The Superhuman Paradox: When Growing Slower Means Growing Bigger
The Minimum Viable Growth Formula: When saying 'no' to $8M monthly revenue is the right call
Imagine turning down $8.25M in monthly revenue.
In 2019, Rahul Vohra's email company Superhuman had 275,000 people on their waitlist, each ready to pay $30/month. Most founders would have rushed to capture that revenue. Instead, Vohra limited growth to 100 new users per week, insisting on a 30-minute video call with each.
Critics argued they were leaving money on the table, but the strategy was clear: this wasn't just another email app, but an experience people would rely on daily. Rapid growth would have compromised the product's uniqueness.
By 2023, Superhuman reached $100M+ ARR with the highest SaaS retention rate. Meanwhile, faster-growing startups that mocked Vohra's conservatism collapsed.
In 2024, startups face a paradox: the success you're chasing might kill you. This happens because founders believe three myths that make rapid growth seem desirable and necessary.
Myth #1: "Growth solves all problems"
Silicon Valley's favorite delusion claims its latest victim: WeWork. This delusion, from Facebook's "Move Fast and Break Things" era, is the belief that rapid growth will solve fundamental business problems. WeWork grew from $4M to $4B in revenue only to discover that growth magnified their problems. Their $47B valuation evaporated as they admitted what careful observers knew: growing faster doesn't fix broken unit economics.
Myth #2: "Raise quickly, spend quickly, grow quickly"
The 2021 playbook is claiming its victims. Just ask Hopin, which raised $1.6B in two years, reached a $7.75B valuation, and then laid off 90% of their staff when reality hit. Their story teaches us: Capital isn't oxygen - it's rocket fuel. Use too much, and you'll explode.
Myth #3: "We'll figure out unit economics later."
In 2021, Casper Sleep exemplified the "grow now, profit later" strategy of the zero-interest era. The company traded growth for profitability until they couldn't anymore. By 2022, they were delisted and sold for a fraction of their original value. In 2024's 5%+ interest rate environment, this strategy is not just risky - it's extremely hazardous financially.
The Hidden Tax of Hypergrowth
Hypergrowth often resembles changing a plane's engines mid-flight. Companies hitting rapid growth milestones frequently fall apart.
This is what hypergrowth looks like. In 2023, three prominent startups showed how rapid scaling can break a company:
The hidden tax of hypergrowth manifests in three areas: customer support systems collapse under increased demand (one fintech saw NPS drop from 70 to 15), engineering velocity halts due to technical debt, and company culture dissolves when rapid hiring outpaces integration (one AI company's employee satisfaction plummeted from 4.8 to 2.1).
Hypergrowth math: At 20% month-over-month, you're doubling every 4 months. Your systems, team, and culture need to reinvent themselves three times a year. Most companies can handle one major reorganization annually. Doing it quarterly will break something - whether it's your support system, engineering velocity, or culture.
We need a better approach to growth, considering not just how fast we can grow, but how fast we should.
The Minimum Viable Growth Framework
What's the alternative to hypergrowth? It's not slow growth - it's synchronized growth.
A startup operates like an orchestra, where each section must work in harmony. When sales operate at full volume while the product team is still learning, the result isn't growth—it's chaos. This isn't just an analogy; the data supports it.
The Minimum Viable Growth Framework emerged from a 2023 case study. A high-growth SaaS company ($50M ARR, 120% annual growth) discovered their sales team was closing 100 new customers monthly but could properly onboard only 40. Their solution was to slow down, capping growth at sustainable levels and focusing on operational excellence. The result: sustainable growth increased from 60% to 85% while burn rate dropped 40%.
Sustainable growth depends on harmonizing four critical rates:
Customer Acquisition Rate: Focus on creating advocates, not just adding logos. In 2012, Stripe capped growth, leading to $800B in annual processing while faster-growing competitors vanished.
Revenue Growth Rate: Prioritize quality revenue over quantity. Zoom's focus on enterprise customers yielded 140% net retention, while competitors chasing broader growth struggled with 70%.
Operational Capacity Rate: Match growth to organizational capabilities. Notion's 18-month waitlist strategy maintained quality while scaling.
Resource Consumption Rate: Convert capital efficiently into sustainable growth. Atlassian turned $32M into $200M by treating every dollar as an investment in lasting value.
The crucial principle of the MVG Framework is that a company's true growth rate isn't the average of these four rates - it's the minimum. An organization is only as strong as its most vulnerable part, like a chain. When companies push beyond their weakest capacity, the entire system fails.
Fast's dramatic implosion in early 2023 provides a stark warning. The one-click checkout startup pushed for 300% annual revenue while their operational capacity could handle only 50%. They attempted to bridge this gap with aggressive hiring and temporary fixes. For a while, they overcame basic business principles. Then, in a single quarter:
Customer complaints jumped 500%.
Employee turnover hit 40%.
Technical incidents doubled.
Cash burn tripled.
Six months later, they were laying off half their staff. The attempt to outrun fundamental problems amplified them.
The New Playbook
What does this look like in practice? How do you implement MVG without sacrificing ambition?
The answer isn't to grow slowly - it's to grow intelligently. It's about discovering your company's optimal rhythm, like a runner finding their natural stride. Some companies are already demonstrating this.
Success Story: Notion
When Notion launched in 2016, the company made an unconventional choice. Despite investor pressure to "blitz scale" and comparisons to Slack, it kept the waitlist active for 18 months, limiting growth.
The strategy was unconventional but purposeful. They were building a tool people would trust with their important work. Breaking that trust was not an option.
The results? By 2023, Notion had:
After 4 funding rounds, the company reached $800M in ARR.
Maintained a retention rate of over 90%.
Built a community for user marketing.
Achieved profitability while competitors burned cash.
Failure Story: Zilingo
Zilingo's story contrasts with the MVG coin. This Southeast Asian fashion marketplace grew from $1M to $400M in revenue in four years. From the outside, it appeared as perfect execution of the aggressive growth strategy.
But they were breaking every MVG rule:
Customer Acquisition Rate outpaced their service ability.
Revenue Growth Rate masked deteriorating unit economics.
Operational capacity couldn't meet demand.
Resource Consumption used up $300M in funding.
By 2022, the company had collapsed. The analysis was clear: they grew the top line but lost control of everything else.
The cathedral builders of medieval Europe offer a lesson for modern startups. Their architectural principle remains relevant: the taller the structure, the deeper its foundation.
In 2024, we're seeing a great divergence:
Growth-at-all-costs companies are hitting their structural limits.
The MVG practitioners are building empires.
The market is finally learning to differentiate.
Tomorrow morning, do these three things:
Calculate your true burn rate, including hidden costs like team exhaustion and technical debt.
Measure your team's capacity, including their ability to maintain quality, not just headcount.
Track customer success metrics beyond NPS to actual value delivered.
Remember: Your optimal growth rate isn't a number you choose or that VCs dictate. It's a number you discover through careful observation and honest assessment. The hardest thing for a founder is to say "not yet" when everything and everyone is urging "now."
The cathedrals still standing weren't built by the fastest builders, but the wisest. They understood that speed isn't the enemy - imbalance is. In 2024's market, that wisdom isn't just nice to have - it's the difference between building something lasting and something collapsing under its weight.
The choice is yours. But remember: the best time to fix your growth rate is now, before external factors force your decision. Just ask the founders who wished they read this a year ago.
_____
Did this post resonate with you? If you found value in these insights, let us know! Hit the 'like' button or share your thoughts in the comments. Your feedback not only motivates us but also helps shape future content. Together, we can build a community that empowers entrepreneurs to thrive. What was your biggest takeaway? We'd love to hear from you!
Interested in taking your startup to the next level? Wildfire Labs is looking for innovative founders like you! Don't miss out on the opportunity to accelerate your business with expert mentorship and resources. Apply now at Wildfire Labs Accelerator https://wildfirelabs.io/apply and ignite your startup's potential. We can't wait to see what you'll achieve!
Growth solves all problems...IF you put the right systems in place to handle the growth.
The key is to be long term greedy. If you're short term greedy and you bite off more than you can chew and deliver a bad experience for customers, that will cost you majorly in the long run.
Rather than growth at all costs, better to ensure everyone who interacts with your brand has a great experience. https://blog.inverteum.com/p/be-long-term-greedy
" An organization is only as strong as its most vulnerable part, like a chain. When companies push beyond their weakest capacity, the entire system fails. "