My biggest growth levers for 2025
based on business mistakes 2024 or what I have learnt juggling own consultancy and client projects
My belief is that we should grow based on our strengths and also, learn from our mistakes, both in business and personal life.
My strengths in general pretty much align with the Via Character strengths test, which my coach Nonie has shared with me, when we were trying to understand if enterpreneurship is my thing (we figured it is).
Every quarter and every year I look book at how I have utilizes my strengths and how I performed in business.
Let’s look at the strengths:
3 (love of learning), 4 (curiosity) and 5 (judgement) have been pretty much on 🔥 for the second half of the year from taking intensive German Course to Wharton Executive Education about Brain and Neuroscience to learning new AI tools, visiting Google Campus regularly and meeting new startups.
1 (leadership) and 2 (creativity) have been heavily under-utilized and mis-used (read below on why’s and what’s).
So here comes the second part. There were so many mistakes done this year in the business and way I managed it that this list can be really really long.
In this short article I’d like to reveal some of those to reflect what happened and why, and what can be done differently. I call them my growth levers 2025 because if I make them right (and focus on my strengths) – I am convinced business will have very different trajectory.
I’ll share my action point for 2025, then elaborate about the mistake made last year and what are my actual next steps to avoid this to happen this year.
Would be curious to hear from you - can you relate?
1. Hire slow and the best, fire fast.
Recently we had a very interesting exchange with one of the founders I have worked with. We discussed how we both regretted not making team decisions fast. We kind of know from about 1 month in, when it’s not a fit, but then the rest of time we spend doubting our own judgement and then convincing ourselves to have this conversation.
For me it started off with the designers - I hired freelancers to help with branding and web design. Both times after first week I had a weird feeling something was off, but was silencing it, as work was being done. In 3 weeks both just dropped out from projects with payments done and no delivery.
Some of my clients, who have hired freelancers for quite a high fee, ended up having someone who was not available or reluctant to implement changes. It costed them a lot of time to change the team and there was a whole drama in the process.
These mistake of wrong hiring costed me few thousands of dollars and client lost somewhat around $50’000.
All of this at the end costed us not only money, but also clients and customers trust, delayed projects and financial consequences of having to pay the back-up suppliers.
What did I learn?
Hire ONLY someone you have good referral about and do NOT hire out of pity or willingness to support. It’s better move slow and hire the A players.
Sometimes people have the right skills, but don’t match your working style. So it’s extremely important to do paid trial weeks (yes, not months)
Now I keep a spreadsheet with names of trusted professionals I have found on this journey, who have been brilliant and who will be always my go to!
2. Be more proactive and persistent with lead generation, networking and seeking advice
I only had about 50 lead calls this year and out of them 11 converted to contracts. Some were not the right type of customer, but there were at least 5 who could have definitely signed-up, if I was more persistent. On top of that, having 50 lead calls in 12 months is not sustainable for the business. And this should have grown to actually about same amount for each quarter. If that happened, we would have closed not 11 deals, but at least 40. Which would be a totally different revenue story.
Why is this happening? Well, few reasons, according to feedback from 10 founders, agency owners and C levels I have collected:
I don’t actively come across as I look for projects or offer any services - my Linkedin and messaging are all over the place (personal development, founder challenges, etc - not real).
Website is unclear - what does the company do, is that an agency or consultancy? number of people told me that they don’t like either forms of business. They also shared that they did not understand what was the outcome of our work.
I learned that I have a strong fear to reach out to people and offer the company services. And recently got an advice from two different people: You are doing this service to help businesses and founders, if they need help - they will be grateful you reached out, if not - that’s ok. And the second one - It’s not about you, it’s about the service not being needed.
Action points?
All of the above step by step - Linkedin, Website, services packaging
Most most importantly - my own mindset.
and last but not least - intentional networking - surround myself with the people who have gone through this journey, people who I can learn from and people who I can genuinely help
3. Create a system to manage projects
October 2023 we took on way too many projects, it was a small freelance team - marketing manager, project manager, copywriter and me and 5 great companies to work with.
Only reason projects were delivered and we did it well, was the fact that I knew the whole team and we worked together before. We had templates, but no Notion, no automations, no clear processes, so everyone felt on the edge.
Q1 2025 we were on stop list for projects and by Q2 I was burned out and had to take a break.
Managing more than 3 projects, requires a system to manage it, so 2025 I am coming to figure out:
CRM to manage client relationships
Automations with Zapier / Make for onboarding, newsletter, call bookings, etc
Process overview of what we do for each project type documented
Clear task management in Notion and Updating the library of templates
Last but not least - new business model opportunities
4. Focus on content and TALK about what I do
It’s not only about lead generation, but in general about sharing the experience. What works in b2c marketing? Best ways to do customer research? Working on market analysis and competitive landscape with AI?
This and maybe 50 more topics in the business growth, marketing and other areas, but have I shared all of this? not even 1%.
Talking action points:
1. I committed to share more helpful information and one of the reasons why you are reading this newsletter is because of that :) Reflections, insights, frameworks - will share it all.
2. LinkedIn will be my second platform to share, so connect if we have not yet.
3. I will experiment with short form and long form video content and stretch my creative muscles as I genuinely miss my teaching experience.
5. Say „no“ to projects
In 2024 I wanted to do and try it all.
I should have said no to maybe 20-30% of the projects and commitments, but I did not. I wanted to manage the relationship, sometimes I was afraid to lose the client and not find another one, but my “yes” approach resulted in poor execution (few times) and most times - we felt bad (me and the team).
Now with all of the above, saying no becomes even more critical - I need to find time to execute on action points list above.
That means that each incoming request will be assessed based on 3 criteria:
Does this align with company focus, values and strategy?
Are we experts who will be able to deliver good or excellent quality? Or can we hire from network fast?
Will this be be profitable?
Summing it up
I always look at life as series of trials and errors and pursuit of joy. The process of finding what works best for me, the team and for the people around us is something I learn to enjoy, even though it is not perfect.
Here is the list:
1. Hire slow and the best, fire fast.
2. Be more proactive and persistent with lead generation and networking
3. Create a system to manage projects
4. Focus on content and TALK about what I do
5. Say „no“ to projects
Will try to get better in this. And by all means, I welcome advice and your stories. What are your action points for 2025?