Miranda Lievers 0:00

We actually have to give ourselves permission to not be like just pushing and trying to be right all the time. It's like actually like it's like this is a this is a machine and it's in motion. And so our job is not to have every single step like perfectly executed and and driven. It's like, no, we just need to be directionally correct. We need to be, uh I like to say we dance with like one step, like one foot on the map, which is like the known where we are and what we understand, and one foot off of the map.

Angela Robertson 0:26

Welcome back to the Stormy Story Show. I am your host, Angela Robertson, CEO of Ace Tech. We are a community of tech entrepreneurs who are looking to build incredible businesses here in beautiful British Columbia. And our community exists so that these tech founders and CEOs don't have to do it alone and so that they can thrive. And we're so delighted to have today's guest on the Stormy Stories show, Miranda Levers, who is the co-founder of ThinkIphic and founder of Torch the Playbooks, where she helps scaling founders navigate the messy middle of growth. She helps scale ThinkGiff from startup to a billion-dollar IPO, building a platform that has empowered more than 200 million learners worldwide. So I can think of no better person to talk to today and to have our community learn from. Welcome to the show, Miranda.

Miranda Lievers 1:21

Thanks so much for having me, Angela. I'm excited to be here.

Angela Robertson 1:24

So grateful. You talk about the messy middle of scaling. Why do you think this stage is so misunderstood in entrepreneurship?

Miranda Lievers 1:32

It's like, how long do we have? I feel like it's like we have so many resources for how to start businesses. And there's so many resources for how to run businesses at scale, right? I mean, most businesses in this world operate by my definition of scale, which is where the activities in the business are things that we've done before. And so every time you pick up a leadership book or any sort of any sort of business book, pretty much off of the shelf in a bookstore is generally about businesses at scale, or it's about how to start. And there's this idea that scaling is just like it's like, oh, you're just supposed to grow up one day. You're just supposed to like start behaving like an at-scale company. And I think that we have this idea that like implementing the processes, the systems, like all of that is what gets you to at scale. And it's like actually at scale is what like earns the processes and the systems. Like, but the process in the middle is something else entirely. It's not just a bigger version of startup and it's not just a smaller version of at scale. Uh and as such, there really aren't that many resources and even people who have like actually led like whole teams through it. And it is chaotic and ungrounding, which we all know. Um, but I think that it's that way for structural reasons too.

Angela Robertson 2:40

Completely agree. And, you know, when you pull that together, right? It's so clear people who are founders, you know, they get to a certain point and they go, okay, well, I'm actually not big enough for this process. And then others who are scaling, they go, Okay, well, I I don't remember how to start up again, right? And you have to kind of think in both of those lenses at the same time. What did you think? You you obviously live this, right? From ThinkIfic growing from a really scrappy startup into a billion-dollar public company. What leadership lessons really came into focus after scaling past 100 plus employees? Or did they?

Miranda Lievers 3:21

I mean, I don't Yeah, like there's so many. And what's interesting, actually, so I I've kind of done this twice. Like, and the first time is like not a conventional scaling story, but I started at TELUS in the late, like like right at the end of the 90s, um, in dial-up technical support. At the time, TELUS was uh a telecommunications company, not a tech company. And we were just a tiny, tiny team doing dial-up technical support. Uh, but then we rolled out high-speed internet, turned out that was a bit of a thing. And so we went from um a team of 40, and when I left, we were 1,600 people. And at the time, we were moving way faster than the company. So my first scaling experience was actually not a think if it was it was doing this before with big teams where we never had to worry about how to pay the bills, but we certainly had to figure out like how to grow really rapidly and build the systems and the teams, all of which was operating way faster than the company was uh like even had a concept of. And so it's like lessons from both of those scaling experiences, like it's it's interesting because probably one of the biggest ones is just like you you've got to get out of your own way, like as a as a like self-described, like really good overachiever, like just like move out of the way, I'll roll up my sleeves, get the like do it myself. Like you can't do that when you're growing so big. You basically just need to like get out of the way. As a leader, you need to grow personally at or ahead of the rate of growth of the company, which is really crazy when you're thinking about how fast you can grow in hypergrowth. And maybe the third thing is like you can't be perfect. Like I like to say, is like you just need to be directionally correct. Like we can never get things right. Like it's like, it's like there's no such thing as like like making the plan and getting it perfectly right. It's like, no, no, no, we just need to wait the dice. We're just trying to like be directionally correct, make it like slightly better than if than if we didn't put our hand on that decision.

Angela Robertson 5:12

Yeah, when you think about it, you have to build the road, right? To take you there. And it's not always going to be like directionally A to B. It's not clear. You're putting the pavement down as you're, you know, road driving down it. So that's amazing. You've said that the old startup playbooks no longer work. Um what assumptions do founders need to let go of in today's business landscape?

Miranda Lievers 5:36

Oh, that's a good question. Uh yeah, I mean, obviously my brand is torched the playbooks and and and I and at other times I'm like, no, no, no. Like we need playbooks, but we need playbooks for the right things. I think we over-optimize on this idea um twofold. Number one, we have this idea that what worked before will continue to work, or what worked in other organizations will work in ours. And that is probably one of the biggest ones is we have like again in this scaling phase where it's like, okay, like we need to create processes and systems around the stuff that we are doing and that is working here. But what we need to be conscious of is when the context underneath the playbooks that we have built for ourselves shifts, that's where we can get ourselves into trouble. And so, like everybody's favorite example is like when COVID happened, obviously, like everybody's context shifted and we understood that and we understood that things were breaking. But sometimes context shifts in simple ways that we actually just don't notice. And so then the playbooks that we have put in place like no longer make sense because something else changed. And we're seeing that a lot now with AI, right? I mean, because AI is changing so much about how we do work and how how things happen between companies and so on and so forth. And so things that worked the way that they did for a really long time in many cases are not working anymore. And we need to go back to sort of like the startup view to be like, okay, well, how do we think about this now? Because we need to go through that whole process of reimagining before we solidify things into playbooks. Things should only be in playbooks when they get boring. Like when it's like so repetitive that you can do it in your sleep and it's boring, that's the time for a playbook. Anytime before that, not the time. And when things get chaotic, uh, we probably need to rip it up and go back to zero.

Angela Robertson 7:12

I think that's so important, especially this piece of like the context can shift subtly, right? And I think like what you've picked up on right now with AI shifting, there's a lot of founders and companies that are going, okay, well, that's happening over there, but it doesn't really affect my like hardware-based business. So I don't need to worry about that. But like, let's be real, the context has shifted, right? You gotta, you know, wake up and figure out what is going to be the next move or or what might shift, even just in your day-to-day of how you're doing work, even if it hasn't affected your product or your customers. Like, how is it affecting your team and how they're thinking and moving?

Miranda Lievers 7:49

Yeah. And I think what you just said, like those are some of the most concerning conversations I'm having right now with founders, is the people who are like, yeah, but like it really doesn't affect me. Um, because it, you know, obviously like the earlier stage folks, like there's lots of people who are like very aware, like how much this is sort of shaking the snow globe, right? Where it's like, I don't know what's gonna happen or I don't know where I am at, but I can see that things are shifting. And I am much more concerned about the people who are like, like, it, I don't really think that this is going to impact me because even if it, you know, as you just said, it's like it like it has its fingers in everything. So it's like, how do we do work? How do the partners that we work with today do work? How do the companies that we serve and support and how do the ones that serve and support us navigate this and even like competitively, right? So it's like, you know, we might have a supplier or or something that we rely on where it's like, oh, this has been a relationship for a really long time. We're not really thinking about it, but their industry might be getting decimated, and we might see some of those people, you know, having to shift and pivot. And so it's it's really a shake the snow globe sort of moment that requires sort of like us to just be really aware of what's going on, even when it seems and it's maybe especially when it seems uh like things are smooth sailing.

Angela Robertson 9:03

Yeah. Yeah. So true. You when you stepped away from th think if you took a two-year sabbatical. What did that time teach you about identity, success, and leadership?

Miranda Lievers 9:16

You know, it's funny because when I first took my sabbatical, I gave myself like the first rule because a really smart people gave me the advice of not starting anything right away. And so I gave myself the rule of like at least six months, don't start anything. I wasn't allowing myself to like don't take board seats, don't take any ongoing advisory, like nothing ongoing. And that was really good advice because I think that especially as entrepreneurs, often our default mode is just to like, like on the next day, all of a sudden we'd be accidentally starting a startup and on like two advisory boards and like all sorts of stuff. And so I didn't do that, thankfully. But the first thing I did is I was like, oh, okay, now I get time to schedule self-work, was like I've like, I've never had time for this. Like, let's do self-work. And so I built a spreadsheet because I'm super nerd. So then I was like, let's like, I want to analyze every project that I've ever done and what I liked about it and what I didn't like about it, so I could quantifiably determine how I want to spend like the next chapter of my life. Anyways, so fast forward turns out I'm autistic. It's like that's a very narrow, spicy thing to do. Anyways, so yeah, so I ended up going down all sorts of of fun rabbit holes and and realizing that I had put in place all sorts of like I built a whole company around how I happen to work. And it turns out that's not entirely how the rest of the world works. And I ended up so on the concept of identity, it's like, oh, well, actually I got an autism diagnosis. Everything makes way more sense now. Um and spent a lot of time just uh learning what I like to do and what brings me joy and thinking much more expansively about how I show up in the world and how I serve in the world and what I want to do next.

Angela Robertson 10:51

So important that you were able to find more within yourself and that helped to expand your worldview. I think that's such a difficult, that's an easy thing to say, but a much more difficult thing to do.

Miranda Lievers 11:02

It is, and I and I'm and I'm very aware of the privilege of having the space to do that. And but but honestly, like I I would if I had to choose between every other thing that I've done professionally in my life, including like the crazy IPO and all of that, or the two years of sabbatical, like it's like I would give up everything else for the two years that I was able to spend focusing on me.

Angela Robertson 11:27

And that you made the intention of study it on you too, right? Because that's such an important choice. I think that leads right into where I was thinking we might go next, which is that mo many founders struggle to scale without burning themselves or their teams out, right? You know, sometimes we can take breaks, so that's not always practical or possible. What systems or mindset shifts do you think make sustainable growth possible?

Miranda Lievers 11:55

Yeah, that's a good it's it's such a good question that I'm writing a book pretty much on that exact like because yes, like a hundred percent. I think um so I'm writing a book called The Scaling Fallacy. And the scaling fallacy is believing that pushing harder is what unlocks the next level. Because everything before that moment in our life, like that's how we got it, right? Like we hustled harder, we worked harder. Um, the whole startup process is basically just like believing in something that nobody else possibly believes is possible and going all in and doing that for a really long time. And that is what gets us the opportunity to get to scaling, but scaling turns into this whole other thing because now the thing that we were doing is actually working or working in some way. And now we've got a team around us. And now decisions that we make are not just impacting us. Like it's really easy to be like, I don't care. Like I'm doing it anyway. I can see the vision. And that becomes so much harder to do with conviction when the path gets less clear, when things are much more murky. And when you have, like, in our case, like we, you know, we grew to like 500 people. You have 500 families who are relying on you to feed their, you know, like you feed their families and pay their like rent and mortgages and all of that. And so it becomes so much more challenging to have that same conviction and to like navigate that like very awkward teenage phase where you are not a startup and you are not at scale. And there are some very real repercussions around that. And so uh I think maybe like in the context of like the time that we have in this conversation, it's really just like you're not alone. Like this is like a very like that feeling of ungroundedness of like, I don't even know if I'm cut out for this. I don't know that I'm even supposed to be here. Like uh this feels painful. This feels like I have to give up more than I thought that I maybe did. Um, maybe this doesn't look and feel on the inside like how I thought it might look and feel um when I was looking in from the outside. And it's a bit of a different task entirely, but we need to be able to see what's right in front of us in ways that I think that um we don't learn.

Angela Robertson 14:07

We don't learn. Yeah. Yeah. We have to have that sort of lateral piece to it too, right? You know, we put our heads down, we're driving, and we're just trying to keep our foot on the gas the whole time, but that can break us too, right? It calls back to that notion of like at scale, the leader has to be growing even faster than the rate of pace at the company. But if we also don't like look up and out, we don't allow ourselves that opportunity to grow, right?

Miranda Lievers 14:38

Yeah, yeah. And it goes, you know, I said it before, is like it's really about like being directionally correct, not perfect. We actually have to give ourselves permission to not be like just pushing and trying to be right all the time. It's like actually like it's like this is a this is a machine and it's in motion. And so our job is not to have every single step like perfectly executed and and driven. It's like, no, we just need to be directionally correct. We need to be, uh I like to say we dance with like one step, like one foot on the map, which is like the known where we are and what we understand, and one foot off of the map. We don't like parachute all the way off the map into the middle of nowhere. That's chaos. We just like dance with like one foot on the map, one foot off of the map, have grace for ourselves, directionally correct. We need to recognize that we can sprint for times, but we can't sprint forever. And so we need to be careful about how we ask that of ourselves and of our teams and create a pace that we can continue to manage and have have grace for both of those motions. Cause ultimately, in the middle, we're really like running two companies at once. Part of our company is still in startup mode and part of our company is in scale, like is at scale mode. And the parts of those, like it's constantly shifting, the balance between the two. And so we actually need to hold both.

Angela Robertson 15:51

And so for founders listening who feel overwhelmed in the middle of scaling in this dance that they're doing between these two companies, really, that they're building at the same time. What is one truth you wish someone had told you earlier?

Miranda Lievers 16:06

It's hard because like I can think of lots of truths I could tell myself, and I don't know what I would have listened to, you know? So I think that that's like a whole separate thing. If I could have gotten myself to actually listen and hear, then probably what I most needed to understand was this idea that uh even though it feels like it, like it's like that you don't have time, you have time. But also like this is why we're part of a team. Like, so this is a thing that we're doing together. Um and uh and we can we can ask more of our team than we think that we can. And that doesn't mean like burn out our team and ask them to sprint forever. Like that's not good for anybody. But we uh we're not alone in this. We can share the load, we can accept, and especially probably accept for ourselves that we know that we don't have all the answers. We don't need to have all the answers. The goal is to be directionally correct um and just keep what putting one fit foot in front of the other and the and the the job is moving at a hell like like at a good clip, but not a clip that you can't maintain because this isn't, I mean, it's not a sprint, like it's a marathon, like but you've gotta we've gotta operate at a at a clip that we can maintain because even if we think that like no no no like we just need to get over this one ridge and then we're gonna be there, it's like no, like that it's like you need to have a pace that you can keep going because it's not it's not just over the ridge.

Angela Robertson 17:26

No, there's another ridge beyond that, always. Thank you so much, Miranda. I so appreciated this conversation. I know our listeners well as well, and I'm just so grateful that you have been able to share so authentically your journey. And I know that so many folks who are listening in might be feeling like they're running at that pace. So I hope that they have taken away this notion of they're not alone and they are, you know, with their teams, and this is a marathon, not a sprint. So thank you for all those wise words.

Miranda Lievers 18:02

Thanks so much, Angela. It was great to be here.

Angela Robertson 18:04

At Ace Tech, we believe one of the most valuable resources a leader can access is another leader's experience. That's why I created the Stormy Stories show to bring you honest conversations about the moments that test us, shape us, and ultimately make us better CEOs and founders. Thanks for listening, and I'll see you next time.