There's a version of growth that looks great from the outside and feels wrong from the inside.

More revenue. More locations. More customers. More hires. The numbers are all moving in the right direction, the press releases write themselves, and everyone around you is telling you things are working.

But you can tell something isn't adding up.

I've been there. Earlier in my career, we leaned heavily on M&A as a growth strategy. Acquiring companies, adding locations, building out the footprint. On paper, the business was expanding. In reality, we were adding complexity on top of a foundation that hadn't earned it yet. We were growing the top line without answering a harder question: was the growth actually enabling us to increase the value we delivered to our clients?

The answer, if I'm honest, was not consistently enough.

So we made a decision that felt completely counterintuitive at the time. We paused the acquisitions. Not because the opportunities weren't there, but because we needed to stop layering growth on top of something that wasn't yet solid. We needed to get clear on what we were actually delivering, fix the gaps, and build the kind of foundation that could carry what came next.

That pause was one of the best decisions we made. It was also one of the hardest to defend in the moment.

I'm sharing this because I've watched it play out enough times to know how it goes. Growth doesn't create problems. It exposes them.

The cracks that were manageable at $5 million become real costs at $25 million. The manager who was fine with a small team is suddenly overwhelmed. The culture that held together when everyone knew each other starts to fray. The systems that were good enough get strained under volume. The client relationships that ran on founder attention start to slip when that attention gets divided.

None of these were caused by growth. They were always there. Growth just turned up the lights, and then presented the bill.

This is the corner I'd encourage you to peer around before you turn it. Because here's what I've seen: the businesses that feel this most acutely are the ones that kept adding before they resolved what was already straining.

It wasn’t because the leaders weren't capable. It’s because growth momentum is hard to argue with, especially when the numbers look good. Saying "let's pause and fix this" takes conviction. It can feel like going backwards. It isn't.

The cost of growing on a weak foundation doesn't always show up immediately. Sometimes it takes a year. Sometimes longer. But it shows up. In margin erosion, in client attrition, in good people leaving because the organization can't support them.

The bill arrives; it just arrives on a delay.

Your job isn't just to grow the business. It's to build a business that can carry what growth brings with it. And that requires being honest — with yourself first, and then your team — about what's genuinely working and what's just holding together because nobody's stress-tested it yet.

The best time to find those cracks is before growth finds them for you.

So here's what I'd ask you to sit with this week: Where in your business are you adding more — more revenue, more people, more complexity — without being certain the foundation beneath it is ready? Name it honestly. That's the first step to getting ahead of it.

Hit reply and let me know what you think. I read every response.

Until next week,
Cabot