Since I began Trajectify, I’ve had the opportunity to coach a number of family-owned businesses, from intergenerational companies to husband-and-wife teams. In some ways, they face the same challenges as any other business. They have to figure out how to maximize their cash flow, hire the right people, and scale their business.
Family-owned businesses also have their own particular set of challenges.
Read MoreYou want to time your capital raise to maximize your valuation. A lot of people say to raise the money when you don’t need the money. It’s important, though, to acknowledge that raising capital isn’t a silver bullet to success.
Read MoreWhat does it take to cross that golden line? We sat down with three long-time Trajectify clients to talk about how they became multimillion dollar businesses and what other entrepreneurs can learn from their success.
Read MoreSome founders reach a point where they need to move beyond their MVP and provide greater value to their customers. Let’s talk about how founders often end up in a technical cofounder search, the problems with that approach, and what you can do instead.
Read MoreCompanies need to spend as much energy finding employees as they do finding customers. Recruiting talent is just as important as acquiring customers. Maybe more so? After all, it’s talent that allows you to grow.
Few founders really understand the acquisition process the first time around. That lack of knowledge can put you at a disadvantage in the most important negotiation of your life.
Read MoreOur team has advised on or been a part of more than half a billion dollars in enterprise-value transactions. Here’s what we’ve learned about finding the right buyer.
Read MoreDo you want to grow with your company? Or are you hoping to sell? Is there a difference in how you operate depending on your answer? We had a series of conversations with past and current clients about their growth strategies to learn more.
Read MoreBefore we can move past our fear, we have to become detectives. We have to find our fear. Identifying our limiting beliefs is one of the most effective ways to figure out where the fear lives and then flush it out.
Read MoreI’m going to share some of the ways we’ve grown in the last three years. I’ll also pull back the curtain a bit and share one of the main places I’m struggling. And there will always be struggles because every solution creates a new set of challenges.
Read MoreSome of the distractions are new. The quest for productivity isn’t. Managing your time better (and thus reaching your goals more efficiently) is about developing two things: (1) self-awareness and (2) structures to support you.
Read MoreCost is the biggest reservation we hear from founders and entrepreneurs who are contemplating their first hire. Affordability is obviously a critical part of the hiring analysis — and there’s a lot more to it. Whether you’re ready to hire and (perhaps the bigger question) who you should hire depends on multiple factors.
Read MoreWe typically share a summer reading list, but this year we have compiled a listening list. Many people are back traveling to and from the office, jetting off for vacations, or popping on those soundproof headphones while continuing to work from home. Our coaches have put together their top suggestions for additions to your listening queue to up your game as a business leader.
Read MoreIf you’re in business, you’ve heard of a SWOT analysis. You’ve probably done one — maybe more than one. When did you last do a SWOT analysis for your organization? Unless you’ve just been doing some strategic planning, it’s likely been awhile. We see businesses wait too long between SWOT analysis sessions. They trudge along under old conceptions of their strengths or weaknesses and fail to effectively respond to the changes around them.
Read MoreWhen you’re going it alone as a founder, you might be missing some critical personal elements of running a business. And the absence of those supports can lead to loneliness.
Read MoreBootstrap startups control their own destiny, and they learn how to harness their own skills and creativity. They also need to control their spending, hold themselves accountable, and get creative.
Read MoreIntentional professional development is one of the most effective investments organizations can make in their own success. Yet it’s something we frequently find lacking. Here’s how to create a plan for every employee.
Read MoreThe CEO rulebook is completely different from the founder rulebook. And once you’re not a startup anymore, you can’t keep acting like one. If you do, you’ll risk the success you’ve worked so hard to achieve.
Read MoreWhether you’re creating a full-fledged training program, helping a few high-potential individuals, or support a recently promoted manager, you need four things to support their development.
Read MoreEvery organization has a culture, whether it was created intentionally or not. Developing and implementing your values puts you in control of that culture. Most importantly, it helps you identify who’s aligned with it and who’s not. Here’s how to create your core values — not just some words that you put on a wall or a website — but the actual tenets that underpin your organization’s culture.
Read MoreStartups and Small Businesses sometimes find themselves at the edge of a chasm. With success in developing and growing their business, a stage is reached where they find that the "next step" is a big one! Trajectify partners with the entrepreneur to build momentum and trajectory to be able to cross the chasm.
We offer private and group (Mastermind) coaching and hold frequent events and seminars.
Trajectify is founded my Mike Krupit, veteran of eight startups. Mike has helped dozens of companies grow and mentored and advised hundreds more.
I don't think every CEO needs to become a LinkedIn personality. The question is simpler. Who needs to know you exist? Where are they? And what would help them understand how you think before they ever sit across from you? That answer will change as the company grows, as your buyers change, as platforms come and go. You adjust. That I don’t think you can do anymore is decide visibility isn’t part of your job at all. Your personal brand is important to your company’s brand.
Most founders and executives I work with are uncomfortable talking about how they look. It feels shallow. Not the point. I get it. They started their companies because of a vision, not an ego. By the time they're working with an advisor, they're wrestling with real problems: who belongs in which seats, how to build accountability, how to run a leadership meeting. Thinking about personal image can feel self-indulgent by comparison.
Founders tend to think about a major transition as a singular event. You prepare, announce, close, and now you're a different company. In my experience, the company starts changing well before any of that happens. I've been through this several times now, and the details were different every time. The weirdness was pretty consistent.
Sometimes exploration is worth it. Sometimes you just spent a week of the team’s attention answering a question the founder could have tested in an afternoon. That is the part I think leaders underestimate. Ideas do not only cost money. They cost time, focus, and brainpower long before anyone approves a budget. The question I’d want answered is: how much of the organization does this idea deserve yet?
Ask a room of leaders why they set goals and most will say accountability. That answer creates the problem. Goals exist for alignment. The company needs to reach a number, so this group does this, that group does that, and together the math works. Everyone is pointed in the same direction. Focus comes second. A good goal tells you what to say no to.
The instinct to build a team that moved in the same direction, at the same pace, with the same set of perspectives is limiting. Consistency is created at the expense of range. The goal isn't alignment of strengths. It's coverage. The most dangerous teams I've seen weren't the ones with conflict. hey were the ones with none. Where every conversation ends in agreement. Where nothing gets surfaced. Where the people who see things differently may have learned to stop saying so.
The same restlessness that makes it hard to stay on plan is what made them start the company in the first place. The wandering mind, the refusal to be satisfied with what already exists, the ability to see something before it exists: that's not a disorder. That's the source.
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I’ve been facilitating CEO peer groups for fifteen years. The biggest factor in whether someone gets value from a group is vulnerability. Not performative vulnerability. The kind that costs you something to say out loud, the thing you'd rather not say because it makes you look uncertain, stuck, bored, scared, or wrong. The people who get the most from these groups aren't necessarily the ones with the biggest problems. They're the ones willing to let the room see the problem clearly enough to help.