Out and In.
A business can hit every number and still be failing the person who runs it.
Drew Sloss built and ran a 250-person, five-location business for 24 years. He now mentors founders and owners.
“I don’t know if I can be more happy, but I know for sure I can be much more unhappy.”
I said that out loud, on camera, in a documentary about our climbing gyms. An opportunity had come along to grow the business. I could see that the upside was small and the downside was large. I saw it so clearly I said it into a lens.
And I went ahead anyway.
The expansion was harder and slower than we planned, and it landed right on top of something my family had spent two years building toward. We had homeschooled, saved, and made our life smaller so we could spend a full ski season in Colorado together. I call a goal like that a summit: something you name on purpose and are willing to sacrifice to reach. We made it. And I spent that season getting up at four in the morning to work, managing a struggling launch remotely.
Nobody is going to feel sorry for a guy working from a ski lift, and they shouldn’t. What I lost was harder to see. I was there, but my head was somewhere else. That season was our family’s summit, and I spent it working toward a summit for the business that I had never named.
So here is what I believe.
A business has to serve out and in.
Out means your customers, your team, and your community. We opened our first gym because we wanted to bring indoor rock climbing to a city we loved. A business that serves only its owner has failed.
In means you and the people you love: your health, your time, your pay, your marriage, your kids’ birthdays, and the life you went into business to build in the first place.
When one side pays for the other, the business is failing, no matter what the P&L says.
Most owners I know have the out side covered. They would never cheat a customer or burn out a team on purpose. The in side is the one they give away, a little at a time, and call it commitment.
This usually shows up in small ways, like a vacation cut short by a phone call or a raise everyone on the team gets except the owner. Sometimes it hides in a policy.
A friend of mine who owns a business took the same two weeks of vacation her employees got. That was the policy, so that was her policy. For years, she held to it, even though she was carrying far more weight than anyone else in the building. Over time, she saw that her role needed a different set of rules.
Fairness is a noble instinct. But equal time off on an unequal load isn’t fair to the person carrying it. A business that won’t let its owner set down the pack has forgotten what it’s for.
You can hit the number, open the next location, land the exit, and still have lost. None of this means climbing less, though. I’m still ambitious and still love what’s possible. I just know now what the ambition is for.
Name your summit.
Make it your own, not borrowed from your industry, your family, or a younger version of yourself. Make it specific, so you can use it to say no.
Name your guardrails.
Pick what no business decision is allowed to cost you, like dinner at home or getting to your kids at a moment’s notice. Decide before the next good opportunity shows up, because in the moment, most of us negotiate against our own interest.
Name the end before you start.
Every summit costs something. Say what it will cost, who will pay it, and when it’s over. A sacrifice with no end date just keeps going, and the people paying for it never got a vote.
Bring your people.
The people your summit will affect most should help shape it. They see things you can’t from where you stand, and the view is better when they get there with you.
Progress is a direction. You can’t make it until you know where you’re headed, which is why naming the summit comes first. A business can be a long way from finished and still be making progress, as long as it’s headed somewhere you chose and the costs stay within the limits you set.
And if you reach the summit without the people you love, all you’ve done is arrive.
Right direction. With your people. That’s how We. Progress.
Name your summit.
This workbook turns the manifesto into five tools you can use this week, including the Out and In Audit, Name Your Guardrails, and the Summit Filter for your next big decision. It runs eleven pages and takes about an hour.
Want a second set of eyes on your summit?
Bring the decision in front of you to a 15-minute call.