A stressed and overworked workforce, constant issue firefighting, unhappy stakeholders, angry customers, and a never-ending backlog of tech debt. When I see this in an established and profitable company, I can’t help but wonder if this is the cost of having to constantly chase revenue growth. Does there come a point where a business has to ask itself whether more is actually better? Or does a business reach a point where it has become so big that it has no choice but to relentlessly strive for more?

What if a company purposely focused on not getting bigger? Instead, focusing on keeping existing customers and employees happy, fixing all the obvious problems, and just creating better and better products. Would that shift in focus lead to overall better outcomes?

There is the idea that our unhappiness stems from the gap between what we have and what we want. We feel that we can only achieve true happiness once we have that new piece of tech, that new car, that new house, or that fancy job. If we learn to appreciate what we have, we won’t feel such discontent, and will find the happiness we seek. If we substitute the concept of happiness for revenue, focusing on revenue growth will only lead to suffering, but perhaps focusing on internal factors may be the true path to sustainable long-term success.