Things I should’ve done sooner as CEO:

• Hosted dinners with inspiring founders
• Hired a coach to keep me on track
• Hired a Head of Sales to drive rev
• Aligned comp with outcomes
• No meetings before noon
• Held our first offsite

If you're a 7-fig founder, read this: 1/ Hosting dinners with inspiring founders

When you cross 10 employees, you lose your friend circle overnight

The people you hired, many of them friends, become people you need to hold accountable

This period is brutally lonely

Most founders wait too long to hire an Executive Assistant.

They say, “I’m not ready” while drowning in emails, calendar chaos, and $20/hr tasks.

Your business isn’t stuck because you need to do more. It’s stuck because you won’t let go.

How to hire your first EA: Before we dive in… this post is just a preview.

I’ve built a full Notion system to help you delegate, onboard, and scale with an EA.

(You can grab it at the end.)

Let’s get into it:

Most founders never break $10m.

Not because they aren’t smart or hardworking.

They just don’t know how to scale.

I took AppSumo from $3m to $84m in six years. Bootstrapped.

Here’s the exact framework I used to do it: Before we dive in...

This post is a preview of the frameworks I dive into depth with @gregisenberg on his podcast.

You can take a listen here:

Meet Codie Sanchez.

Queen of boring businesses, YouTuber (1.5m+ subs), and author of Main Street Millionaire.

I’ve had the privilege of knowing her for the past 8 years.

11 things I’ve learned from Codie: 1. Power of Social.

When I first met Codie, she had 7 followers and was doing breakout rooms.

Today? She has 6.5 million followers across all social platforms.

It’s no accident. She saw where the world was heading and took advantage.

I was CEO of AppSumo while it grew from $3m to $84m+ in annual revenue.

A few thoughts and hot takes (on how to be an effective CEO): The CEO should be the laziest person in the company.

At AppSumo, hiring an intern to handle admin work freed me up to close deals—doubling our revenue from $4m to $7m in one year.

Automate then delegate anything that doesn’t move the needle.

The CEO is the most unnatural position at any company

You don’t actually “do” anything tangible.

Your output is the output of the team.

Your metrics are the teams metrics.

7 differences between a founder and a CEO: Here's how most small companies operate:

The founder starts the business, does everything by themself, and slowly brings in employees to help with the workload.

But the founder still plays a critical role in every function of the business.

🙃 Founder and CEO are completely different roles

Your job now is not to "do things."

It’s to hire smart operators and set the vision.

7 more harsh truths about being a CEO (that you won’t learn in business books): I took a software marketplace company from $3m to $84m+ in six years as CEO.

5 simple tips to align your team’s interests with your own…

You're one hire away from cutting your problems in half

Two hires from a completely different company

Here are 10 counterintuitive tips to help you build a team that doesn't suck: I was the CEO of AppSumo, a marketplace for software for entrepreneurs

In six years, I took the company from $3m to $84m/year in revenue bootstrapped

But what I’m most proud of is the team we built
($1m+ rev/employee - see below)

Companies are built on Sundays:

- Plan on Sundays
- Execute the plan Monday thru Thursday
- Clean Up Friday
- Rest on Saturday

Here's what that looks like in action: 👇 First, Why Sunday?

Because Mondays are chaotic...

Emails, slack messages, company emergencies.

Sundays? Sundays are quiet.

It's just you, airplane mode, and a fresh cup of coffee.

It's the most important 30 minutes of a CEO's week:

WARNING: this is a long ass post.

(But I’m willing to bet it will be the most valuable post you'll read all week.)

I condensed 6+ years of work as CEO of AppSumo into a 9-step process to help you build a $100m+ business: I was in a unique position at AppSumo because I got to see over 1,000 companies launch. Some went on to 🦄. Others went bankrupt.

I got to identify the common plateaus that plague companies (and used them to grow AppSumo to $84m in Annual Revenue).

Allow me to REintroduce myself

I’m Ayman

Born in Kuwait - Refugeed to USA

My dad is a scientist. My mom is an engineer.

I like to think of myself as both

What I'm most known for is taking AppSumo from $3M to $84M/year in 6 years

The secret? Working Less

Let me explain.. “I just don’t have enough time!!”

It was 11pm and I was monitoring a critical launch for an AppSumo partner

I was Stressed Overwhelmed Burnt out

To add insult to injury, my team was too

But since I was CEO, I thought I had to be involved in everything...

Weekly 1-on-1 meetings are the centerpiece of managing employees

But lots of managers are doing them wrong!

Here's how I run 1-on-1's with my direct reports: I have a simple agenda for 1-on-1 meetings:

1. Say hi and ask about their weekend/week

2. Review action items from last week. Did they get done? Why or why not?

3. Blockers. What problems are stopping you from working most effectively?

4. Action items for both of us.

There are only 5 things a CEO can't delegate:

1⃣ Vision (where you're going)
2⃣ Culture (how you operate)
3⃣ Hiring Exec Team (who will build it)
4⃣ Allocation of Resources (how we spend our money) 5⃣ Cash (ensure survivability)

If you feel overwhelmed as CEO, you're doing too much

Everything else (including managing of the team) can and should eventually be delegated.

Let's break down each one: 1⃣ Vision (where you're going)

CEOs often ask me how do I get my team on the same page?

I ask them: "What does the "same page" mean to you?"

The CEO looking back at me: 👁👄👁

A CEO without a vision is a captain without a map

The CEO is the most unnatural position at any company

You don’t actually “do” anything tangible.

Your output is the output of the team.

Your metrics are the teams metrics.

But in order for the company to be successful, you have to nail 10 major areas of mastery: 1. People - are you hiring the best people for the job?

How many of your problems would go away if you were only surrounded by A players?

Your job as CEO is ensuring you're putting the best team possible on the field.

I was CEO of a company that grew from $3 million to $80 million in annual sales

Here's what my day-to-day looked like through each stage of growth: In the beginning, I was in the weeds doing a little bit of everything

I'd do customer support one day, write our email newsletter the next day, and work on sales the day after that

Everyone talks about hiring 'A' players over B and C players

But only the best CEOs talk about A roles vs. B and C roles

Here's what you should know: Every CEO wants A players on their team

But you don't need A players in every single role (even if you can afford it, which you likely can't)

That's why I prioritize which roles to hire A players for

What's the best metric for tracking your startup's growth? It's not MRR, revenue growth, or number of new customers.

It's NRR: Net Revenue Retention.

Here's why:

Most CEOs are shocked when they learn that I worked less hours as an $80m CEO than I did as an $8m CEO.

Let me explain 🧵 Here's how most small companies operate:

The owner/founder starts the business, does everything by him/herself, and slowly brings in employees to help with the workload

But the founder still plays a critical role in every function of the business

Just scooped up a new Macbook Air so I could have a "Bedside Macbook" for the moments I want to work from bed.

(I got it in Midnight Blue in case you were wondering.)

Just finished setting it up so figured I'd walk you through the first 10 things I do with a new computer: 1. Download Paste App ()

By far the best Copy/Paste Management tool in the Apple Ecosystem.

It even lets you copy/paste across devices seamlessly.

The biggest hack is saving common "pastes" like your EIN or Address or so you can paste with one click.pasteapp.io

I used to think that the ideal CEO was a genius who could run 20 businesses at once

But after working with dozens of CEOs of multi-million dollar businesses, I've realized I was wrong

Here's what the ideal CEO is actually like: My initial idea of the "super CEO" was just unrealistic

There are a few people who can do it, like Richard Branson, Steve Jobs, and Elon Musk

But for the mere mortals like me and most other CEOs, we have to play a different game

CEOs often ask me how do I get my team on the same page?

I ask them: "What does the "same page" mean to you?"

The CEO looking back at me: 👁👄👁

This is very common.

But if the CEO doesn't know what success looks like, how can the team? Most disfunction in a company is because of a lack of clarity

The leader hasn't properly clarified the goals of the organization

How do you fix this?