While scaling, Khan Academy learned that students form a strong bond with a single instructor. Introducing too many new voices, even if they were excellent, created a "dissonant" experience akin to a substitute teacher arriving. This insight led them to deliberately limit their instructor pool to preserve trust and continuity.

The path to a multi-million dollar local business involves three steps. First, maximize your current location's capacity and marketing channels. Once that's capped, the real scale comes from duplicating the successful model in new locations, turning a small opportunity into a large one.

Contradicting the common startup goal of scaling headcount, the founders now actively question how small they can keep their team. They see a direct link between adding people, increasing process, and slowing down, leveraging a small, elite team as a core part of their high-velocity strategy.

Gamma's CEO resists the pressure to scale headcount aggressively, arguing that doubling the team size does not guarantee double the speed. He believes a smaller, more agile team can change direction faster, which is more valuable than raw speed in a rapidly evolving market.

Upon returning as CEO, David Cohen implemented a 'better is better, not bigger is better' philosophy at Techstars. This strategic shift prioritizes improving the quality of the investment offer, selection process, and founder experience over simply increasing the number of companies funded. It's a crucial lesson for any organization that risks mistaking sheer growth for progress.

Techstars founder David Cohen attributes the success of their most exceptional programs, some producing multiple unicorns from a single cohort, directly to the quality and dedication of the individual Managing Director. This highlights that in venture, the person on the ground leading the program is far more critical than the overarching brand or process.

Initially, 6AM City hired two editors per market. Over time, they discovered a more efficient model: empowering a single, autonomous local editor and centralizing all other operations (marketing, sales support, design). This streamlined the process, reduced overhead, and allowed the local editor to focus purely on creating a high-quality, localized product.

Instead of choosing between tech hubs like Austin and San Francisco, founders can adopt a hybrid model. Spend a concentrated period (1-3 months) in a high-density talent hub like SF to build domain expertise and relationships, then apply that capital back in a lower-cost home base.