Crusty on the outside, curmudgeonly on the inside

I'm Peter Holgate. Over the last two decades I've raised tens of millions in venture capital, created multiple nine figures in enterprise value while building and exiting six global companies, written multiple books, invested in numerous businesses and spent an unhealthy amount of time obsessing over the same question: why do good operators get stuck at exactly the point where the business should start running itself?

For context I have been featured in Recode, Fast Company, the Financial Post and even on the front page of the WEF blog (long story) and yes I have won numerous awards for innovation all while being a dad to 7 kids (and an emotionally needy pet pig). Lived on multiple continents and currently call Mexico my home.

I like to say that I am not a virgin trying to be a sex therapist.

The answer to why so many SME operators stall out is almost never the one they expect. It's rarely strategy. It's rarely talent (in fact they are some of the most insanely talented human beings I have met). It's almost always a single wheel in the machine - a delivery system, a sales motion, a founder dependency - that's seized up and is quietly dragging everything else to a halt.

What I do now

I read the label on the outside of the jar while you are stuck inside. I find the wheel where you are stuck. I name it out loud, and get it turning again. Sometimes that's on The Buccaneer's Table, diagnosing a guest's agency in the open. Sometimes it's in The Broadside, the fortnightly dispatch. And sometimes it's one-to-one, with operators who built something real and now need to build something that runs without them. And sometimes it is in the ClockWork League where my co-founder Jordi Buskermolen and I coach Agency Owners through the stalls that stand between them and the life they deserve.