Structure & leadership

You might not need a COO. You might need a structure.

Hiring a COO into a broken setup usually fails. Check the setup first.

Hire a COO when the problem is getting things done, not knowing what to do. And when there are real decisions for that person to take over. Drop a senior hire into a company where everything still goes through the founder, and they'll stall. It doesn't matter how good they are.

The common, expensive mistake

Founders often hire a COO to get out of the bottleneck. Then the bottleneck outlives the hire. Who decides what and who owns what never changed. Now you're paying a senior salary, and everything still waits on you.

The simple test

A Staff Analysis tells you if your company is ready for that hire. Are decisions and owners clear enough for someone to take them over? Or do you need to fix the setup first? Either way, you spend the next hire well. Or you save it.

Three minutes from now, you'll know what to fix first.

Eight questions. A red, yellow, or green on People, Structure, and Systems. And the one thing to fix first.

Start free → Or try the Bottleneck Audit · $49 →
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