The Better Growth Path:
Breaking Free from the Traditional Growth Trap
The Problem: Why Traditional Growth No Longer Works
Tech leaders are under constant pressure to grow. The default playbook? Traditional growth models—scaling aggressively or sustaining growth through efficiency and cost-cutting. While these approaches seem logical, they often break down in highly disruptive and fast-changing markets. What worked in the past no longer guarantees long-term success.
The Traditional Growth Trap
Traditional growth assumes that expansion follows a predictable, linear path. The focus is on optimizing existing processes, scaling revenue, and cutting inefficiencies to maintain upward momentum. While this works in stable industries, tech leaders in fast-evolving markets face serious challenges:
- Scaling at any cost leads to burnout. A Deloitte study found that 77% of employees have experienced burnout at their current job, with high-growth companies among the biggest offenders.
- Culture stagnates and weakens performance. Instead of evolving with their customers and employees, rigid cultures fracture, dragging down innovation and engagement. MIT Sloan research found that companies with toxic work cultures are 10x more likely to lose employees, and PwC found that misaligned cultures reduce long-term performance by over 50%.
- Innovation becomes out of step with real market needs. A BCG study found that 70% of corporate innovation spending does not deliver positive ROI due to poor customer alignment and execution challenges. McKinsey reports that companies focused solely on incremental innovation see lower long-term revenue growth (4.5%) compared to disruptive innovators (9.5%).
- Market relevance declines. Companies that fail to adapt lose their competitive edge. A BCG report found that businesses with strong adaptive cultures outperform peers by 16% in total shareholder return over a 10-year period.
The result is a growth trap that many leaders fall into: growth slows, teams struggle, and innovation becomes reactive and less differentiated. The pressure to grow pushes leaders redouble their efforts, accelerating the problem.
The Alternative: Why Sustaining Growth Is a Step in the Right Direction—but Not Enough
Some leaders recognize the problems with relentless scaling and shift their focus to sustaining growth—optimizing efficiency, reducing risks, and maintaining stability. This approach is a clear improvement over traditional growth because it prioritizes longevity over short-term gains.
However, in highly disruptive industries, sustaining growth alone isn’t a competitive advantage—it’s just survival. It keeps companies going, but it doesn’t make them stronger.
While sustaining growth prevents burnout and reduces instability, it still doesn’t address a key challenge: How do you stay ahead in a market that is constantly evolving?
The Breakthrough: Better Growth
If traditional growth is unsustainable and sustaining growth is too passive, what’s the answer? Better Growth.
Better Growth is the adaptive synergy—the continuously evolving, reinforcing interconnections of Talent, Culture, and Customers.
The Better Growth model transforms change and disruption into fuel for a self-sustaining flywheel of growth—building resilience in talent, deepening company relevance, and driving meaningful innovation.
The result?
Companies and brands become essential to both employees and customers while leading their markets in growth and customer impact.
Where traditional growth strategies often lead to burnout, short-term thinking, and innovation that fails to resonate, Better Growth takes a different path.
It’s a path that builds resilience, deepens relevance, and fuels meaningful innovation so leaders can drive above-market growth for the company while becoming essential and meaningful to its employees and customers.
Why Better Growth Works in Fast-Changing Markets
1. Resilient Talent: Growth That Strengthens, Not Drains
Traditional growth pushes employees to their limits, often leading to burnout and disengagement. Better Growth ensures that talent is empowered and adaptable, evolving into a high-performing and innovative workforce.
Atlassian, for example, fosters a culture where employees experiment, learn, and grow. The result? Long-term engagement and sustained innovation. This aligns with McKinsey research that show companies with strong learning cultures are 30% more likely to be market leaders over time.
2. Relevant Culture: A Company That Evolves, Not Stagnates
Culture is often an afterthought in traditional growth models, leading to misalignment and disengagement. PwC found that 79% of executives believe culture is critical to business success, but only 32% say their company’s culture aligns with its growth strategy.
Better Growth ensures that culture becomes a strategic advantage—attracting top talent and customers with a dynamic, purpose-driven environment that evolves alongside market needs.
Shopify exemplifies the advantage of cultural evolution, shifting from an e-commerce platform to a broader ecosystem of business solutions while keeping employees and customers engaged.
3. Meaningful Innovation: Staying Ahead by Creating Value
Traditional growth often leads to reactive innovation, responding to competitors rather than anticipating customer needs. Harvard Business Review found that companies prioritizing customer-driven innovation grow revenue at 2.5x the rate of competitors.
Better Growth prioritizes innovation that is deeply connected to employees and customers, ensuring products and services stay relevant and impactful. Netflix’s evolution—from DVDs to streaming to content creation—demonstrates how aligning innovation with customer behavior leads to sustained success.
The Outcome: Stronger, More Sustainable Growth
Better Growth is built on the principle of companies grow when their employees and customers grow. Growth in a highly disruptive and fast-changing world isn’t just about scaling; it must be about strengthening.
Better Growth ensures that employees, customers, and the company grow together creating a cycle of success that is resilient, relevant, and continually innovative. Unlike traditional approaches focused on short-term results, Better Growth delivers long-term, sustainable success in a way that fuels continuous progress.
Steps to Shift from Traditional Growth to Better Growth
The shift to Better Growth doesn’t have to be overwhelming. Leaders are already under immense pressure—so instead of thinking about large-scale transformation, focus on one powerful shift: Re-evaluate your growth mindset.
A key question to ask yourself:
Are you chasing growth for the sake of expansion, or are you strengthening the core elements—your talent, culture, and customer alignment—that drive meaningful, sustainable success?
One Simple Action to Take Today:
Start with a Better Growth Self-Check. Have a 15-minute conversation with your leadership team. Ask:
- Are we growing in a way that strengthens or drains our talent?
- Is our culture helping or hindering our ability to evolve?
- Are we innovating in ways that truly matter to our customers?
These simple but powerful questions create the right mindset shift. From there, leaders can take the next step: Measure their company’s current growth approach with the Better Growth Evaluation Framework.
Ready to Shift?
Traditional growth is outdated. Sustaining growth is survival. Better Growth is the future.
Better Growth will get you out of the traditional growth trap and onto a path to above-market growth.
Get started by evaluating where your company stands. Download our Better Growth Evaluation Framework to assess your current model. The framework will point the way forward by identifying the key shifts needed to create lasting, meaningful success.
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