I suppose the first question is what happens if you take two weeks off. Does the business keep running, or does it slowly fall apart?
System design is the shape of the business. Where the information goes. Who makes which call. How the team's put together. How the pieces talk to each other.
Most premium retail brands are built by people who are brilliant at product and brilliant with customers. But rarely do we sit down and say “I’m going to design a business system”. Why would we? We’re so busy running around. So the system's growing by addition, by reaction... a new hire here, a new tool there, another spreadsheet, another process, another Slack channel.
And then one day you wake up and realise you’re the system. It’s why the business works. It's also why it can't get any bigger without something breaking.
That's the work we need to do.
Why it’s critical to growth
Have a think about last week. How many times did somebody need an answer only you could give? And of those, how many were real decisions? How many were just someone checking?
That gap's your system talking to you.
So when the design's good, you get your time back. Not all of it. But the handful of calls that really need your judgement stay with you, and the rest runs without you.
It's worth money too. Look, I'm not an M&A guy. But a brand with clean systems is worth a lot more when you go to sell it. It is. Brands where the founder is embedded in the system are much harder to sell and when they do sell they go for a good deal less because any buyer sitting across the table can work out inside about ten minutes that what they'd really be buying is you.
Now, to be honest, there's half of this I can't do. I can build the system and I'll help you get the team in. Whether you then go back to doing the things you love doing and what you started all this for, or just fill the space back up with more work, that's on you.
How I think about system design
System design sits above operations. Operations is how the work gets done. System design's how the business is shaped, so the thing that needs doing sits with the person who should be doing it and it gets done.
A few principles I work to:
- I'd visualise it before I changed anything. What flows where, who owns what, where the handoffs are, where the decisions sit. Most founders have never seen their own business drawn out like that. It's really useful. And it's uncomfortable for about ten minutes - then we start seeing what’s possible.
- I'd design around you, not with you in the centre. Every system's got the founder in it somewhere. The question is where. I'd be moving you out of the daily rhythm and into the few calls that need your judgement or into the part of the business you actually like being in.
- I'd then connect the parts. A team that can't see what another team's doing will redo their work. A tool that doesn't talk to another tool creates a person whose job's copying and pasting. Connection's half of good design.
- I'd build for the next twelve months. Designing for a five-year business you haven't got yet makes as much mess as designing for the one you've already grown out of.
And good system design's pretty dull on paper, to be honest. The org chart makes sense. The meetings have a job, and you'd be surprised how many don't. Reports might actually get read. Decisions happen on time. And that ordinariness is what helps a brand get bigger without it all coming apart.
What working with me looks like
It'll usually start with a diagnostic. Time with you, time with the team, time inside the tools you're all running on. I'm after the system as it actually runs, not the one that's drawn on the org chart.
Then a redesign. New flows, new ownership, new rhythms. Sometimes new tools. Often fewer tools, actually. And nearly always fewer meetings, better ones. How many of yours would survive somebody asking what they're actually for?
Then implementation, embedded with the team. And this is the part that matters. A system redesign that just gets handed over is a recipe sitting on the bench. Nobody's cooked anything. It works when somebody's actually sitting with the team week by week, in the meetings, in the tools, catching the spots where the old way keeps creeping back in, until the new way stops feeling like extra work and just becomes how things get done.
AI runs through it where it helps. Where a process used to need a person and now doesn't, the system gets simpler. Where it can give you a clear view of the business without you having to ask anybody, I'd build that. And where it's just noise? I'll tell you it's noise.
Now the AI part's the newest bit of my work and I'd rather say so. The wins I'm seeing inside client businesses are real. But I'm still costing them properly, so I'm not going to oversell it. Ask me again in six months.
Who it's for
Founder-led premium retail brands at the transition point. Usually somewhere around $3M heading for $10M or $12M, though I've done this work either side of that. At $3M you can still run it yourself. By $10M you can't. It's hard to say exactly where it flips, it's a bit industry specific, but somewhere in there the business either gets a proper shape or it starts breaking.
Brands that are heading into a big hire, a raise, an exit, or a new category. And founders who want the business to run like a system instead of a circus.
Who it isn't for
Anyone after an org chart template, a process library, or a standard operating procedure drop. I've got nothing against any of those. They just don't work here, because the design's got to fit this brand and this founder, and a template can't know either. You know your brand better than I ever will. My job's the shape around it.
Let's have a look at how your business is built
If the system side of your brand's grown by accident and you can feel it, get in touch. The first conversation's free.
It usually starts with a couple of questions about your week. What kept you answering emails and chasing orders, instead of doing the stuff only you can do? And which of those could somebody else have handled, if the system had been built for it?
So before you call me, have a look at your calendar from last week. That'll tell you most of it.
Key points
- A diagnostic of the system as it actually runs, not the one on the org chart
- A redesign built around getting you out of the day-to-day
- I'd sit with the team and do it, not hand it over
- Built for the next twelve months, not a five-year business you haven't got yet
- AI in where it simplifies things, out where it's just noise