7 Mistakes You’re Making with Business Growth (and How the 4 Drivers Fix Them)

Look, we’ve all been there. You’re growing your business, things are looking good, and then BAM, you hit a wall. Maybe revenue plateaus. Maybe your team starts burning out. Maybe you’re working 80-hour weeks and wondering where the hell your life went.

Here’s the thing: most growth problems aren’t about market conditions or bad luck. They’re about seven predictable mistakes that trip up even the smartest founders. The good news? Once you know what they are, you can fix them using a framework that actually works.

Let me walk you through the seven biggest growth killers I see, and show you how the 4 Drivers of Leadership can turn each one around.

Mistake #1: Chasing Every Shiny Object

You know this one. New opportunity comes up, and suddenly you’re launching a second business before your first one is running smoothly. Or you’re adding new product lines because “diversification is smart,” right?

Wrong. This is how you end up with three mediocre businesses instead of one great one.

The 4 Drivers Fix: This is a classic Commitment problem. You haven’t fully committed to making your core business exceptional. Real commitment means saying no to good opportunities so you can say yes to great ones. Ask yourself: “What have I explicitly committed to that others can see?” If the answer is “everything,” you’ve committed to nothing.

Mistake #2: Expanding Before You’ve Mastered Your Core

I see this constantly. Companies that haven’t even dominated their local market trying to go national. Agencies taking on any client with a pulse instead of becoming the best at serving one type of customer.

Going broad before going deep is like building a house on quicksand. Looks impressive until it collapses.

The 4 Drivers Fix: This requires both Commitment and Performance. Commit to being the absolute best at one thing before you tackle two things. Set clear performance metrics for market dominance in your core area. Are you the go-to solution for your ideal client? Can you consistently deliver exceptional results? If not, adding complexity will only multiply your problems.

Mistake #3: The “I’ll Do It Myself” Trap

Here’s a fun fact: the number one reason businesses plateau is because the founder becomes the bottleneck. You’re still approving every email, reviewing every proposal, making every decision. Congratulations, you’ve built yourself a very expensive job.

The 4 Drivers Fix: This is where Influence and Adaptability come in. You need to build trust with your team so you can actually delegate (that’s Influence). And you need to adapt from being a doer to being a leader (that’s Adaptability). Start by asking: “How much do others trust me in the four trust dimensions, sincerity, reliability, competence, and care?” If trust is low, delegation will fail every time.

Mistake #4: Flying Without a Flight Plan

No clear priorities. No defined objectives. Just a vague sense that you need to “grow the business.” This is how you end up spinning your wheels, working incredibly hard but moving nowhere fast.

The 4 Drivers Fix: Pure Performance driver territory. You need clear goals, measurable metrics, and accountability systems. Ask yourself: “Are results clearly defined and tracked?” If your team can’t tell you exactly what success looks like this quarter, you’re flying blind.

Mistake #5: Treating People Like Interchangeable Parts

You hire fast and hope for the best. No real onboarding. Minimal training. When someone struggles, you just replace them instead of developing them. Then you wonder why you can’t retain good people or why it takes forever to get new hires productive.

The 4 Drivers Fix: This hits Influence and Performance simultaneously. Strong leaders invest in their people because they understand that your business growth is limited by your team’s capability. The diagnostic question is: “How do you handle difficult conversations?” If you’re avoiding them instead of having them with care and sincerity, your people aren’t growing.

Mistake #6: Building Products in a Vacuum

You fall in love with your idea and assume everyone else will too. You spend months building the “perfect” solution without talking to customers. Or worse, you do talk to them, but only to confirm what you already believe.

The 4 Drivers Fix: Adaptability is your friend here. Markets change. Customer needs evolve. Your assumptions are probably wrong. Great leaders stay open to feedback and adapt based on what they learn. Ask yourself: “Where are you resisting change instead of embracing it?” If you’re not regularly having your assumptions challenged, you’re in trouble.

Mistake #7: Ignoring the Voice of Your Market

Customer complaints get dismissed as isolated incidents. Market feedback gets filtered through rose-colored glasses. You keep pushing forward with your strategy even when the market is telling you something different.

The 4 Drivers Fix: This is Adaptability and Influence working together. You need to adapt your approach based on market feedback (Adaptability), and you need to build systems to regularly collect and act on customer input (Influence through building trust with your market). The key question: “How do you respond to unexpected challenges or setbacks?” If your response is to double down instead of recalibrate, you’re missing crucial growth opportunities.

How the 4 Drivers Work Together for Growth

Here’s what most people miss: these drivers aren’t separate tools, they’re an integrated system. When you’re trying to scale your business:

Commitment gives you the clarity to say no to distractions and yes to what matters most. It’s your North Star.

Adaptability keeps you flexible as markets shift and challenges arise. It’s your shock absorber.

Influence builds the trust and relationships you need to scale through people, not just personal effort. It’s your multiplier.

Performance turns all that leadership potential into actual results that you can measure and improve. It’s your scoreboard.

When one driver is weak, the whole system suffers. Try to scale with weak Commitment, and you’ll chase every opportunity. Scale with weak Influence, and you’ll burn out trying to do everything yourself. Scale with weak Adaptability, and you’ll break when the market inevitably changes.

The Bottom Line

Most growth problems aren’t actually growth problems: they’re leadership problems disguised as business problems. You can’t solve a Commitment issue with better marketing. You can’t fix an Influence problem with more systems. You can’t overcome an Adaptability challenge with harder work.

But when you develop all four drivers intentionally, growth becomes less about grinding and more about leading. Less about doing everything and more about creating the conditions where your business can thrive without you having to micromanage every detail.

Want to see how the 4 Drivers can transform your specific growth challenges? Check out our comprehensive guide to scaling without sacrifice or learn more about activating all 4 drivers in your leadership approach.

The mistakes are predictable. The solutions are proven. The only question is: are you ready to stop making the same growth mistakes and start building the business you actually want to run?