扩大你的公司规模可能存在什么风险？如果你正因扩展需求而考虑扩大公司，那你的做法无疑是值得肯定的。
不过急于扩大公司规模可能会引起随之而来的严重问题，尤其是在人力资源和会计部门。我们咨询了10位青年企业家协会（YEC）里的企业家，让他们分享扩大公司的独家经验以及为新的一年准备大展身手的创业家提出最佳建议。
1. 延伸公司区域
作出承诺是你在扩大公司时面临的最大问题。作出扩大办公室、发展科技与增加雇员或者任何资产数目的承诺都可能会放缓你的速度并让银行账户大出血。延伸雇员区域是个很不错的选项。在Staff.com，我们有着来自9个不同国家的50名雇员团队；我们的员工要比本地雇员更富效率，我们也不必许诺办公室、涨工资或者官僚问题等本地雇员产生的要求。我们仍然雇佣一批本地员工，不过每名雇员都是随着地区员工的数量而增加的。这之间的关系以极小的成本大大有效地完成了雇佣形式。——利亚姆·马丁，Staff.com
2. 花钱雇最好的人力
不管你是卖产品还是卖服务，在迅速扩张的过程中控制质量不容易。在Pandemic Labs，我们的代理业务和软件平台都对此有所体验。我们通过我们的员工解决问题。当你的业务沿着平稳的管理方向发展时，你可能会以4万美元的价格雇用一名员工而忽视了在这个职位上花9万美元的价值。但是这其中有着重要缘由，你将会在业务迅速扩张时发现这一点。一流的人员成本更高，但是他们会和你一同稳步推动公司进步，而其他公司可能会毁在他们自己的发展速度下。雇佣一流人力，在初期虽然贵，但是一流的团队能控制公司这节火车在运行中不脱轨。——马特·彼得斯，Pandemic Labs
3. 懂得怎样为客户提供十倍的服务
新兴公司在扩张业务时易犯的最大错误就是搞不懂支持10个与100个客户之间的区别。作为企业家，在企业发展过程中要规划一切所需资源。预测你的每一项主要资源（例如员工、战略领导、基础设施）需要怎样的扩张。Yodle就扩张得很成功，因为我们充分为企业成长的每一恰当环节作了谨慎计划后的投资。我们以此实现了增速控制，这也是控制额外成本和资源的最佳方式。——约翰·贝尔科维奇，Yodle
4.首先建立体系
我的公司RewardMe是针对餐馆的数字化平台。因而我们的成功取决于我们尽可能多地抓取市场份额的能力。我们最早的100位客户位于加利福尼亚北部，那时起我们就有了扩张的准备：在全国范围内雇佣销售人员并尽快落实。不过我们最明智的决定就是在所有体系和训练指南到位前推迟扩张的计划。当你雇了人员准备扩大销售份额时，一切都必须面面俱到：他们必须清楚地明白应该怎样拉客、完成一桩交易需要多久、产品应该卖什么价以及落实过程中错综复杂的细节。在客户收购的任何一方面落到实处前不要扩大公司。——军·洛埃扎，, Passport Peru
5.草率扩张带来的致命错误
有关这点毫无疑问——新兴公司提供了检验电子科技与系统工程知识的众多机会。我的工程师朋友们常常对Google, Amazon和Netflix等公司需要处理分析和提供的数据量而感到震惊。问题出在这里：这种机遇不对创业初期的新兴公司打开大门，因为顾名思义，它们没有用户或者客户。在早期为“扩大”公司而发愁只是单纯的错误投资。你可能甚至还没发现值得推广的产品或市场。新兴公司创立者必须在建立应用程苏蓝本时开发技术。然后再考虑扩张的事。——安德鲁·蒙特兰提， Parse.ly
6.聆听你的客户
衡量扩大公司的最好标志之一就是客户满意度。如果你的客户感到满意，你就能如己所愿地扩大公司。通常情况下，当某些地方出现问题或者公司人手不足时，你的客户就会告诉你！当我们在第一年奋力推广7型标记时，我的兄弟兼业务伙伴留下来管理他的Gmail账户里客户支持。身为大学毕业生和垒球队新人，他每周工作50到60小时。我们知道必须作出些改变，当时我们正好找来了全职的客户支持人员。斯考特在全力以赴的同时，我知道客户也越来越不满。从那以后，我能做到平衡斯考特的能力，我们的业务也变得前所未有的强大。——布瑞恩·莫兰，Get 10,000 Fans
7.一次只骑一匹马
我们一旦开始出售业务便会迅速扩张，检验新的服务流程与推出新品牌看似顺理成章。然而，我们在不熟悉的领域里缩手缩脚，以失败告终。我们的核心业务遭到重创，新的倡议也不起作用。我给的建议是：在扩张前先立足于你置身的领域。确信自己有强大的体系和收入来源。进行市场检测并缓慢扩大业务，以保证每一步都稳定坚固和充满凝聚力。如果你想一次骑一匹以上的马，你注定要摔下来。——尼克·弗里德曼，College Hunks Hauling Junk
8.精挑细选，缓慢打开市场
我们一年前推出SaberBlast.com时，公司增长的速度太快了以至于我们无法跟上需求。我们的客户会通过我们网站发送订阅人数3万或者超过10万的新闻信，一方面服务器会爆掉，另一方面产生的信息堵塞将给我们带来致命的后果。情况十分窘迫。随着近期服务的再次推出，我们不仅升级了技术，也升级了自己对待客户的方式。其实我们有申请流程和等待过程。然后我们每月开设若干新区域并邮件通知等候名单上的客户，告知他们可以签订合同的事项。通过这样控制数量与挑选客户，我们能够控制以牺牲服务质量而过度扩张业务的风险。——马太·埃克森，Saber Blast
9.注重资金流动
过速扩张带来的最危险的问题莫过于资金流动。我在19岁二次创业时经历过这一点。开头几年里，我们几乎把100万美元都用来填补收入损失，但是一旦我们有了更大的客户，他们要求更好的付款条件。错失大客户的付款将会损失惨重，这也恰好发生了。资金流动是业务扩张的根本。大多数企业家都费了一番苦工才学到这一点，这个话题无疑需要另开讨论。——彼得·阮，Literati Institute
10.估算涨势，然后一分为二
我们乐于幻想增长爆发和我们产品或服务需求旺盛的同时，我们的热情可能也会扭曲有关未来规划的现实。如果你能估算出未来12个月里的收益，将得数除以二，接着用差不多的数字规划你的资源和开支。举个例子，我满怀期待地基于参与人数为新的体育业务（我们经营成人娱乐联盟）订购了2000件运动衫。开张那天出现了75人，结果一整年我都不知道是要做体育业务还是尽卖运动衫了。放低你的期望值并向外界寻求公平公正的估算帮助。卖光库存从来不是什么坏事，它反而促进了需求。——史蒂文·斯特利， Playbook Community
What could possibly be bad about scaling up your startup? If you're thinking about growth because the demand is there, you're clearly
doing something right.
But a rush to ramp up too soon can lead to serious growing pains,
especially in the human resources and accounting departments. We asked 10 entrepreneurs in the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) to share their own experiences with scale - and their best advice for founders about to embark on a big push in the new year.
1. Scale Remotely
The biggest problem with scaling is you take on commitments. Commitments for offices, technology, employees and any number of assets that can slow you down and bleed your bank account. A great option is remote employment. At Staff.com, we run a team of more than 50 employees from 9 different countries; our employees are more efficient than local ones and we don't have commitments like offices, payroll or the bureaucratic headaches that local employees produce. We still have some local employees, but each local worker is augmented by remote ones. This relationship produces incredibly efficient employees at a fraction of the cost. - Liam Martin, Staff.com
2. Spend Money On The Best People
Whether you're selling a product or service, maintaining quality during periods of quick scaling is hard. At Pandemic Labs, we experienced this in both our agency business and our software platform. Our solution is in our people. When your business is moving along at a steady, manageable pace, you might not see the value of hiring someone for $90,000 when you can fill that position with someone for $40,000.
But there's a big reason, and you'll see it when business ramps up. A-level people cost more, but they'll be able to keep a steady hand on the wheel with you in situations where other companies would crumble
under the speed of their own growth. The best people will feel expensive at first, but a team of great people can control a train that would otherwise fly off the tracks. - Matt Peters,Pandemic Labs
3. Understand What It Takes To Serve 10X The Customers
The biggest mistake startups can make when trying to scale a business is to not understand what it takes to support 10 customers versus 100 customers. As an entrepreneur, project all the resources you will need
as you grow. Forecast how each of your key resources (i.e. staff, strategic leadership, infrastructure) will need to be expanded. Yodle scaled successfully because we invested in careful planning in order to
be properly prepared for each juncture of growth. In this way, we achieved controlled growth - and this was the best way to manage additional costs and resources. - John Berkowitz, Yodle
4. Set Up Systems First
My company, RewardMe, is a digital loyalty platform for restaurants. Our success therefore depends on our ability to capture as much of the market as possible. Our initial 100 clients were in Northern California
and it seemed like we were ready to scale: hire sales people across the country and implement as fast as possible. But the smartest decision we made was to delay scaling until we had all our systems and training
manuals in place. When you bring people on board to scale sales, everything must be a no-brainer: they must know exactly how to get clients, how long it takes to close deals, how much to sell the product
for, and the intricacies of the implementation process. Don't scale until every single aspect from customer acquisition to implementation is a process. - Jun Loayza, Passport Peru
5. Premature Scaling Kills
There is no doubt about it - startups offer some amazing opportunities to exercise Computer Science and Systems Engineering knowledge. Engineering friends of mine regularly marvel at the amount of
data companies like Google, Amazon and Netflix have to process, analyze and serve. Here’s the problem: This opportunity doesn’t exist for early-stage startups, because, by definition, they have no users or
customers. Worrying about “scale” in the early days of your startup is simply a bad investment. You may not have even discovered whether a product or market is worth pursuing, but you will have already invested
in scaling that pursuit. Startup founders have to develop a craft in rapid application prototyping. Scaling comes later. - Andrew Montalenti, Parsely
6. Listen To Your Customers
One of the best barometers for scaling should be customer satisfaction. If your customers are satisfied, you can scale as fast as you want. Typically, when something starts going wrong or you’re understaffed, your customers will tell you! When we started pushing hard toward the 7-figure mark in our first year, my brother/business partner was left managing customer support from his Gmail account. He was a senior in college, a starter on the baseball team, and working 50-60 hours each week. We knew something had to change, and that’s when we found a full-time customer support staff member. While Scott was doing all he could, I knew our customers were growing restless. Since then, I’ve been able to leverage Scott’s abilities, and our business has never been stronger. - Brian Moran, Get 10,000 Fans
7. Ride One Horse At A Time
When we started franchising our business, we expanded rather quickly, and it seemed logical to test out new service lines and launch new brands. However, we stretched ourselves thin and ended up over our heads in unfamiliar waters. Our core business suffered, and the new initiatives didn’t work. My advice: Focus on dominating the sandbox you’re already in before branching out. Make sure you have strong systems and resilient revenue streams. Run market tests and grow your business slowly so that every piece is sturdy, stable and cohesive. If you try to ride more than one horse at the same time, you’re going to fall off. - Nick Friedman, College Hunks Hauling Junk
8. Be Selective, Open Up Slowly
When we launched SaberBlast.com a year ago, it grew so fast that we couldn't keep up with demand. Our clients would try to send out newsletters with 30,000 or 100,000+ subscribers on it - and either the server would blow up or the resulting traffic would kill us. It was embarrassing. With the recent relaunch of the service, not only have we upgraded our technology, but we've upgraded how we onboard clients. We actually have an application process and a waiting period. Then, once a month we open up X number of new spots and email clients who are on the waiting list telling them they can sign-up. This way, by controlling demand and being selective about who we take on as clients, we're controlling the risk of growing too fast without sacrificing the quality of how our service is delivered. - Matthew Ackerson, Saber Blast
9. Stay Focused On Cash Flow
The most dangerous problem with scaling too quickly is usually cash flow. I experienced that when building my second business when I was 19. We nearly hit our $1 million in revenue in the first few years, but as
we got bigger clients, they required better payment terms. One missed payment from a big client could be disastrous, which is what happened. Cash flow is king in scaling up your business. Most entrepreneurs learn
the hard way and this is definitely something that needs to be talked about more. - Peter Nguyen, Literati Institute
10. Estimate Growth, Then Divide By 2
As much as we love to dream about explosive growth and unyielding demand for our product or service, our passion and excitement may skew the truth about future projections. If you can estimate revenue for the
next 12 months, take that number then divide by 2 - and plan your resources and expenses around that number instead. Case in point, I ordered 2,000 jerseys for my new sports business (we ran rec leagues for
adults) based on lofty expectations about how may players would sign up to play. We had 75 people show up on opening day and for an entire year I did not know if I was running a sports business or a t-shirt
business. Be modest in your expectations and seek outside help for an unbiased estimate. It is never a bad thing to sell out beyond capacity,
