How Much Does Scaling Up Coaching Cost?

As a growth-minded CEO, you want to scale your business. You may have either read Scaling Up, attended a Scaling Up workshop, or had a consultation with a Certified Scaling Up Coach. You are certain the Scaling Up tools and processes will dramatically help you grow your business—and help you enjoy the ride.

When you meet with a Certified Scaling Up Coach, they will start by quantifying how each of the four decisions—People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash—will contribute to your profit and cash flow improvement. As a coach, my goal is to generate at least a return of +6–10x (+600%-1,000%) for you on your investment in our engagement.

So what will your specific investment be? That depends on several variables:

1. The size of your business.
2. The size of the leadership team involved in your annual, monthly, and quarterly Scaling Up meetings.
3. The quality of your team and what shape your business is in. For example, do you have more B than A Players? Are your systems proven and documented, or are they unproven and undocumented?
4. Your annual growth rate.
5. Your short-term goals. For example, is this a turnaround situation? Or does your business need to scale more smoothly and predictably?
6. Your long-term goals and your BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal). What does your exit look like? Are you looking to be bought by a strategic buyer at a strategic multiple? Sell the business to your employees? Pass the business on to future generations?

As you can see, quite a few factors go into how much Scaling Up Coaching will cost for your business. However, here are some rules of thumb to determine what your annual investment will be:

• If you are a business with under $20 million in revenue, you can expect that a Scaling Up engagement will cost what you would spend on an administrative assistant’s annual salary ($45,000 to $65,000). This investment level makes the Scaling Up program a very attractive alternative to EOS.
• If your revenue is $20–50 million, a Scaling Up engagement will cost roughly the same as a mid-level manager’s annual salary ($66,000 to $100,000).
• If your revenue is between $50–200 million, your investment in a Scaling Up engagement will run approximately on par with the annual salary of a finance or marketing executive ($100,000 to $150,000).

Every CEO is going to ask the question about what the annual cost of Scaling Up is. Since the investment in Scaling Up Coaching equates to what an employee’s annual salary would be, the question should really be this: Will a coach make a bigger impact on my organization than an individual employee?

For many CEOs, the answer is a resounding yes.