By Co-Founder min read.jpg)
I’ve sat inside some of the fastest-growing businesses in the Australian apparel industry. I’ve also worked with businesses that chased growth without strategic clarity and ended up breaking themselves in the process.
I’ve seen the same patterns play out again and again. It doesn’t come down to talent, vision, ambition, the product in question, or even what your competitors are doing – although those things obviously play a massive role.
The businesses that navigate growth well tend to have one thing in common: clarity. They are exceptionally clear on what they are trying to build, how they intend to win, and what they are prepared to say no to.
Here are five different ways a lack of clarity can manifest itself in business.
1. YOUR STRATEGY IS UNCLEAR - TO YOUR TEAM, YOUR CUSTOMERS, AND POSSIBLY EVEN YOURSELF
The concept of a business strategy can often be misunderstood (or overcomplicated), but getting clear on this is absolutely critical. Think of your strategy as your internal guiding light: a clear view of where you will compete, what customers you are competing for, and how you intend to win. It becomes the benchmark against which you and your team judge every major business decision, including pricing, product, hiring, channels, structure, branding and investment – and ultimately how you measure success.
Who will your business be? What are you offering that the market doesn’t already have? Who are you targeting? Are you a “must have” for potential customers, or just another option in the market? This needs to be clearly articulated internally, and everyone in the business needs to understand it and actively work towards it.
Strategy is also about what you don’t do. If something doesn’t align with the strategy, it shouldn’t happen. That sounds simple, but maintaining that discipline when an exciting opportunity lands on your desk is much harder than defining the strategy in the first place.
Surround yourself with switched-on people who can pressure test your strategy, challenge your assumptions and bring expertise you don’t have. This can be a delicate balance – too many opinions can overwhelm, particularly if those voices don’t have the right expertise. Have a trusted circle of people with the relevant experience who can give you clarity, not more confusion.
Strategic clarity not only makes for faster, clearer decisions and better resource allocation, it also leads to higher staff engagement and stronger positioning in market.
2. YOU JUMP AT OPPORTUNITIES THAT DON'T ALIGN WITH YOUR STRATEGY
The true test of your strategy, and your discipline, is what happens when an attractive opportunity comes along that doesn’t quite fit.
This is a real risk for many businesses. The apparel and lifestyle space is full of brands that started with a clear point of view and then diluted it by chasing growth in ways that didn’t make sense for them. It’s only human to want to jump on opportunities as they arise, especially when you’ve got that exciting feeling of momentum driving you. But those opportunities need to be carefully weighed up. Does that new category or market make sense for you? Is that retailer a good fit? What are you saying to your core customer by making that move?
The businesses that grow sustainably tend to do fewer things better. They know exactly who they’re for, they go deep in that lane, and they let that focus compound over time. If they do decide to pursue a new category, market or channel, it’s only after careful consideration – and with the honest acknowledgement that the strategy may have changed. And it’s important to mention that changing strategy isn’t failure; businesses need to change strategy as they evolve to meet the needs of the market. But a conscious strategy shift is very different to drifting into a different strategy without realising it.
I see plenty of brands fishing in different markets hoping something will stick. Over time, that lack of focus can dilute the brand, put pressure on margins and ultimately create a business that is difficult to sustain.
Lock in on the thing you are truly passionate about, understand where you can genuinely win, and get after it.
3. YOU UNDERESTIMATE WHAT GROWTH WILL DEMAND FROM THE BUSINESS
Even when your strategy is dialled and you’re seeking the right opportunities, underestimating what growth will demand from the business is a huge vulnerability.
An example I have seen play out many times over the years: a business wins a large account, launches a new product or enters a new market, and the top line grows. Everyone celebrates. Then six months later, the cash position doesn’t make sense and no one can work out why.
Often, it’s because the true cost and complexity of that growth haven’t been properly understood or planned for. Before you pursue any significant growth lever, you need to know exactly what it costs to service that growth. Growth creates complexity – more SKUs, more customers, more suppliers, more systems, more people, more touchpoints. The operational infrastructure that worked at one level of the business can crack under the weight of the next phase. If you haven’t built for it ahead of time, growth can become the thing that breaks a business.
The best growth plans account for what needs to be true operationally before the revenue actually arrives. In apparel, one rule of thumb I’ve always worked to is being cash positive enough to cover your third production order. A lot of businesses go full steam ahead in an early business phase without thinking about how they are going to pay for what comes next. New designs, more marketing, expanded production costs. What happens if your brand gets picked up by a large retailer? What if they want 60–90 day payment terms? What if existing sales are sluggish – how are you going to pay for the next shipment to fulfil those orders? And can you actually produce and deliver the next shipment in time to meet the larger client’s demand?
There’s another risk that often gets overlooked when planning for growth: assuming that today’s demand will still be there tomorrow, or that positive feedback from your close network will translate into genuine market demand. We’ve experienced this ourselves, and I see it constantly with other businesses. The people closest to you will often be the most supportive of a new idea, product or direction – but genuine enthusiasm isn’t the same thing as willingness to buy. Until the broader market validates the idea with actual customers and revenue, you don’t really know if there’s genuine demand for it. That matters because growth decisions often require you to commit cash before that demand is proven. You’re ordering stock, increasing production, investing in marketing and potentially taking on additional people or infrastructure based on what you believe demand will be.
I’ve also found it’s never wise to overestimate customer loyalty. Customers are fickle, and if your customer has a better opportunity, lower price or something new or exciting grabbing their attention, there’s a high chance they will switch. Now you have increased stock holding, purchase orders paid and in production, with reduced demand.
These are just some of the endless examples I’ve witnessed. Before you chase growth, understand exactly what that growth is going to demand from the business.
4. YOU HAVEN'T DEFINED WHAT SUCCESS ACTUALLY MEANS
Growth is not the same thing as success.
I’ve seen businesses chase revenue, distribution, headcount and market share simply because those things look like progress. But it’s important to ask yourself – what are you actually trying to build? How big does the business need to be? What level of profitability do you need? What role do you want to have as the owner? Are you building for scale, lifestyle, independence, legacy or an eventual exit? There is no right answer, but there needs to be a clear answer. And when you’ve made the call, back yourself and stick with it.
Once you know what success looks like, you can put some meaningful measures around it. You don’t need 40 KPIs. You need to know the handful of numbers and outcomes that genuinely tell you whether you are moving towards the business you set out to build. Always play the long game. How do key decisions look in 3, 5, 10 years? For each decision, what does success look like? Will this decision play a positive role in the company’s health and long-term success?
I regularly work with business owners who have achieved significant growth but aren’t particularly happy with where the business has taken them. I encourage people to have tough conversations with themselves about how they define success, and whether they genuinely feel like they’re on the right track.
5. YOU EXPECT INSTANT RESULTS
Just as jumping in too many different directions can be damaging, so can pulling back too quickly.
I’ve seen businesses identify a genuine opportunity and start moving towards it, only to get spooked by the risk or investment required and pull back before the strategy has had time to work.
Time, money and resources have already been invested, but there is almost always a lag before you see meaningful returns. That can be genuinely uncomfortable. But if the move was strategically sound enough to pursue in the first place, you need to be prepared to stay the course long enough to give it a genuine chance.
That doesn’t mean blindly sticking with a bad strategy. You need clear measures for what progress should look like and a timeframe over which you’ll assess them. If the evidence tells you the strategy isn’t working, adapt. But don’t abandon a sound strategy simply because the results haven’t happened as quickly as you hoped.
THE COMMON THREAD
There is a clear common thread connecting all of these issues: a lack of clarity about what the business is actually trying to do, why it is doing it, and what needs to happen to create success. And by success, I mean both the success of the business and the life you want it to support.
Growth in business is rarely easy. But it becomes a hell of a lot easier when you have the clarity to know which opportunities are worth pursuing and which ones aren’t.
With any business I work with, I’m simultaneously thinking about the next year, five years from now and ten years from now. We can’t always predict the future, but there are ways to set ourselves up for the best chance of success, whatever comes our way.
