Why I'm making Growth Waves smaller on purpose
A growth advisor's plan to grow less.
Hi there,
I’m a growth advisor. And I’ve decided to stop growing.
Not the advice you’d expect from someone whose entire job is helping companies grow. But here we are.
Today, instead of telling you how to expand your brand, I’m going to tell you why I’m deliberately putting a ceiling on my own. Bear with me.
When “more” started to hurt
I fell into freelancing accidentally and stayed for years. Every single year, I grew. I never wanted to become an agency, so that capped things nicely, but I still kept doing more. More courses, more talks, more projects.
Until more started hurting me.
My newer courses cannibalised the sales of my old ones.
My website grew bigger but felt constantly out of date.
I had a list of projects and ideas I never had time to touch.
I made mistakes in the rush to ship — wrong links, a feedback form none of you could actually access (oops).
Better beats more
Then I read Company of One. It describes how a business can become a beast: you grow and grow until you lose control of it. The answer isn’t more. It’s better.
More is tempting, especially with AI. But more doesn’t always mean better.
I want to be better. My revenue has grown, and I don’t need it to grow beyond this. I don’t want to hire a team I have to manage, or do everything at half quality.
I know not everyone gets to make this choice right now. Plenty of people are having “less” forced on them, not choosing it — and I don’t take for granted that I get to choose.
The point of a Company of One isn’t growth at all costs (ironic, coming from a growth advisor). It’s growing to the level that feels right for you, and shaping your life around it, instead of the other way round.
Why now?
Because I love what I do. Truly. But I also love long walks with my dog, working out, visiting new places, and time with my family and friends.
The last two years made that non-negotiable. I lost my stepfather. My husband had cancer (he’s been all clear now for 1.5 years). My older sister has been in hospital for 10 weeks with pregnancy complications.
If I’d grown faster, I couldn’t have been there for them. Even now at times I’m feeling the strain of it all.
What I’m stripping back
So I’m doing something that sounds strange for a growth person. I’m stripping things back.
Over the coming months, I’m going to be:
1. Removing my self-serve courses.
Don’t panic. Hear me out.
So much has changed since AI, and since then I’ve launched my CXL and RevenueCat courses to high demand. So it just doesn’t justify keeping my self-serve courses.
I’ll keep my CXL and RevenueCat courses, and I’m working on shifting the rest to Google Drive Access. If you bought one: don’t worry, you’ll keep your access, and I’ll share some additional gifts as a thank you.
2. Simplifying my website and how I work with brands.
Less noise, more up-to-date content on my actual approach and who I am. Removing the courses will help with this, and then it’s time for a full refresh.
3. Testing simpler LinkedIn content.
My carousels have been precious to me; they’re my mini stories and guides, and the way I love to consume content as someone with ADHD. But LinkedIn’s new formatting has made them almost impossible to read. So I’m testing simpler text-and-image posts: still scannable, but a better fit for what actually works there now. As well as carousels with larger fonts.
4. Removing inactive subscribers.
My newsletter grows over time, but the open rate has slipped over time. It’s hard to let go of list size, but a smaller, engaged list beats a big, quiet one. I’ve just tidied up inactive subscribers. This will also make it easier for me to see which content you like and which you dislike.
5. Reducing my client load.
I love my current clients, and I’m not going anywhere. I keep my client list small on purpose, so I can do right by the ones I have. At some point one of them will outgrow me — they’ll need a full-time hire or a different kind of expert for their next phase. When that day came last month, I chose not to take on a new client.
The missing piece
There’s one puzzle piece I haven’t solved. I want to help smaller startups too — the earlier-stage founders who don’t fit ongoing client work, and who I rarely have room for anyway.
To be clear: this isn’t me adding more on top. It’s redirecting. I’ve tested one-off strategy sessions, courses, workshops and growth audits. Strategy sessions and audits worked best, but they don’t scale.
So I don’t have the answer yet, and that’s fine. It will come later.
If you’re feeling the pressure to do more right now — more output, more channels, more everything, because AI makes “more” so easy — take this as permission to do less, better, too.
First, I want to focus on you. This newsletter. Showing up better here, adding more value, more consistency. I’ve already built a Claude dashboard to keep a better eye on performance.
Worth a read (this week’s recommendations)
The book that kicked all of this off is Company of One by Paul Jarvis. If any of this hit a nerve, start there — it’s the clearest case I’ve found for staying small on purpose.
Two more, if you want to sit with the idea:
Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman — on making peace with the fact that you can’t do it all. The one that helped me most this year.
Essentialism by Greg McKeown — the disciplined pursuit of less, but better.
So here’s my question for you: if you let yourself, what would you strip back?
Hit reply and tell me; I read every answer.
Thank you for being part of my Company of One.
Company of One doesn’t mean doing it alone with no help — I have a lot of help.
It means a company that resists traditional growth: not chasing more, not hiring to add capacity, but getting better.
My younger sister has a tattoo on her arm: This is me trying.
Well, this is me trying to be better,
Daphne