The E Myth

Interestingly, I first read e-myth on vacation in Hawaii in 2022. I was on the island of Kauai next to a pool, and this book had been on my reading list for years. I figured let's knock it out.

The main point behind E-Myth is that entrepreneurs get into business hoping to escape the 9-5 and work for themselves but ultimately get stuck working inside their business and not on their business.

The book articulates this by calling these people 'technicians' working in the business vs.' entrepreneurs' working on the business. You essentially built yourself a job. Stuck on a treadmill.

The book uses this great example of a talented baker who opens a pie shop. They make amazing pies, the customers love them, but they're trapped. They're making just enough to cover rent and sustain their lifestyle, but they're the only ones who can make the pies. No systems, no scalability, no freedom - just a self-created job with extra stress.

My takeaways

• Find skilled technicians and operators to be 'in' the business while you, the entrepreneur works on the business

As the entrepreneur your job is to build your business in a way where if you left it can still operate. This was the great thing about the affiliate site model I ran with from 2017 - 2021 and what attracted me to the business model. With Pest Strategies and LearningJewelry I recruited skilled freelance writers and let them write. I could've done all of the writing, and I did in the early days, but I quickly offloaded this task.

• Build systems as soon as possible to scale

Systems allow businesses to scale. They're the key to scaling because they create repeatable processes anyone can follow. Returning to the pie shop example - maybe the pies are 10-15% worse when the master baker isn't making them, but that tradeoff enables you to scale up. A slightly less perfect pie that can be made consistently by anyone beats a perfect pie that can only be made by one person.