Before we get started…
Applications are officially open for the September cohort of our Scale & Exit Accelerator, and this month's focus is a big one: “Fix My Marketing.”
Every business owner who joins in September gets a complete, custom Scalable Marketing Strategy™…the same institutional-grade plan we build for our own portfolio companies that includes:
Your Growth Engine — a visual map of exactly how your business acquires customers
Your Marketing Scorecards — the metrics that matter, with owners, targets, and a weekly review protocol
Your Marketing OS — the messaging, offer, and channel assets your team needs to execute without you
Your AI Head of Marketing — installed in your business to handle research, drafts, and analysis between sessions
So if your leads are flat and you honestly can't tell whether the problem is your marketing or your marketer (more on that in a minute)…this was built for you.
Just know there are only 12 spots left this month, and applications close at 5pm on Thursday, August 27th.
Ok, onto this week’s issue...
"I think I’m gonna have to fire him…"
We were barely 30 seconds into our call when my client dropped that line, and I knew exactly who she was talking about.
The guy in question (let's call him "Jim") was her former marketing manager who had been promoted to Head of Marketing the previous quarter.
And let me be clear: Jim's awesome.
He's fast, he's reliable, he never misses a deadline. Jim is exactly what most business owners picture when they say the words "high performer"…
…which is why my client felt he “deserved” a promotion.
Fast-forward three months: leads are flat, sales are flat, and the guy who used to be the best employee in the company is floundering.
But here's the thing…
Jim didn’t change. He didn’t get “worse” at his job.
What changed was the way he was being measured…and nobody told him.
You've probably heard of the "Peter Principle"…the idea that people keep getting promoted until they reach the level of their incompetence. (Hat tip, Dr. Laurence Peter.)
In my experience, the Peter Principle is wildly over-diagnosed.
The problem isn’t that good people get promoted past their ABILITY. The problem is that good people get promoted past their INSTRUCTIONS!
The rules changed, but they’re still “crushing it” at the old game all while losing the new one.
To spot this before it costs you somebody great, you need to know the three types of employees, because everybody in your company is one of them…
Type 1: Task-Based Employees
For a task-based employee, the task IS the scorecard:
Did the work get done?
Was it done right?
Was it done on time?
These are typically your non-managerial individual contributors, but don't confuse "task-based" with "junior." Salespeople are task-based. Heart surgeons are task-based. Some of the highest-paid people in the world are task-based employees.
Task-based people build companies, because you don't get outputs without inputs.
This was Jim. Jim wrote copy, built landing pages, launched email campaigns. All inputs. All excellent.
Which is exactly why my client promoted him.
How to evaluate someone at this tier: Ask yourself one question about them: "Can I hand it off and forget it?"
If the answer is yes, you have an A-player…at this tier. That's all their track record proves (more on that in a second).
Type 2: Metrics-Based Employees
For a metrics-based employee, the scorecard is literally…wait for it…a scorecard:
Did the critical metrics move?
Do they know WHY they moved (or didn't)?
Do they know which lever to pull next?
These are typically your managers and directors, because this is the first seat in your company where somebody owns a NUMBER instead of a task list.
Inputs still matter, but now they're just one lever among many…and the actual job is figuring out which lever.
SIDE NOTE: If you want metrics-based employees, you need to have an actual scorecard with clearly-defined metrics.
If you don't have one yet, grab the free CEO Dashboard template my companies and clients use before you have any of these conversations.
This is the seat where my client plopped poor Jim.
As Head of Marketing, he now owns site traffic, lead velocity, and conversion rates. Landing pages and email campaigns are inputs TO those outputs…
…they’re related to the job, but they’re not THE job.
How to evaluate someone at this tier: Ask them one question…"What do you think needs to happen to move this number?"
….then, stop talking.
If they come back with ideas OUTSIDE the tasks they already own (even rough, half-baked ideas), they can probably make the leap. They just need some extra coaching, resources, and accountability.
If they come back with more of what they've always done, they don't understand the scope of the job yet, and being an amazing Task-Based Employee won’t fix that. (In fact, it usually just makes things worse.)
That second one is exactly what happened with Jim.
When leads went flat, he tested more landing pages and sent more emails. In other words, he just did MORE of what he knew.
And that's the tell, because what breaks people in this seat isn't managing humans (that's teachable)…
…what breaks people is managing to a number.
Pro Tip: This question is also the entire interview when you're hiring for a metrics-based role.
Don't ask candidates what they know how to do. Ask them how they'd move YOUR specific numbers.
Type 3: Strategy-Based Employees
Strategy-based employees aren't looking at tasks or metrics. They're asking, "WHICH metrics?"
Which numbers should this company be chasing?
Which metrics are we optimizing that no longer matter?
Where are we going next?
These are your VPs and C-suite…or really anybody reporting directly to the CEO with a voice in where the company goes.
Fair warning: if you're the owner, there's a decent chance you're the only strategy-based thinker in your entire company right now (which is probably why you can't understand why nobody on your team thinks the way you do.)
How to evaluate someone at this tier: Ask them, "If you ran this company for the next 12 months, what would you stop measuring, and what would you measure instead?"
A metrics-based employee will defend the current scorecard. A strategy-based leader will challenge it.
The Promotion Trap (and the Fix)
Here's the one thing to remember: titles give someone a ROLE They don’t give them CAPABILITY.
Jim's title said "Head of Marketing," which is a metrics-based role. But Jim was still operating as a task-based employee, and the gap between those two capabilities explains everything that went wrong.
The good news? The gap isn't fatal.
My client didn't fire Jim. She sat down with him and accepted responsibility for her part in the failure:
"Jim, I owe you an apology. The way we measure success in your new role changed. I never made that clear, and that's on me."
Then she told him exactly what the new scorecard was, asked him the "what needs to happen" question, and waited for Jim’s answer.
Will Jim make it? I don't know yet…he's still in the seat. But whichever way it goes, nobody gets blindsided and nobody gets humiliated, because now everybody understands the three employee types and what’s expected of each.
⚡️ Action Step: Make a list of everyone on your team who owns (or is supposed to own) a number. This week, ask each of them: "What do you think needs to happen to move your number?" Then stop talking, and read the answer.
Give it a shot and let me know how it goes…
-Ryan
Ryan Deiss
Co-Founder and CEO, The Scalable Company
P.S. In case you skipped to the bottom: applications are officially open for the September Scale & Exit cohort, and this month every new client gets a complete, custom Scalable Marketing Strategy™ built with them…
…Growth Engine, marketing scorecards, Marketing OS, and an AI Head of Marketing included.
Only 12 spots are left, and applications close at 5pm on Thursday, August 27th.
Quick Hits
The best stuff I read, watched, and argued with this week:
📈 Growth
Bad, better, and best sales strategy at every level, from $200K to $20M (Instagram)
The $300K lesson in adding a second market too early (Owned and Operated)
How Krispy Kreme traded a cult brand for gas-station shelf space (Girdley's Letter)
💰 Money
75% of founders regret selling. Here's how to exit without becoming one of them (Business Lunch)
Three operators open their books: $8M, $10M, and $40M a year (My First Million)
He took over billing at the family business and found one customer owing nearly $200K (Reddit)
⚙️ Systems & Ops
🛠️ Tools & AI
Find out where your week is leaking in under 5 minutes (CEO Time Audit)
Give every dollar of revenue a job before it hits your checking account (Cashflow Waterfall)
Unlimited screen-recorded SOPs for $29 a year (Cap)
