?? Follow the Growth & Build a Great Career

There's a reason I love working in high-growth businesses.

When a business is in growth mode, you grow along with them.

It's simple advice, but it's amazing how true it really is:

Follow the growth, and you'll naturally grow along the way.

If you step toward things that are shrinking, you'll be diminished.

Career growth usually means moving forward, toward bigger or better things.

That always links back to your own growth.

And how you build a truly great career over time.

This does not always mean bigger companies.

It can mean bigger challenges, vision, or breadth of impact.

But it always means expanding your horizons versus narrowing them.

Choosing Growth Over Titles

Here's a story I told a class full of graduate students in a class I was teaching.

When I was in my mid-30s, I held a C-level title.

But at a small-to-medium-sized business (SMB).

Prior to that, I had already worked in several different companies, including a Fortune 500 one, along a more typical career growth path, from individual contributor to manager, to senior manager, to entrepreneur starting my own business, to acqui-hired director, to senior director, and so on.

But I yearned to be part of something different and bigger, that was growing faster, even if it meant a lesser title.

So, I moved to a bigger company and pivoted into tech, where I "only" had a VP title.

Was it a demotion? Far from it.

Tech companies back then were on fire!

The company I moved to was bigger and growing fast.

I learned a ton!

That helped me grow in my career hugely.

Then I moved to a public company, and again, had "just" a VP title.

That company (HubSpot) was even bigger and growing even faster.

I worked in one of the highest-growth areas of the business (international).

So I got to experience really high growth, at a sustained pace, for many years.

I learned so much in each job I've had.

What I learned was different in each case.

But I learned the most when I followed the growth.

And importantly, I thought about the type of growth I wanted to experience.

Not just the amount of revenue, but the scope of the challenge the business addressed.

Because the scope and the size of the ambition of a business can also help your career grow.

After you've worked in growth stage companies for a while...

• You can smell the growth just ahead of a business.
• You can sense where they're at in their market.
• You can tell what they're doing is incredible and will lead to more growth.

That's the type of company, division, new product, or opportunity that you really want to attach yourself to.

(That's why I'm at Zappi , too) :-)

But I have a TON of colleagues in tech who've had bad luck due to big tech layoffs.

And I spend a lot of my time helping others with referrals, coaching, etc.

When mentoring folks, I often use these phrases:

• "Hitch your wagon to a star"
• "Ride the growth wave"
• "Follow the up and to the right trajectory"

When you find a business in growth mode, take advantage of that opportunity.

Those opportunities are far less common than you might think!

They are the career version of diamonds.

Know the Different Stages of Growth

There are different types of year-over-year revenue growth.

1. Anti-Growth (Negative Growth) ??

• Definition: Declining revenue, shrinking market share, or contraction.
• YoY Growth Rate: < 0% (Negative Growth)
• Examples: Start-ups and scale-ups in saturated markets where they are losing market share and cannot out-develop competitors, having no choice but to keep cutting budgets and staff. Businesses impacted by macroeconomic downturns or industry disruptions. Declining industries that are traditional and seeing disruption. Stay away!

2. Slow Growth (Flat to Low Growth) ??

• Definition: Low single-digit revenue increases, often tied to mature markets.
• YoY Growth Rate: 0% – 5%
• Examples: Established enterprises in saturated markets (e.g., traditional banking, some legacy CPG brands). Businesses in this phase are focused on cost optimization rather than revenue expansion. Not a fan.

3. Moderate Growth (Sustainable Growth) ??

• Definition: Solid, steady growth that aligns with industry benchmarks.
• YoY Growth Rate: 5% – 20%
• Examples: Well-run SaaS companies with strong customer retention and expansion. Mature enterprises investing in organic growth and M&A. Market leaders in stable industries like consumer goods, logistics, and healthcare. This is fine.

4. High Growth (Fast Growth) ?

• Definition: Strong, above-average expansion, often fueled by market demand, investment, or innovation.
• YoY Growth Rate: 20% – 50%
• Examples: SaaS, AI, and fintech companies scaling rapidly. Well-funded startups growing aggressively before profitability. Consumer brands capitalizing on viral trends (e.g., Peloton pre-pandemic slowdown). This is FUN, depending on company culture.

5. Hypergrowth (Explosive Growth) ??

• Definition: Exponential scaling, typically driven by product-market fit, network effects, or aggressive expansion.
• YoY Growth Rate: 50% – 200%+
• Examples: Startups achieving massive adoption (e.g., OpenAI, TikTok, Stripe in their peak growth phases). Unicorns scaling globally with venture backing. Market disruptors like Tesla in its early explosive years. This can be chaotic at times (hopefully not toxic), but you learn a lot.

The Hard Lessons of Anti-Growth

The opposite of the amazing feeling and uplift to your career of following the growth is when you join a company that is literally shrinking.

This can be hard to recognize sometimes, especially for people early in their careers who've only worked at a handful of companies.

• When a market is growing underneath you, it's so easy to take it for granted.
• When you have great operational maturity, you might not even notice it.
• When your customers love you, it's hard to imagine what the opposite looks like.

In really ripe market conditions, it's actually hard for a business to fail.

But what if you join business that's headed down a path of anti-growth?

Well...

You'll experience painful lessons.

And earn some battle scars.

And you'll surely learn a lot.

But I wouldn't wish that experience on anyone!

It's natural to hit some bumps along the road of a growth trajectory.

It's totally normal to have some "lean years" and "hard times."

That's totally different from an anti-growth scenario.

Most businesses have "cost-cutting years" and changes with the ups and downs of the economy.

But... then there are "anti-growth" companies that are in actual descent.

There's a big difference between holding on for a bumpy ride and jumping aboard a sinking ship.

When a company is actually losing market share to competitors, under-funding development, or failing to grow for other reasons that will keep them on that path, it's a very bad sign. Culture can be partially to blame in such a place.

Those companies can actually pull you down along with them, like undertow.

Investing your precious years of your career in at companies in a tailspin of descent can in fact really be harmful.

As I have seen many friends go through situations like this over the years, I would say the worst parts about being in an "anti-growth" situation are:

• It can taint your reputation to be associated with a business failure (depending on role)
• It can make you question yourself even if the failure was not your fault
• It can create scars that are hard to heal from

It's possible to climb back from these scenarios of course.

It's just really hard.

So, to protect yourself from that kind of hardship, always go for a company in growth mode, whenever possible.

The Risks of Hyper-Growth

If you join a company that is growing too quickly, there are also risks, but less severe ones than an "anti-growth" situation.

Sometimes companies grow so fast they cannot keep up!

Hyper-growth sounds exciting, and truly can be, depending on how long it lasts and how much control a company has over its growth.

One problem with this: some parts of a company grow faster than others.

There, it depends which team you're on as to how much risk there is.

In some companies like this in tech, product teams are growing so fast and so is development, but other teams cannot keep up.

In others, sales and marketing grow so fast, customer success or support can't keep up.

And in others, product teams can't keep up due to forward-selling (yikes!)

Usually the teams that suffer hugely in hyper-growth companies are not the ones driving the growth, but the ones viewed as overhead. They are the last to get any support or funding!

I have many friends in those types of roles who were abruptly tossed out the second growth slowed down (recruiters, DEI friends, do you hear me...?)

But the ones on the GTM side often suffer from strained muscles too.

And even those who survive often suffer vicarious trauma from having their work friends or beloved bosses cast aside, seemingly overnight.

When growth is out of whack, even if "hyper-growth" sounds exciting, it's not always what it's cut out to be. Especially when that growth level slows down and changes the entire business model.

What Different Growth Rates Feel Like

Here is what each type of growth feels like when you're inside a company:

• Hyper-growth = sprinting. When companies are careening out of control sometimes because of how fast they are growing, the pace is incredible. I find that incredibly exciting growth on some levels, but perhaps concerned when there's no throttle to combat the lack of control. You can't do this forever! You cannot sprint a marathon.
• High growth = running. I experienced this pace for nearly 8 years at HubSpot. I would say the international business was close to sprinting in some years actually, but the pace was sustainable overall because it was high growth that we could support for many consecutive years (and my former colleagues there very much still are!)
• Dependable growth = jogging. It's repeatable, sustainable, and you can do this form of growth for ages. It flies under the radar because it's seen as maybe a little boring. There are no Olympics for jogging. It's just something people do quietly on their own time, without calling a ton of attention to themselves. That pace is generally too slow for me to find a company interesting.
• Slow growth = sitting / fidgeting. This feels like an annoying sedentary situation where you are constantly wondering, "are we there yet?" To hear, "Let's just hit the same number we hit last year" is not motivating to me at all. This is basically not moving, and to me that's almost as bad as degrading, but at least you're still alive. I get antsy and fidget in any company that just wants to keep the same revenue levels flat, and consider it more of a lifestyle business.
• Anti-growth = dying. Sounds severe, but that's how I see it. Deceleration is the opposite of where I'd ever want to be, or where I'd ever want a friend to go. I have an aversion to joining things that are on a downturn. I love a good turn-around story as much as anyone, but business fundamentals matter more. The fact is, most anti-growth trajectories do not end well.

Where possible, make sure you're at least at a company that is jogging. I think anything less than that is not good for your career.

My magic number?

20%+ YoY growth rate is the repeatable and sustainable groove where I shine.

That is the natural pace that feels right for me, even at a larger company.

I've been in companies with lower and higher growth rates, but to me, a company can feel lumberingly slow, and I begin to yawn, when it goes below 15% YoY growth for very long.

Your magic number might be different.

Just make sure it isn't negative.

Connect with Me

Thank you for reading this newsletter! I hope you found it helpful.

Here are 3 other ways we can connect:

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• Brand Global, Adapt Local, with Katherine Melchior Ray, comes out in June.
• Take Your Company Global, was endorsed by executives from Microsoft, Harvard Business School, Calendly, and HubSpot.
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Thank you for reading!

Nataly