Dundee Growth Partners

Most people see a problem and assume someone else is already solving it. 🎙️ In the latest episode of From Grit to Growth, Jacque Burklund shares how she discovered a real gap in the market: a tomato-free pasta sauce that didn’t compromise on flavor. By talking to real customers and listening closely, she uncovered a problem that had been ignored for too long��and built a business around solving it. If you want to hear how founders turn insight into action and real growth, listen to the full episode: YouTube: https://lnkd.in/grqM22D4 Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gSj7P9FS Apple Podcasts: https://lnkd.in/gpdPZrXu #FromGritToGrowth #FounderInsights #Leadership #Scaling #CustomerDriven #DGP

Some teams run fine day-to-day—but fine isn’t the same as focused. Without strategy, vision, or clarity, the effects show up everywhere: decisions stall, priorities blur, and accountability fades. 🎙️ In the latest episode of From Grit to Growth, Jennifer L. DiMotta and Mark Hasebroock explore how the right outside partner can turn a plateaued business into one with clear direction, ownership, and measurable progress. It’s not about pointing out problems—it’s about creating action that sticks. Listen now and see how hands-on expertise can accelerate growth: YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gXb_2zv3 Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gCava9Jy Apple Podcasts: https://lnkd.in/eZVkP_Rm #FromGritToGrowth #FounderInsights #Leadership #Scaling #BusinessGrowth #DGP

A lot of businesses don’t fail—they stall. In this episode of From Grit to Growth, Jennifer L. DiMotta and Mark Hasebroock unpack the plateau trap—the quiet growth killer that shows up when things are profitable, customers are happy, and founders assume everything is working. The problem? Ego. It can prevent leaders from seeking outside perspective, delaying changes until small stalls turn into real barriers. They break down how to make outside expertise actually valuable, get real buy-in, and unlock the next phase of growth. The lesson is clear: the best time to bring in help isn’t when things are broken—it’s when they’re working. 🎙️ Listen now and see how challenging your own thinking can push your business past the plateau. YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gXb_2zv3 Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gCava9Jy Apple Podcasts: https://lnkd.in/eZVkP_Rm #FromGritToGrowth #FounderInsights #Leadership #Scaling #BusinessGrowth #Boardroom #DGP

WHAT THEY DON'T TEACH YOU IN THE BOARDROOM MASTER YOUR INPUTS, OWN YOUR OUTPUTS What Founders Don’t Tell Boards About Input Discipline and Leadership Focus A week ago, I quit the news completely. No headlines. No social feeds. No “just checking.” Not because I didn’t care. Because I realized it was costing me more than I thought. The constant stream of information wasn’t making me sharper—it was making me reactive, distracted, and drained. Every scroll pulled my attention outward. Every headline tugged on emotions. My thinking started following the noise. Almost immediately, everything changed. More energy. Clearer thinking. Better focus. Higher output. This isn’t a lifestyle choice. It’s a leadership advantage. And it’s something no one teaches you in the boardroom. THE BLIND SPOT Executives are trained to manage capital, strategy, and people. Few are taught to manage inputs. Your brain is your most important operating asset. Treat it like an open system and it fills with: Noise Distraction Reaction Unchecked, exposure becomes distortion. Your outputs—decisions, clarity, leadership—reflect what you consume. THE REACTIVE TRAP You start your day with intent. Then you “check something quickly.” Thirty minutes later, you’re deep in headlines, opinions, outrage, and noise. You walk into the day: Mentally fragmented Emotionally charged Reacting instead of leading Modern media isn’t designed to inform. It’s designed to capture attention. The more emotionally charged the content, the more it shapes your thinking. Not strategically. Not long-term. Reactively. THE CLARITY SHIFT When I replaced news with long-form thinking—books, deep articles, timeless ideas—the shift was immediate. Fewer inputs Better ones Stronger outputs Patterns became clearer. Decisions faster. Execution sharper. It’s not about disconnecting—it’s about choosing how the world reaches you. BOARDROOM LESSONS Treat inputs like capital, hires, and strategic bets: Curate aggressively Eliminate noise Replace with signal Measure impact on energy, clarity, and execution Leaders obsess over outputs—revenue, growth, performance—but inputs drive everything. YOUR MOVE Audit your inputs for one week. Track noise vs. signal. Remove distractions. Replace with frameworks, deep thinking, and content that compounds knowledge. Notice the shift in energy, clarity, and execution. Starve the noise. Feed the signal. That’s the edge no one teaches in the boardroom. Follow Mark Hasebroock for boardroom lessons you won’t hear anywhere else. Learn how to scale founder-led companies, sharpen leadership, and turn strategy into results. Master your inputs, own your outputs, and build teams that execute without excuses. #BoardroomLessons #FounderLeadership #ScalingBusinesses #ExecutiveDecisionMaking #OperatorMindset #StartupGrowth #LeadershipClarity #InputDiscipline

WHAT WE DO WHEN WE’RE HIRED A REAL CLIENT STORY She had built a beautiful business. A stunning store. Incredible product. Loyal customers who loved her. And a very real ceiling. $500K. Tapped out. ⚠️ The business wasn’t underperforming. It was trapped. Everything lived inside four walls. If the door didn’t open, revenue didn’t happen. DTC felt foreign. Marketplaces felt overwhelming. Wholesale felt like a gamble. But here’s the truth. Avoiding channels doesn’t protect your business. It caps it. THE REAL ISSUE This wasn’t a product problem. It wasn’t a brand problem. It was a channel avoidance problem disguised as focus. The business had no integrated view of how retail, DTC, wholesale, and marketplaces could work together. Each option felt like a risk instead of part of a system. So nothing moved. WHAT WE DID We did not start with “let’s launch ecommerce.” We started with the truth. If you want to grow, you have to stop treating channels like threats and start using them like tools. First, we rebuilt the vision across all channels. Not just adding DTC, but defining the role each channel plays in revenue, brand, and profit. DTC to own the customer. Wholesale to expand reach. Marketplaces to drive incremental volume. Retail to anchor the brand. Every channel had a job. No confusion. No overlap. Then we built the financial model behind it. Revenue targets, margin expectations, investment levels. If the numbers don’t work, the strategy doesn’t matter. Then we executed. We stood up DTC and marketplace foundations with speed and discipline. At the same time, we aligned operations, inventory, and messaging so the business could support growth without breaking. The goal was not expansion for the sake of it. It was building a system that scales. 📈 WHAT SHIFTED The business moved from being dependent on foot traffic to having a real growth engine. More importantly, the founder stopped thinking “what if this doesn’t work” and started operating like someone building a brand, not just running a store. Clarity replaced hesitation. Confidence replaced avoidance. And the ceiling disappeared. OPERATOR INSIGHT If your business only works when the door opens, you don’t have a growth strategy. You have a location. This is WHAT WE DO WHEN WE’RE HIRED at Uprisors Growth Partners. FOLLOW ME Follow Jennifer L. DiMotta if you are done playing small inside a business that deserves to scale. Uprisors Growth Partners #WhatWeDoWhenWereHired #DTC #Omnichannel #RetailStrategy #EcommerceGrowth #OperatorLed #ScalingSmart #BusinessGrowth #Uprisorsgrowthpartners

Most founders understand the idea: more volume should lead to better pricing. In practice, it’s much harder to make that work. Scale alone doesn’t guarantee leverage. Coordination does. Trust does. Structure does. 🎙️ In this episode of From Grit to Growth, Jennifer L. DiMotta and Mark Hasebroock sit down with Bill Smithers to unpack how CBUSA turned collective buying into real negotiating power. What sounds simple on paper required: • Convincing independent builders to trust each other • Getting suppliers to rethink how they sell • Building a system that could actually hold under pressure It’s a conversation about execution, not theory and what it really takes to scale a network-driven business through market shifts, downturns, and change. One takeaway stands out: Sometimes the advantage isn’t scale alone. It’s collaboration done right. Listen to the full episode: YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gYdmYRMN Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gPEkjfCp Apple Podcasts: https://lnkd.in/gfa_f_pR #FromGritToGrowth #Leadership #Scaling #FounderMindset #Collaboration #DGP

A lot of founders hit a moment where progress slows and doubt creeps in. The instinct is to assume something must be broken—the model, the pricing, the strategy. But often the real work isn’t abandoning the idea. It’s stress-testing it. The best companies question everything while still believing in the core value they bring to customers. They debate the model, challenge assumptions, and keep refining how they deliver that value. Not because they’ve lost faith, but because they care enough to make it stronger. Conviction doesn’t mean ignoring problems. It means believing the problem is worth solving, even when the path forward isn’t obvious. 🎙️ Jennifer L. DiMotta and Mark Hasebroock talk with Bill Smithers about navigating these moments at CBUSA, and what helped push the company through the toughest stretches. Listen here: YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gYdmYRMN Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gPEkjfCp Apple Podcasts: https://lnkd.in/gfa_f_pR #FromGritToGrowth #FounderInsights #Leadership #Scaling #DecisionMaking #DGP

WHAT WE DO WHEN WE’RE HIRED A REAL CLIENT STORY They had been hovering around $1M for years. Same number, different year, same frustration. ⚠️ This is one of the most common ceilings in business. Not because of demand, but because of structure. I engaged with them through a business assessment, one I take seriously because it consistently uncovers what is actually holding a business back. In this case, three opportunities stood out immediately. ① 📊 KPIs There were no visible, owned KPIs driving the business. We defined the right metrics, tied them directly to growth goals, and built clear tactics around how to improve each one. Visibility creates accountability, and accountability drives performance. ② ⚙️ COO The business was highly founder-dependent. We needed an integrator to install operational governance, cadence, and execution discipline. Hiring a COO changed everything. It gave the founder space to think and lead instead of manage and react. ③ 🤖 AI + USP We infused AI directly into their Unique Selling Proposition, not as a trend, but as a lever. It created internal scale while increasing the value delivered to customers. From there, we moved into execution. I built a 90-day plan with clear 30, 60, and 90-day actions and stayed shoulder to shoulder with them, pressure testing decisions and ensuring the strategy was actually implemented. 📈 WHAT SHIFTED In the first 90 days, all three priorities were executed, along with two additional opportunities that emerged along the way. Growth started to show, but more importantly, the business found its rhythm. Clarity replaced chaos. Energy came back. Productivity increased across the team. The COO was a complete unlock. The founder could finally breathe, and the business now has the leadership capacity to scale. They will break through the $1M ceiling this year, and they will do it profitably. OPERATOR INSIGHT You do not break through $1M by working harder. You break through it by installing structure, leadership, and clarity. This is WHAT WE DO WHEN WE’RE HIRED at Uprisors Growth Partners FOLLOW ME Follow Jennifer L. DiMotta if you are done hovering and ready to break through. Uprisors Growth Partners #WhatWeDoWhenWereHired #OperatorLed #ScalingSmart #BusinessGrowth #KPIs #LeadershipMatters #AIinBusiness #COO