvious to everyone that the entire department is failing and losing key employees.
Processes that have served well for years have begun, mysteriously, to fail. Financial controls that used to be adequate can no longer account for greater complexity in the company, and the risk of fraud and embezzlement increases.
It is in such seasons that leaders will often intentionally pause top-line growth to consolidate, shore up, and refocus the inner workings of a business. This gives them the time and bandwidth to grow their culture and health, improve processes, and restructure leadership to achieve their goals.
That brings me now to what I believe are the most important principles of this axiom.
First, growth is best when it is intentional growth. Growth that is intentional allows us to plan for it and lead it well. When the markets drive growth at a pace for which we are not organizationally prepared, the ride up can be exhilarating for a season. The ride down, which inevitably follows, can be painful at best and fatal at worst.
Be intentional about growth, no matter what area of growth you see as most important for your business. Identify that area, focus on it, get the help you need to invest in that growth, and in time you will reap the rewards of that growth.
Second, be sure the growth you seek serves your intended end—not just for the business, but for you as a leader, for you as an owner, and for the life you are seeking to build for yourself, your family, and for those in your sphere of influence. This requires a level of attention and intention about nearly every aspect of life.
Businesses that become your master and dictate your life can only continue to grow by sapping the very life out of every person involved. Why would anyone want such a business?
Be very intentional about addressing the particular areas of growth required to convert your business tyrant into a business servant—serving to help you build the life to which you are called.
