The hard truth of one man business

For the last five years, I've been running my one-man education business: creating the brand, designing the curriculum, running the classes, talking to parents, capturing the highlights, producing marketing content and more. Well, basically everything.

I'm pretty good at all of it. I can go from an idea to a revenue-making program people sign up for in a matter of weeks.

But the thing is it is easy to start, but hard to maintain.

Everyone has been glorifying the term 'One Person Business' since COVID. I have the hard truth to share.

In the early days, when I was excited about a new idea, things were flying. I was building systems and curriculum during the day and running live classes at night. My two daughters were young so I had plenty of time when they were napping too.

When the girls were 5 and 3 and when the business got to a stage where I had to continue every single part to keep momentum going, that's when I stopped believing in a one-man business.

I usually felt the limitation on family vacations. I treasure these trips so much that I'd actively resist working on the business. This means less marketing going out. Or when I was deep into designing a learning experience for my students, I gave up on promoting the next camp.

The wheel gets heavier over time.

But here's something I didn't see clearly until recently: the one-man business model isn't just a people problem. It's a business model problem.

For the first four years, I ran a pure online education business: books, video courses, a live online program. That model and the one-man framework are a perfect match. The work is largely repeatable. I write an email once, it goes out to thousands. I record a lesson once, students watch it forever. I create content once, it drives sales for months. Everything I did created leverage.

Then last year I moved into running live in-person kids' programs. Everything changed. Every class had to be prepared and conducted fresh. Every parent needed individual outreach and follow-up. Every camp had to be promoted from scratch. Nothing was compounding.

That's when I understood: a one-man business works when your output is repeatable and scalable. The moment your business runs on live, in-person, human interaction, it stops working. You can't systematize a conversation with a parent. You can't scale a moment in a classroom.

I also didn't expect to miss working with people this much. About ten years ago, I ran a kids' coding school alongside the founder. It was a lot of work, a wide range of work, but there was someone to bounce ideas with, to debate things, to cheer each other on. I still remember a ton of those conversations in the office, over dinner, over Slack. There was chemistry and energy.

So yup, for the next chapter of my career, I'm going for a team of collaborators. While my skillsets qualify me as a generalist (which is particularly good in the AI era), I want to double down on certain areas (relationship building and working directly with students) as a specialist to create a bigger outcome.

If you're fantasizing over "One Person Business" because you see people talk about it, I hope this gives you a different perspective.