(2024-01-30) Verna There's A Whole Lot Of Ugly Out There When It Comes To Growth Teams

Elena Verna There's a whole lot of ugly out there when it comes to growth teams. It’s hard to believe that 15 years ago, growth as a discipline didn’t exist. Yet nowadays nearly every company wants to cash in on the growth team ‘promise’: for growth to take them on that coveted exponential growth curve to unicorn status

But there is a problem: there's a whole lot of ugly out there when it comes to growth teams....resulting in the systematic failure of growth teams and growth efforts across the entire industry.

This issue starts at the top.

The problem is that most of the executives don’t actually understand growth fundamentals, yet make huge strategic and operational growth decisions that are just… bad.

Let’s dive into ten symptoms of a bad growth team.

1. Allergic to monetization

teams often blindly chase after user acquisition, bringing all sorts of unqualified and confused users through the door.

Sometimes they focus on activation, which is only slightly better, because not all engaged users can be monetized

2. Retention avoidance

Chasing new users and revenue without a thought for churn or retention is like filling a bucket with a giant hole at the bottom

3. 'Hacks' fixation

The original idea was to showcase growth opportunities businesses were leaving on the table that could be scooped up by ‘growth hacking’, i.e. dedicated efforts. But people ruined it (as they always do). It got twisted into a desperate search for quick fixes and shady tactics

4. Profitability Blindness

I don’t care if you are a startup or an established enterprise—profitability (or at least a path to it) should always be a priority for a growth team. So understanding profit and margins is crucial for any growth leader

5. Premature Growth Team Hiring

Hiring a growth team before you even know if your product has product-market fit (PMF) is a surefire way to ensure that your product never actually reaches PMF. Founders, please don’t waste your capital. Instead, you've got to wear the growth hat first—it’s called founder-led growth and it’s a real thing. Wear it till you are about $1M in ARR—then hire away for growth. (Should you also be passing the Very Disappointed test?)

6. Siloed Growth Syndrome

7. Data Aversion

In order to run effective experiments, you need data.

8. Customer Amnesia

A lot of Growth teams overlook talking with their customers. (customer development)

Growth is as much about people’s psychology as it is about the quantitative side of your business

Picking up the phone and talking to the customers is the most rudimentary way to solve this, but don’t forget you already have customer feedback across support tickets, sales calls, social media, surveys

9. Failure Phobia

many growth teams are faced with internal freak out if they ever ‘fail’ an a/b test.

10. Dislocated Growth Teams

The most common example I see? Someone who is supposed to lead product-led growth efforts, while sitting in marketing… whaa? Product-led growth means the product is responsible for activating, engaging, and selling itself. If you are not in product, with engineering resources, how exactly are you supposed to achieve that?

the road to a good growth team depends on company leadership investing the time and resources needed to understand their companies’ unique growth needs.