Every business is held together with tape

Ask a growing business what their stack is and they’ll name the software. Ask what actually runs the business and the answer is a spreadsheet, a group text, and one person who remembers everything.

That’s not a failure. Tape is how every business gets off the ground. The problem is that tape doesn’t scale, and it doesn’t announce when it’s about to fail.

The most important system in most businesses is a person. That’s the risk.

The fix is rarely a new platform. It’s finding the handoffs and making each one explicit. Who owns it. What triggers it. What happens if nobody does anything.

Map the handoffs and the tape becomes obvious. Then replace it one strip at a time.

— T.