Growing your people as the primary lever for scaling a business

Executive overview

Most businesses train employees on what they do and what the product is, but skip training on how to lead, delegate, coach, and manage time. The result is constant friction — overwhelmed managers, slow hiring, poor meetings, and an owner who can't step back.

The fix is a deliberate internal leadership development system built around 12 core executive functioning skills. Train managers in these skills, grow their confidence alongside their competence, and the business scales without the founder having to do everything.

Your job as a leader is to grow people — not do the work yourself.

The two-ladder model

• Every manager climbs two ladders simultaneously: skills and confidence.
• If one ladder is shaky, they freeze and can't advance on either.
• Growing skills builds confidence; growing confidence creates appetite for more skill.
• Remove anyone who doesn't want to grow — even elite athletes have coaches.

The three levels of training (bronze, silver, gold)

• Bronze: pre-test → teach → watch → practice → post-test. More than most companies do today.
• Silver: add certification — repeat the teach/observe/demonstrate cycle until the employee can be certified in the skill.
• Gold: full internal training department with LMS, videos, manuals, field training, and train-the-trainer models (relevant at ~250+ employees).
• Most companies don't even hit the podium. Aim for bronze or silver first.

Training what matters: the three layers of the "why/how/what"

• Most companies only train on the what — product, processes, software.
• Why training: core values, purpose, BHAG, vivid vision, company history — get these on video so they scale without the founder repeating them.
• How training: the 12 executive functioning skills — this is where the real leverage lives.

The 12 executive functioning skills

1. Situational leadership — adapt style based on an employee's skill and commitment on each specific task. The single most important skill; Starbucks retrains its top 40 leaders on this every quarter.
2. Coaching — use Socratic method, inspire confidence, step back rather than micromanage. Can be learned; transforms manager output across all areas of the business.
3. Delegation — clear systems prevent wasted cycles, scope creep, and confused employees. Every manager delegates something daily; none have been trained on how.
4. One-on-one meetings — 30-minute structured sessions covering delegation, support, situational leadership, and problem-solving. Most managers have never been trained on these and then delegate them untrained.
5. Time management — letter tasks A/B, numerically order A's, time-block them into the calendar, delegate 80% of B's. Almost no managers use a system like this.
6. Interviewing — open/closed questions, pregnant pause, resume analysis against a scorecard, cultural and behavioural trait assessment, reference checks. Untrained interviewers make hiring decisions in the 90-day trial period instead of before the offer.
7. Conflict management — written communication (Slack, email, SMS) has amplified workplace conflict. Managers with a model resolve conflict themselves; without one, it escalates to HR or the founder.
8. Meetings — every meeting needs a purpose, outcome, and timed agenda. Label each agenda item as info-share, creative discussion, or consensus decision. Book meetings for half the time you first estimate. Only invite people you want to speak.
9. Email/inbox management — inbox zero as a daily discipline. Employees' inboxes are typically out of control; this drags productivity for everyone.
10. Classroom teaching — teaching two or more people at once. Covers visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learning styles; abstract conceptualisation → active experimentation → concrete experience → reflective observation.
11. Project management — preventing scope creep, budget blowout, and effort with no results. Particularly weak outside tech companies.
12. Executing against your vivid vision — if the team can't read the founder's mind, the vivid vision isn't clear or embedded enough.

How to build the training program

• Cover three learning styles in every module: visual (watch content/demos), auditory (reading, listening), kinesthetic (role play, worksheets, doing).
• Move learners clockwise: abstract concept → active experimentation → concrete experience → reflective observation → reintroduce.
• Layer the same skill through multiple media: book, then video, then consultant or coach.
• Use pre-tests rigged so learners will fail — this opens them to learning before you teach.
• Certify employees in skills and tie certification to pay raises and promotions — creates a viral internal incentive loop.

Building vs. buying

• You don't need to build everything from scratch. Use existing courses, book chapters, TED talks, conferences, and external coaches.
• Assign formal mentors to key leaders — pair each with a senior practitioner in their functional area.
• Software like Talent Guard can support certification tracking.
• R&D = Rip off and Duplicate. Take proven systems; don't invent from scratch.

Budget and time guidelines

• Spend at least 1% of annual wage per employee on training (minimum $750/person/year).
• Employees should spend 2–5% of their working time on skill development — roughly one hour per week.
• If you won't invest $750 to grow someone, question whether they should be on the team at all.
• Counter-argument to "what if they leave after training": what if you don't train them and they stay?

The most neglected lever: confidence

• The single thing leaders most consistently fail to do is praise and thank people.
• Employees are not told what's going well — only handed new problems and projects.
• Telling your team what they're doing well, regularly and specifically, costs nothing and directly raises performance.
• If it would be strange to tell your spouse you love them once a quarter, it's equally strange to leave employees unrecognised for months.

Hiring for accountability

• You cannot install accountability into people who don't have it. Hire for it instead.
• Write job postings that deliberately scare off 50% of applicants — A players self-select in.
• In interviews: ask candidates to show their calendar, walk through how they break down a project, and explain where they've missed deadlines and why.
• Use thorough reference checks (e.g. Topgrading's TORC method) to verify patterns before the hire, not after.