Rachel Haviland, PhD

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Rachel Haviland, PhD Private Advisor to established business owners looking to optimize their business to better reflect their life, leadership, and impact.

You measure the revenue you earned, but what about the revenue lost from deals that didn’t close? Read below ⬇️
09/25/2026

You measure the revenue you earned, but what about the revenue lost from deals that didn’t close? Read below ⬇️

I’ve been writing on Substack since 2024, and I've wanted to create something like this for a while — so today I’m launc...
09/20/2026

I’ve been writing on Substack since 2024, and I've wanted to create something like this for a while — so today I’m launching a new Sunday series on Substack:

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐒𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐖𝐞𝐞𝐤𝐥𝐲 𝐂𝐡𝐞𝐜𝐤 𝐈𝐧

Each week, I’ll share one question I regularly ask my clients that will help you think differently about the success you’re building and how to make sure it continues to support the life you actually want.

If you want one thought-provoking question in your inbox each week, I invite you to subscribe now. The first check-in goes out in less than an hour. It’s free for all subscribers — subscribe now to get tonight’s question in your inbox. (Link in first comment)

I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to get a prescription filled that is currently out of stock nationally. (Ladies of ...
08/10/2026

I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to get a prescription filled that is currently out of stock nationally. (Ladies of a certain age, IYKYK 🤣) My pharmacy initially told me it would ship by Friday. I was surprised.

Then they canceled it because they couldn’t fill it. Not surprised.
They've got no idea when the supply chain will be able to fill the demand.

So I asked my doctor to prescribe an alternative...which the pharmacy flagged because I now had two prescriptions for the same thing.

No one noticed that the reason the second prescription existed was because the first one couldn’t be filled. I had to be the one to call and point that out to the pharmacist (!)

Eventually, the replacement prescription shipped and is apparently on it's way. Then I got a text telling me that prescription had been canceled too...which was particularly interesting, given that it was already in transit.

And while this has been frustrating as a patient, the business strategist in me has been fascinated, because this is what operational issues often looks like - and they're usually completely hidden from the people inside the business who need to know in order to fix it.

Every individual part of the system can be doing exactly what it was designed to do:

- The inventory system knows it's unavailable.

- The prescription system sees 2 active prescriptions and stalls without further input (from me, not my Dr).

- The fulfillment system ships the available prescription.

- The notification system accidentally sends a cancellation message.

It all works separately, but no part of the system has the whole story and they don't communicate. And when systems like this don’t understand context, humans have to fill the gap for them.

- I made multiple phone calls.

- Explained things to 6 different people (not kidding).

- Corrected mistakes made by the system.

- Then followed up. ALL UNPAID might I add.

Something that should have required one simple online transaction consumed the time and attention of 6 different people.

And yet, even in the middle of a personal frustration, I couldn't help but start reverse-engineering the system because I see these issues constantly inside my client's businesses.

I wonder what's lurking behind the scenes in yours. If you don't know, you can't fix it. It might show up as:

“Customer service is overwhelmed.”

“We need to expand the customer service team.”

“Clients keep asking the same questions.”

“Things keep falling through the cracks."

and if no one asks Why? then the symptoms are treated, but the true problem stays hidden and is never solved.

If it's time to look beneath the obvious problems to find what’s actually costing your business time, money, focus and capacity, that’s exactly what I write about on Substack (link in first comment).

P.S. It's just an AI-generated screenshot. I wouldn't actually share the real ones (with the national pharmacy name for all to see 🤣 Tempting though...)

Sustaining a successful business doesn’t mean maintaining the status quo or becoming less ambitious. It also doesn’t mea...
07/29/2026

Sustaining a successful business doesn’t mean maintaining the status quo or becoming less ambitious. It also doesn’t mean slowing down permanently, avoiding growth, or settling for what you already have. And most importantly, Sustain is not the opposite of Scale. It’s what makes Scale possible - without sacrificing the founder, the team, or the quality of the business along the way.

The Sustain stage is where you redesign the business so it can continue the success it has already created. It is where you reduce the unnecessary dependence on the founder:

⬢️ Clarify ownership.
⬢️ Simplify how work is done.
⬢️ Retain strategic focus.
⬢️ Strengthen decision-making.
⬢️ Remove unnecessary complexity.
⬢️ Build capacity before adding more demand.

It's where the business stops relying on the founder to jump in to fill every gap.

I’m not saying that a sustainable business is one that never needs you, but it requires you for the work that only you should be doing. It asks you to contribute your judgment, vision, relationships, and expertise, without requiring your constant presence to keep everything stable.

That’s a business where the team has more clarity, better decisions are made, the client experience is superior, and you, as the founder, have more freedom of thought, as well as more free hours. Most of all, it becomes more resilient, more profitable, and more valuable as it grows. That is why the real business journey is:

𝗟𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵 → 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄 → 𝗦𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 → 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲

⬢️ Launch proves the idea.
⬢️ Grow creates momentum.
⬢️ Sustain strengthens the business.
⬢️ Scale expands a business that is now ready for more.

I'm exploring how successful founders redesign the business, so success becomes easier to maintain long-term. It shouldn’t get harder and harder to keep your business going. I believe that a well-designed business doesn’t wear out the founder and use up all their resources to produce its results. It should become stronger with every stage of growth. Join me as we explore this important topic!

When a business is successful but starts to feel harder to run, most founders think they need better time management, mo...
07/28/2026

When a business is successful but starts to feel harder to run, most founders think they need better time management, more discipline, a stronger morning routine, or a more productive calendar. Maybe more staff, better delegation, another system, or a new project management tool. Or perhaps they simply need to work harder for a little longer until they reach the next level.

The core thought is that it comes down to your own ability to manage the business. What I’ve seen working with founders is something different: the problem is usually that the business has outgrown the way it was originally designed.

⬢ You think you need better time management, but the real issue may be that too many decisions, questions, and responsibilities still have to go through you.
⬢ You think you need a larger team, but the real issue may be that the team doesn’t have enough ownership, clarity, or authority to move forward without you.
⬢ You think you need another system, but the real issue may be that the business has become so complex that it no longer feels simple.
⬢ You think you need to delegate more, but the real issue is that you have never decided what you should no longer have to do.
⬢ You think the next revenue milestone will create freedom, but it can amplify the strain on you, your decisions, and delivery that already exists.

As a result, you often try to solve a business design problem with personal effort, becoming more organized, more available, more responsive, and even more responsible. You get better at filling in the gaps, but doing so in an unsustainable business does not make the business sustainable.

𝗜𝘁 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝗯𝗲 𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘆 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗸 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂'𝗿𝗲 𝗳𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗹. 𝗜𝗻 𝗳𝗮𝗰𝘁, 𝗶𝘁’𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗽𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗲 - 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗶𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝘀𝘂𝗽𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁 𝗬𝗢𝗨.

And until you get clear on that, the solutions you try just treat the symptoms instead of addressing the root cause.

---
𝘞𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘯 𝘣𝘺 𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘮𝘺 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘢𝘴𝘵 18 𝘺𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘴. 𝘎𝘳𝘢𝘱𝘩𝘪𝘤 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘈𝘐 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳 𝘮𝘺 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯.

There’s a stage missing before "scale" that I’ve never heard discussed in training on how to grow your business, yet I s...
07/24/2026

There’s a stage missing before "scale" that I’ve never heard discussed in training on how to grow your business, yet I see it all the time in the businesses I work with.

Turns out that scaling is not the natural next step after growth - it's being able to 𝘀𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 what you've already built.

The real path is not: 𝗟𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵 → 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄 → 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲

It’s actually: 𝗟𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵 → 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄 → 𝗦𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 → 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲

When business owners skip the Sustain stage, they don’t fail per se, and that’s what makes this critical developmental step so easy to miss. You keep on growing and increasing revenue. The team delivers and keeps the clients happy. It all appears to be just hunky-dory.

However, what I often see inside the business is that the founder has become the stabilizing force. They are the one to step in to fill any (and all) gaps.

Here’s what I look for:

⬢ You’ve built a team, but too many decisions still come back to you. It feels like they can’t get anything done without you.

⬢ You take time off, but keep checking your phone/Slack because you’re not fully confident they can handle everything without you.

⬢ You have more opportunities than ever for growth, but less and less uninterrupted time to think about which ones are actually worth pursuing.

⬢ Revenue has increased, but so has the amount of coordination, management, and brain input required to produce it.

It can be easy to miss because the business keeps moving. You keep stepping in to catch something that was missed, solve a problem that wasn’t anticipated, and solve communication issues.

All the knowledge is in your head, so you are the one to make the final call, protect the client relationship, and compensate for what the business can’t yet do without you.

This is what skipping Sustain looks like:

⬢ The business grows, but its capacity doesn’t expand with it because too much depends on you.

⬢ The team grows, but ownership of decisions doesn’t. It all still comes back to you for approval.

⬢ The opportunities increase, but your focus decreases.

⬢ The business becomes more successful and, at the same time, more dependent on you as the founder and main source of, well, everything.

The clearest sign is this:

The business may be growing, but sustaining that growth is a struggle.

And eventually, every additional client, team member, offer, or opportunity adds more pressure to a system that is already relying too heavily on you.

The good news is, I have never seen this be an actual personal productivity problem. The symptoms are just a sign that the business needs to be redesigned for the level of success you’ve already reached…before you can start to scale.

Probably, like me, you were taught to launch and grow your business, then scale it. But over the past 18 years working w...
07/23/2026

Probably, like me, you were taught to launch and grow your business, then scale it. But over the past 18 years working with entrepreneurs across 36 different industries, something became clear to me – there’s a stage missing before "scale' that I never heard in training on how to grow your business.

Turns out that scaling is not the natural next step after growth - it's being able to 𝘀𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 what you've already built.

There came a point when my business was successful, whilst at the same time becoming harder to operate day-to-day. We’ve all been there when revenue pops, the team grows and opportunities increase…but so do the decisions, interruptions, complexity and pressure on you as the founder.

The business is getting more clients and producing more revenue, but it's also requiring more from you, and instead of pausing to address that, we're usually encouraged to keep going:

𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄 𝗳𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿. 𝗛𝗶𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲.
𝗔𝗱𝗱 𝗮𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺. 𝗟𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵 𝗮𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿.
𝗞𝗲𝗲𝗽 𝗽𝘂𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝘅𝘁 𝗺𝗶𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗻𝗲.

But when you try to scale a business that is already hard to run, the strain doesn’t go away – it’s amplified. Before a business can scale well, it needs to become capable of sustaining what it has already created.

That means asking some tough questions:

- Can the business sustain this level of success without me constantly stepping in to fill the gaps?

- Can it continue to perform without using up every ounce of my focus, time, energy and attention?

- Is the business becoming stronger as it grows, or more demanding?

For me, and many of my clients, we found the answers to be No.

The real path is not: 𝗟𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵 → 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄 → 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲

Instead, it’s: 𝗟𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵 → 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄 → 𝗦𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 → 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲

Over the next few days, I’m going to share what I’ve learned from founders who skipped the Sustain stage, and why success often becomes harder than it should be. I invite you to follow along.

Instead of asking: “How can I fit more into the day?” Ask: “What should no longer require my time, attention, approval, ...
07/07/2026

Instead of asking: “How can I fit more into the day?” Ask:
“What should no longer require my time, attention, approval, or involvement?”

The business owner who works fewer hours isn't lazy or less ambitious. They're simply making wiser decisions about what deserves their involvement.

You didn’t build your business so your life could fit into the leftover time when you're not working. You built it for f...
06/25/2026

You didn’t build your business so your life could fit into the leftover time when you're not working. You built it for freedom. For choice. For room to think, breathe, love, lead, and actually live.

If your calendar no longer reflects the life you want, it may be time to redesign the business around what matters most to you.

As a business owner, your real status symbol is no longer the lengthy hours you put in, but whether you have the capacit...
06/22/2026

As a business owner, your real status symbol is no longer the lengthy hours you put in, but whether you have the capacity to lead well without sacrificing your energy, health, family, or longevity.

It used to be that the old flex was:
“I work 80 hours a week.”

The new flex is:
“My business performance is sustainable.”

That cultural shift is important because even the most successful businesses will become unsustainable if everything depends on your stamina and health to hold it together. Success used to mean pushing harder. Now it means designing a sustainable business you can actually keep leading.

Full article in the comments

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