Working to help a company thrive through a period of hyper-growth is a rewarding and challenging experience.  The problems we encounter are not necessarily more complex than problems confronted on other projects; their volume, speed of development and the stakes involved are all magnified however.  There is more to do.  Balancing the tasks is challenging and hard decisions must be made fast.  There is little time to think, prioritize, test or simply wait.  Action is required and it is easy to end up in a reactive state.

There are three trajectories for a company experiencing hyper-growth:  first, to blow up during take off; second, to rise successfully but to be unrecognizable when through the other side (“who are all these people and why are we making this?!”); third, perfection (“we are just what we were when six of us sat around that card table, even though now there are 25,000 of us in offices world wide”).  

Of course the third-outcome is the desired outcome.  The companies coming through the other side successfully pass a simple test (or a variant to this metaphor):  the founder visits a new and distant office for the first time and feels at home.  The culture survived the leap through the prism from great idea to awesome company; the company does essentially the same thing it did before it entered warp speed; not insignificantly, the margins are the same and the clients as satisfied (or more satisfied).

We will post about hyper-growth some over the next few months and talk about experiences, approaches and outcomes.  We would love to hear of your experiences, thoughts and ideas about the topic and look forward to hearing from you.