Why Understanding the Economics Behind Growth Isn’t One Sided Will Make You Better at Using It

The Question That Sparked This Series

After publishing Growth Isn’t One Sided, I kept getting the same types of questions from readers:

“I understand that operators, refiners, and creators need different systems, but why does my company keep defaulting to treating them all the same?”

“The Harmonizer concept makes intuitive sense, but how do I actually measure whether it’s creating value?”

“I see that some problems are scalable and others aren’t, but how do I identify which is which before we waste resources on the wrong approach?”

These aren’t questions about what the frameworks are. They’re questions about why they work and how to adapt them to specific contexts.

The answer lies in economics.

From Frameworks to Economic Principles

Growth Isn’t One Sided introduced practical frameworks for organizational challenges that emerge during growth: operators, refiners, and creators; scalable versus non-scalable problems; Harmonizers as connectors; and the tension between optimization and innovation.

These frameworks work because they’re grounded in fundamental economic principles about how organizations create value and why they break down predictably as they scale.

Over the next few weeks, we’re going deeper. Not to make things more academic or theoretical, but to give you the economic logic that makes these frameworks adaptable rather than formulaic.

Why This Matters for You

Understanding the economics behind these frameworks changes how you can use them:

When you understand why specialization creates coordination problems, you can diagnose which coordination failures in your organization are predictable consequences of growth versus signs you’re doing something wrong.

When you understand why some problems respond to calculation while others require judgment, you can stop wasting resources on trying to gain full certainty in uncertain challenges while ensuring predictable problems get the optimization they deserve.

When you understand why transaction costs make internal collaboration economically irrational, you can design Harmonizer roles that create measurable value rather than just “improving teamwork.”

When you understand why measurement systems kill innovation, you can build metrics that support creator work instead of accidentally punishing it.

The economic principles explain not just what works, but why it works. This means you can adapt these approaches to your specific context rather than trying to copy someone else’s playbook.

What We’ll Cover Over Eight Weeks

This series bridges Growth Isn’t One Sided with Economics for Entrepreneurs (a full-length book coming later this year). Each article takes one framework and reveals the economic logic that makes it work:

Week 1 (Jan 14): The Economic Logic Behind Operators, Refiners, and Creators Why these three functions emerge so predictably, and why role specialization creates both value and coordination challenges.

Week 2 (Jan 21): The Economics of Management vs. Entrepreneurship When calculation works versus when judgment works, and why matching your decision-making approach to your information environment determines success.

Week 3 (Jan 28): Information Economics and the Scalable vs. Non-Scalable Distinction Why some problems respond to optimization while others require experimentation, and how to systematically identify which is which.

Week 4 (Feb 4): Why Harmonizers Solve Transaction Cost Problems The hidden friction costs that make internal coordination fail, and how Harmonizers create measurable economic value.

Week 5 (Feb 11): The Knowledge Problem at Scale Why centralized decision-making becomes less effective as you grow, and when decentralization creates better outcomes.

Week 6 (Feb 18): Measurement Economics and Why Metrics Kill Innovation The systematic biases that make organizations overinvest in measurable activities while underinvesting in valuable uncertainty.

Week 7 (Feb 25): Organizational Design as an Economic Problem How structure either enables or prevents the coordination necessary for complex problem-solving.

Week 8 (Mar 4): Creative Destruction and the Innovation-Optimization Tension Why sustaining current success while building future capabilities requires fundamentally different economic approaches.

How to Get the Most From This Series

Each article is designed to work standalone. You don’t need to read them sequentially. But they build on each other, in hopes to deepen your understanding of why organizational challenges that I’ve lived first-hand emerge and how economic thinking can fill in the gaps.

If you’ve already read Growth Isn’t One Sided, this series will give you the economic foundation to adapt those frameworks more effectively to your specific challenges. This series is the behind-the-scenes-making-of-the-sausage.

If you haven’t read it yet, that’s completely fine. Each article includes enough context to be valuable on its own. But I’ll link to relevant chapters where deeper dives would be helpful.

This series also sets up Economics for Entrepreneurs, which will show how these economic principles apply across the complete business lifecycle. It’s focused on addressing specific problems with specific ideas across a businesses’ different stages of foundation through growth, maturity, and sustainability.

Who This Series Is For

This content is designed for scale-up leaders. Founders, COOs, VPs at companies that have achieved product-market fit and are now facing the organizational complexity that comes with growth.

If you’re in this position, you’re likely dealing with challenges that didn’t exist when you were smaller:

• Coordination failures between departments that used to communicate naturally

• Measurement systems that worked for 20 people but kill innovation at 100

• The tension between optimizing your current business and building your future one

• Organizational structures that feel increasingly inadequate as complexity grows

These aren’t problems you can fully solve by working harder or hiring better people. They require you to think differently. They’re economic problems that require economic solutions.

Let’s Begin

Next Wednesday (January 14), we’ll start with the economic logic behind operators, refiners, and creators. We’ll dive into why these functions emerge, why specialization creates both value and problems, and how understanding the economics behind this helps you build better organizational systems.

If you want these insights delivered weekly, Subscribe below!

If you’re facing these challenges right now and want to discuss your specific context, reach out at calendly.com/cameron-m-belt.

The competitive advantage in the next decade won’t go to companies with the best frameworks. It will go to companies that understand the economic principles behind those frameworks and can adapt them effectively to reality as the world around us continues to change.

Let’s build that understanding together.