The Path to Rapid Growth Starts With Intentionality

PUBLISHED JULY 2025

When people hear “fast-growth company,” they usually imagine something flashy and new—a young startup, a viral product, a team that came out of nowhere. But that’s not how it usually works. Real growth—the kind that lasts—is slow, hard, and earned.

Every entrepreneurial experience, regardless of business sector, is shared by visionaries who are willing to accept some tough early days, plenty of long days, and ample doubts about whether success is even possible.

Southwind wasn’t built overnight. Tyler Staszak and I started this thing 18 years ago with two trucks, no formal business experience, and a whole lot of those late nights. There were plenty of times we questioned whether this would ever work. People doubted us—and honestly, we doubted ourselves too.

Frankly, it was beyond our ability to dream to think we might wind up here: Not only on the Ingram’s 100 list of this region’s largest companies, but also on its Corporate Report 100 for fastest-growing companies.

But we kept showing up. We stayed grateful. And somewhere along the way, we figured out how to stop just working the business … and start building one.

Overnight Successes Rarely Are

It took us nearly a decade to understand the power of intention. We weren’t lacking effort. We were lacking clarity. Once we got intentional—about who we were, where we were going, and what we believed in—everything changed.

That shift started with learning. I knew we didn’t have the traditional playbook, so I committed to reading. A lot. Patterns started to emerge. The great companies weren’t just talented—they were aligned. They had a strong mission. A clear vision. Defined values that actually meant something. That’s when it clicked: clarity creates momentum.

So we slowed down to speed up. We brought in our leaders, our long-time teammates, and we started asking better questions:

• Who are we?

• What do we value?

• Where are we going?

• What’s our mission?

• How will we get there?

We didn’t leave it vague. We white-boarded words, documented how the company felt, and wrote down what we wanted our people and our customers to experience. We spent weeks getting it right. And we did it together.

That was the turning point.

Anyone in with a similar goal for their enterprise should spend some time thinking through this concept. Ponder the vision for what you are creating. Talk with trusted advisers, potential clients, new hires and others about what you believe is possible. 

From a Company to a Movement

Commit to spending significant time—in our case, a couple of weeks—documenting how the company makes you feel, what you want your team and customers to experience when doing business with you. Consider the factors that will create wins for your enterprise, as well as any weaknesses that could derail you.

When a team helps shape the vision, they don’t just see a company—they see their company. They don’t just clock in—they buy in. That’s when culture goes from abstract to real. When your people believe in what you’re building, they give you something you can’t teach: discretionary effort. The kind that doubles your business in a year—like we did.

It’s easy to lose that focus. The daily demands of a growing company will eat you alive if you let them. Hiring, onboarding, inventory, customer issues, system builds—it never ends. But if you want to grow on purpose, not by accident, you have to stop and align.

The best leaders don’t just run hard. They run aligned. They anchor to mission, they live the values, and they help their team see the future—then build it.

That’s how you unlock potential. That’s how you turn a company into a movement.

Be intentional, and success tends to show up.