Genius Is a Bottleneck

I realized I wasn’t scaling a business. I was scaling my personality.

It looked like high standards. It sounded like “nobody can do it like I can.”

But what it really was — was fragile.

Because if your company depends on you being sharp, creative, emotionally regulated, and on every day…

That’s not a business. That’s a performance.

And eventually, it breaks.

You miss a day. Then two. Then a launch goes sideways. Then someone quits.

And suddenly your “well-run machine” is a panic room with WiFi.

Genius is Impossible to Emulate

Genius improvises. It pulls off miracles.

But it’s not predictable. It can’t be delegated. And it absolutely can’t be automated.

Redundancy is the opposite.

It’s boring. It’s documented. It works at 2AM when no one’s looking.

The moment my business actually started to scale?

It wasn’t when I hired smarter people.

It was when I started making dumber decisions — on purpose.

I asked myself:

“What’s the slow, mechanical version of this that still works every time?”

And then I built that.

You?

Write the script. Build the checklist. Document the edge cases. Automate the handoff. And remove the hero.

Because genius might get you going — but redundancy lets you leave the room.

If your business relies on brilliance — yours or someone else’s — you're not building a system.

You're building a shrine.

And when the genius burns out?

So does the business.

Best,
Peter Delle

P.S. If this hit a nerve, you’ll get even more out of this one:
👉 The Best Strategic Move I Made Was Saying “I Don’t Know”