I believe that people perceive growth as external expansion. In order to achieve growth, companies structure their activities to consistently produce a specific outcome, namely profit.

What happens if and when there is no longer room to expand? Perhaps the market is saturated or the interests of customers shift. This may be the time redefine what growth means to your organization.

Focused internally, growth becomes about creating flow. This may include developing or re-purposing existing resources, or removing impediments to sharing ideas and collaboration among employees or customers. When done right, organizations develop new capabilities, products, services, and potentially new markets.

At this point, the focus of business is not primarily to generate a profit, but to develop strong relationships across all points in your ecosystem. Creating profit is a by-product of a healthy network of collaborators.