If every decision needs you, you’ve built a job
The most common ceiling on a growing business is the person who built it. Here is how to start moving decisions off your desk.
J. Michael Hart · 5 min read
Somewhere between the first hire and the first million in revenue, most founders hit the same wall. The business is growing, but every decision still routes through them. Pricing. Hiring. The difficult customer. The new tool. The owner becomes the bottleneck of the thing they built.
This isn’t a character flaw. It’s what got the business here. Early on, the owner’s judgment is the company’s main asset. The problem comes when that judgment is never written down, taught or delegated.
Three questions to ask this month
First: which decisions do you make more than once a week? Those are candidates for a rule, a checklist or a person. Second: which of those decisions could someone else make at 80% of your quality? That’s usually good enough, and it frees you for the decisions only you can make. Third: what would you do with ten more hours a week? If you don’t have an answer, the business won’t either.
What changes
Delegation isn’t a single act. It’s a system: clear ownership, a way to check the work, and patience while someone else learns. It feels slower at first. Over a year, it’s the difference between a job and a company.