You know how to perform. Do you know how to scale?
Dear Substack Reader, Happy Friday!
Being excellent at what you do isn’t the same as knowing how to scale it. At a certain point in leadership, the real growth edge isn’t working harder—it’s multiplying your impact through others. That shift sounds simple. It’s not. Here’s what it looks like in practice.
Main takeaway from this newsletter
Scaling yourself isn’t about delegation. It’s about definition. You can’t scale excellence if you can’t name it. That means making expectations visible, performance standards explicit, and accountability normal. Not as micromanagement—but as a path to trust, autonomy, and momentum.
What Scaling Really Looks Like
One of the most common questions I hear in coaching sessions—whether I’m working with a founder managing a team or a senior director operating as an individual contributor—is this:
“How do I scale myself?”
Because scaling isn’t just about leading others.
It’s about increasing your influence, your strategic value, your ability to move the business forward—without burning out.
What they usually mean is:
→ I’ve built something good.
→ I know what great looks like.
→ But I can’t keep doing everything—or being everywhere.
They want to hand things off, without lowering the bar. They want to build a team that doesn’t just support them—but actually expands their capacity.
Sometimes that looks like building and leading a team.
Other times, it looks like shifting how you manage cross-functional work, raise your hand for the right problems, or define your scope beyond execution.
Either way, the principle is the same: scaling yourself starts by getting clearer on what only you can do—and letting go of the rest.
One client I work with was right in the middle of that shift.
He’s smart, committed, tracking ahead of goal. But in our session, he said something that really stuck with me:
“I think I’ve kept people on too long in the past. I don’t want to do that again.”
He was talking about a junior team member—someone with potential, but not enough urgency. Not enough initiative. Not enough progress, especially a year into the role.
This leader had been doing what many thoughtful managers do:
Giving space. Checking in. Offering reminders. Making tweaks.
But he was still doing too much of the heavy lifting. And he knew it.
We looked at the big picture. This wasn’t just about one person. It was about how he was going to scale his leadership going forward.
And the answer, as it often is, started with a deceptively simple question:
“What does success look like?”
Not just in outcomes. But in behaviors.
Not just what you want people to achieve—but how you want them to operate.
That’s where things clicked.
He realized he’d never actually written down what “great” looks like in that role. He could feel it when it wasn’t there. But he hadn’t made it visible.
We defined it together:
Generating new ideas
Consistent outreach and presence on the phone
Showing up in the right rooms and networks
Asking for help when stuck—not after a missed deadline
Suddenly, everything was clearer. Not just for him—but for his team.
Scaling Isn’t Delegating. It’s Defining.
A lot of leaders try to scale by handing off tasks. But what you really need to hand off is standards.
If expectations are vague, you’ll always end up compensating.
If accountability isn’t normalized, you’ll be stuck chasing follow-ups.
If you can’t define success, you’ll quietly carry underperformance—until it’s too late.
And that’s not just inefficient. It’s exhausting.
This leader had been doing exactly what good managers are told to do: delegate, coach, trust. But without a clear bar, he was operating in a grey zone—supporting someone who wasn’t really stepping up, and feeling the slow drag of it day to day.
Once we named the bar, he was able to say—with kindness and clarity:
“Here’s what I expect. Here’s where you are. Here’s what needs to change if we’re going to keep going.”
That conversation wasn’t easy. But it was honest. And it marked a turning point in how he leads.
What Scaling Feels Like
Scaling yourself doesn’t feel like victory laps.
It feels like:
Letting go of being the best at everything.
Saying things more explicitly than feels natural.
Having direct conversations you’d rather delay.
Watching someone else do it differently—and resisting the urge to step in.
Trusting the process of coaching, even when the results are slow.
It also feels like:
Seeing a team member step up—without you prompting them.
Getting your time and focus back.
Watching the bar stay high, even when you’re not in the room.
Realizing your value isn’t in doing more—but in building a system that performs, even when you step away.
Scaling yourself isn’t about letting go of quality.
It’s about making quality repeatable.
And that doesn’t happen through heroics.
It happens through clarity, trust, and the courage to be honest early.
Because the more clearly you define the path, the easier it becomes to walk it—with others, not for them.
“If you’re at this inflection point and want a thinking partner—I’m here.”
🛠️Resources / Prompts to Reflect On
If you’re in this place—moving from top performer to leader of a high-performing team (or strategic individual contributor)—pause and ask:
Have I defined what “great” looks like, or am I managing through assumptions?
What expectations am I holding in my head that my team (or collaborators) can’t see?
Where am I quietly compensating for a gap I haven’t named?
What would shift if I made the standard visible—and stuck to it?
Tools you mind find useful
Write a “Success Profile” for your most critical roles or functions. Focus on behaviors, not just outcomes.
Create a timeline: When should someone show signs of trajectory? (Hint: 18 months max usually)
Practice saying: “This is what’s needed for the role. I want to support you in getting there—but I also need to be honest about where we are.”
📣 Connect With Me
If you have any thoughts, questions, or insights you’d like to share, please feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn or reply directly to this email. I’d love to hear from you! Feel free to go check my website if you are interested for us to partner together.
🙏 Thank you for spending part of your week with us. Stay strong, keep leading, keep inspiring, and fully embrace the roller coaster of leadership.
Warm regards,
Vanessa