Scaling Up, Scaling Down

Over the last decade, I have experienced organisational growth in two very different creative industries.

The first was television and media, where I watched an organisation grow from around 15 to more than 80 employees while navigating the pace and unpredictability of live broadcasting and content production.

The second was the Web3 software industry, where I joined a specialist engineering consultancy of approximately 14 people and helped support its growth to more than 40 employees, before later helping the organisation navigate the realities of a contracting market.

At first glance, those industries could not be more different. One creates stories. The other builds technology. One delivers live television. The other develops software for emerging technologies. But the organisational patterns became remarkably similar.

Growth created complexity. Contraction revealed operating quality. Both tested leadership.

Those experiences changed the way I think about scaling organisations. I no longer see growth as a hiring exercise. I see it as building an organisation capable of adapting.

Growth Hides Weaknesses

Rapid growth often disguises problems. When revenue is increasing and new opportunities keep arriving, organisations naturally focus on momentum. Hiring accelerates. Processes become reactive. Managers solve problems as they appear. Communication stays informal because, for a while, informal still works.

Because everyone is busy and success is visible, many of these issues go unnoticed. Growth can create the illusion that the organisation is stronger than it actually is.

Looking back, I do not think growth creates every organisational problem. More often, it delays the moment we notice them.

Contraction Reveals Operating Quality

If growth hides weaknesses, contraction reveals them. Budgets tighten. Priorities change. Projects become more selective. Every investment is scrutinised. Leadership has to make difficult decisions that directly affect people's careers.

Culture is not proven in the easy moments. It is revealed when uncertainty exists: when projects are cancelled, roles change, teams restructure, or people lose their jobs.

Those moments define how employees experience an organisation far more than any values statement ever will. During uncertainty, people rarely expect perfection. They expect honesty, consistency, visibility, and leadership willing to explain not only what decisions are being made, but why.

Momentum Is Not the Same as Rhythm

One of the biggest mistakes I see in growing businesses is confusing momentum with maturity. Momentum often comes from external conditions: strong markets, new clients, investment, demand. Operating rhythm comes from internal discipline.

• Clear priorities.
• Regular leadership conversations.
• Consistent one-on-ones.
• Quarterly planning.
• Decision-making frameworks.
• Workforce planning.

None of these are particularly glamorous. In fact, they are often repetitive. But they are exactly what allow organisations to remain stable when external conditions inevitably change.

Organisations do not become resilient during difficult times. They reveal whether they were resilient already.

Workforce Planning Is Not Hiring

Early in my career, I thought workforce planning was primarily about headcount. Today, I see it very differently.

Workforce planning is really about balancing five competing variables: capability, capacity, cost, risk, and future demand.

Every hiring decision changes that equation. Every resignation changes it. Every promotion changes it. Every new client changes it. Every change in market conditions changes it.

The objective is not simply to grow. Nor is it to become smaller. The objective is alignment: having the right people, with the right capabilities, at the right time, to execute the organisation's strategy sustainably.

Sometimes that means hiring aggressively. Sometimes it means investing in development. Sometimes it means redesigning roles. Sometimes it means making incredibly difficult decisions. All of those are workforce planning.

Leadership Changes as Organisations Change

Another pattern that became clear is how much leadership itself changes depending on the stage of the organisation.

During growth, leaders spend much of their time building: recruiting, onboarding, creating structure, defining culture, and establishing systems. When growth slows, the focus shifts. Communication becomes more important. Coaching becomes more important. Prioritisation becomes more important. Commercial thinking becomes more important.

People & Culture shifts from enabling expansion to helping the organisation navigate complexity with confidence. Neither stage is more valuable than the other. They simply require different leadership capabilities.

The Pattern Was the Same in Every Industry

Looking back, what stands out is not how different these businesses were. It is how familiar the organisational questions became.

• How do we keep talented people engaged?
• How do we maintain quality while growing?
• How do we create clarity without reducing creativity?
• How do we protect culture while changing the organisation?

Whether supporting television producers delivering live broadcasts or software engineers building complex blockchain solutions, the industries changed, the products changed, and the technology changed. The leadership principles did not.

Final Thoughts

The biggest lesson I took from both experiences is that organisations are not defined by how quickly they grow. They are defined by how deliberately they respond when circumstances change.

Growth is exciting because it gives leaders permission to dream. Contraction is uncomfortable because it forces leaders to choose. Having experienced both, I have come to believe that the role of People & Culture is not simply to support growth. It is to help organisations build the leadership habits, operating rhythm, and people systems that allow them to move through every stage with more confidence.

HR should not only respond to business strategy. It should help shape the conditions that make strategy achievable.

If you do the homework every day, you are far better prepared for eventualities and far less dependent on external factors. I believe the same is true for organisations.

The strongest businesses are not necessarily those that grow the fastest. They are the ones that consistently invest in leadership, communication, and disciplined people systems long before those capabilities are tested.