“Not a real business owner”

I’m pretty sick of the rhetoric that gets lobbed at solo owners like grenades. “If you don’t have an assistant, you are the assistant.” “If you’re doing the work, you don’t own a business, you own a job.” “Real entrepreneurs scale with a team.”

I get the sentiment, and I’ve even said some of those things, too. But I think they do real harm. They disparage an entire group of super-smart and talented people, the ones who chose self-employment because they wanted agency over their lives, enjoy their craft, and care deeply about their family, friends, and freedom. They relegate us to a second-class category: not real business owners.

I disagree.

What we actually want

Over the past 15 years I’ve met so many enthusiastic and skilled people who went out on their own, not with dreams of making millions, but simply to own their life, their way. They want to pick clients they like, protect their time, and do meaningful, enjoyable work.

They want lean, and they want flexible. They want ease, peace, and security. They want respect for their work, they want freedom, and they want enough.

How I learned it

Steve and I learned this the expensive way. We had been trying to build what we thought was a “real business” with employees, selling big, premium services, and working with lots of clients. In March of 2014, we had generated $250,000 in revenue over the previous twelve months and were still $40,000 in debt.

The problem wasn’t that we were not skilled, and it wasn’t that we couldn’t find enough clients. We had hired employees before our offers were profitable enough to reliably cover their salaries. Thinking that hiring help would solve our problem was a core mistake.

So we went back to just the two of us and rebuilt how the business worked. It went on to earn us $250,000 to $500,000 a year while working with clients less than 50% of our time.

Small on purpose is not anti-growth

It’s anti-unintentional growth.

The business is designed to be profitable without employees first. Hiring later is an option. It isn’t a requirement, and it isn’t the natural next step.

I now run a business with a team, and I’ve been able to do it profitably, without compromising my lifestyle or time with my young child, because I built it on the same model. If and when you choose to hire, your offers are already profitable, so you aren’t paying out all your revenue to the team at your own expense.

What Scale Solo means

Scale Solo is the name of my book and the name of the goal: a highly profitable business without employees. You scale what you earn and how much freedom you have. You don’t scale your headcount.

How you actually do it

A philosophy doesn’t pay anyone. The No BS Business Model is the how: you price for the life you want, you sell with the Lead Product Method, you deliver through Intensives, and you grow through referrals. It’s all in Scale Solo.

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