A founder I know—someone running one of the hottest beauty brands right now—told me something over dinner recently that I can’t stop thinking about.
In November, right after hitting her year-end revenue goal, she gave her entire team a week off.
Not because morale was low. Not because things were falling apart. But because they’d already won the year they set out to win. Her priority wasn’t squeezing out more growth for the sake of it—it was protecting the energy and the people who made that growth possible.
That conversation has stayed with me because it runs directly counter to what so many of us have been taught by people we trust: pedal to the metal. Grow as fast as you can. Push harder. Build to sell.
But lately I’ve been asking myself: then what? And at what cost?
What do you give up along the way—joy, presence, health, the ability to actually feel good about what you’re building?
When I started Dreamday, I had a different intention. I wanted to enjoy building it. That idea is literally in our name—I wanted to create my dream day, every day. I wanted to lead in a way that felt right, not just effective. I wanted to grow a business without putting my life on hold for some hypothetical exit down the road.
I’ve spoken with many founders—mostly men—who built agencies or venture-backed consumer brands. They scaled fast, exited well, and now look back on those years with equal parts pride and exhaustion. The growth came, but so did burnout, strained relationships, and in some cases, damage to the very businesses they worked so hard to build.
One statistic in particular has stayed with me: fewer than 1 percent of marketing and advertising agencies are female-founded. That number reframed how I think about Dreamday and Quality Media—not just as businesses, but as counterexamples. Over 70 percent of our clients are female-founded or led by diverse teams, and that perspective shows up in how we approach growth: more thoughtfully, more humanly, and with durability in mind.
After seven years of building my own company, I’ve come to believe this: not all growth is good growth. And not all speed is worth the energy it takes.
The myth that faster is always better
For over a decade, startup culture rewarded acceleration above all else. In the era of zero interest rates, venture capital flowed toward companies chasing top-line growth at any cost.
That frantic energy never stays contained at the top. It leaks into rushed decisions, reactive leadership, and teams that feel perpetually behind—always sprinting, never pausing long enough to recognize what they’ve built. The unspoken rule was simple: if you’re not scaling, you’re dying.
Early on, I absorbed that mindset completely. I equated intensity with commitment. I thought pushing harder—staying up later, doing more—was the only path forward. Sometimes it worked. The hustle was necessary early in my career. But often it didn’t, and I had to learn the hard way that working harder is not the same as working smarter.
Eventually, my co-founders and I made a quiet decision: we would treat the agencies like a lifestyle business, at least for now. A business we actually want to run. One where the day-to-day feels good. And if that leads to a great outcome someday, even better—we’ll have enjoyed the process instead of enduring it.
The irony is that once I stopped treating an exit as the primary goal, everything became lighter. Decisions grew clearer. The pressure to force growth eased. The business felt more solid.
I’m still unwinding old habits. I still type like my life depends on it. It’s PR, not the ER—though sometimes it feels like the ER. My heart rate still spikes, not from stress exactly, but from excitement and momentum. I’m learning that calm isn’t something you decide once. It’s a practice.
Calm is a leadership strategy
Being calm doesn’t mean lowering standards. It means fewer emotional spikes. Less manufactured urgency. Trusting your systems and your people instead of treating everything like a five-alarm fire.
That shift didn’t happen overnight. I’m an intense person by nature. But part of the change came from building a real executive team—people with judgment, ownership, and pride in their work. Another part was getting clear about who we’re not for. As our case studies strengthened, we earned the right to narrow our focus, raise minimums, and set firmer boundaries. Fewer clients. Better fits. Clearer expectations.
The third piece was letting go of the idea that every year has to be a rocket ship. Incremental, sustainable growth compounds in ways frantic growth doesn’t. Teams stay longer. Culture stabilizes. Decisions improve. And importantly, this approach has still produced meaningful growth—not in spite of it, but because of it.
Saying no is part of real growth
I think often about Steve Jobs’ definition of focus: it’s not about saying yes—it’s about saying no. Not just to bad ideas, but to good ones that don’t fit.
That mindset has reshaped how I lead. We say no to misaligned clients. No to growth paths that require constant urgency just to survive. No to opportunities that look great on paper but feel heavy in practice.
In The Science of Scaling, Benjamin Hardy talks about “raising the floor”—eliminating what no longer moves the needle. I’ve found that saying no hasn’t slowed our business down. It’s protected it.
Investors are rewarding this shift
For years, founders were told to prioritize growth at all costs. That message has changed.
In 2022, Sequoia Capital released a memo declaring that the era of growth at all costs was over, and that efficiency, durability, and profitability were once again what markets rewarded. It marked a real turning point.
Today, investor conversations sound different. That beauty founder I mentioned earlier? She’s backed by top-tier VCs. And the questions she’s getting now are telling: How resilient is the model? How dependent is the business on the founder’s personal intensity? Can the team execute without burning out?
Sustainable growth isn’t boring anymore. It’s investable.
What explosive growth can hide
Speed can mask fragility—until it can’t.
Foxtrot raised nearly $200 million, expanded rapidly, and then shut down when the economics couldn’t support the pace. Outdoor Voices scaled aggressively, became a DTC darling, and later closed all its stores after years of internal strain. Modern Retail has documented this pattern repeatedly: brands that look successful on the surface but collapse once capital tightens and fundamentals matter again.
These companies didn’t fail for lack of vision. They failed because growth outran stability.
Where gratitude fits in
My word this year is gratitude—not in a vague, inspirational way, but as a daily grounding practice.
Gratitude for the team we’ve built. For steady progress instead of constant pressure. For the ability to pause and acknowledge what’s working without immediately raising the bar again.
That doesn’t mean I’ve stopped thinking big. I still do. But I’ve learned that big thinking doesn’t require frantic execution. Vision doesn’t have to come with burnout attached.
What sustainable growth actually looks like
Sustainable growth doesn’t make headlines the way hypergrowth does. But it builds something that lasts.
It looks like teams that don’t burn out every year. Leaders who can zoom out instead of constantly reacting. Businesses that evolve steadily instead of scaling at any cost.
That beauty founder who gave her team a week off wasn’t being soft—she was being disciplined. She understood that the long game isn’t just about revenue targets. It’s about preserving the people, culture, and energy that make those targets possible.
After seven years, I’m still learning how to hold ambition without white-knuckling it. How to stay excited without being frantic. How to lead with gratitude instead of pressure.
My therapist always says your business is a mirror of yourself. Take care of yourself, and the rest follows.
Choosing sustainable growth hasn’t made me less driven. It’s made the work feel better. And in the long run, that may be what I’m most proud of.