Breaking the Owner Bottleneck: How Small Businesses Can Begin to Scale
Many small businesses, especially service businesses, don’t hit a ceiling because of the market, competition, or talent. Their growth stalls because the owner or founder becomes the bottleneck.
It’s not intentional. It’s also not a character flaw. It’s simply how many small firms are built: the owner starts out doing everything—selling, delivering, project managing, approving, billing and those habits stay long after the company outgrows them. Over time, the business becomes dependent on the owner for decisions, expertise, and to some extent even emotional stability. And that’s where growth slows… or stops altogether.
Cracking the Unwritten Rules of Marketing Leadership Advancement
You’ve delivered results. You’ve built strong campaigns. Your peers see you as a leader. But when the Marketing Director or VP role opened up, you weren’t the one promoted.
If you’ve been here before, you know the sting — and the confusion. According to John Beeson’s Harvard Business Review article “Why You Didn’t Get That Promotion,” the leap into senior leadership isn’t only about your performance today. It’s about how decision-makers perceive your readiness for tomorrow — based on a mix of unwritten rules, non-negotiable factors, and deselection factors that can quietly block your path.