Grow With Purpose

Every business goes through succession. Some owners are well prepared for it, and some let it happen. In this talk to Legacy Business Leaders at Bayside Community Church, Joey Brannon lays out why success and succession ask different questions, why succession is decided in culture and leadership, and the operating rhythm Axiom runs with companies whether they plan to sell, hand the business to the...

There are some owners with an adult child in the business who aren't comfortable asking the question out loud: Can they run this? The common plan is to move that son or daughter through department after department, a couple of years at a time, so they pick up technical expertise and build rapport with the team on the way up. Both of those hopes can come apart. Some people are going to resent the l...

Billy Swanson's two sons and his nephew are the third generation at Tri County Air Conditioning and Heating, and all three of them hold shares in it. Getting there took six or seven years. Three of those years were standing meetings two or three times a month on sales, cost of sales, liabilities, assets, financial statements, and leadership styles, and a full year went to one book about mission dr...

Billy Swanson spent years treating ministry and business as two separate things that were in conflict with each other. He came back from a family vacation in North Carolina with a new purpose statement, a new vision statement, and a new mission statement, and then called a meeting to tell his employees they no longer had a job at the company they knew. Instead they could work for a new company wit...

Every owner who sits down with us asks for the same thing: more accountability . Almost none describe it as a leadership problem. Chris Romine has spent 40 years in financial services, and he leads his market inside a large institution the way an owner leads a company: a P&L he answers for, a mission he can say out loud, and a team he refuses to let one person grind down. Joey and Chris get in...

By midyear, a lot of leadership teams are off the plan they set in January. Sometimes that's a rough patch. Sometimes it's something bigger. The hard part is knowing which one you're in before the window to fix it closes. In this episode, Mike LoBue sits down with Joey Brannon to work through how to diagnose a midyear drift, tell a tactical problem from a systemic one, and reset priorities without...

Owners say they want freedom. Push on the word and most are describing relief - not being overwhelmed, not carrying every decision, not putting out every fire. That's real, but it's a short-term fix. Real freedom is different: it's what's left once the structure, the team, and the standards can carry the business without the owner in every room. Mike LoBue and Tommy Rohrlack separate the two, get...

Every owner says some version of the same thing: they wish their people would think like owners. In this episode, Joey Brannon and Tommy Rohrlack take that wish apart and rebuild it into something an owner can use. They get into what owners are really asking for, why most founders react like operators instead of thinking like owners, the margin it takes to think at all, and the grip on control tha...

Every owner wants growth. Few are ready for the version that shows up uninvited and never lets up. In this episode, Joey Brannon and Tommy Rohrlack talk through what happens when sustained growth starts to break the owner: the apathy that signals burnout, the financial squeeze that hides behind rising revenue, and the hard conversations owners avoid until the weight lands entirely on their own sho...

Joey Brannon sits down with Axiom advisor Cameron Earhart, CEPA, to break down a recent client sale to a private equity firm. Cameron worked with the owner through the process, and the two talk candidly about why the buyer mattered more than the number, what changes the day after closing, and how the right firm turns a team loose to grow. It is an honest look at how these deals work from the insid...

Mike LoBue had just walked a packed advisor circle event through three moves one of our clients made that changed their business. The day after, Joey pulled him into the studio to go through them again while the conversation was fresh. The three moves: leadership development, a real scorecard, and a planning and execution rhythm. Each one is the kind of move owners delay. Each one is the kind that...

“My team just won’t take ownership.” Most owners say it as a verdict on their people. Tommy Rohrlack and Cameron Earhart push back on that diagnosis. Before you decide you hired the wrong people, or that a younger generation just doesn’t care, look at the environment those people are working in. Tommy and Cameron get into what ownership means, the culture that makes it possible, the clarity that g...

Every owner says they want freedom. Then the day comes when the company can run without them, and a lot of them don’t know what to do with it. Cameron Earhart and Mike LoBue dig into why stepping back feels uncomfortable instead of freeing. They cover how an owner’s identity gets tied to being needed, where the fear of losing control comes from, and why the time you’ve been chasing can feel emptie...

Most owners know they're stuck in the weeds. The harder question is what to do with the time once they finally step out. Joey and Tommy walk through why owners stay stuck (reactivity, identity, lack of trust, fear of losing clients), what it's costing the business, and the four things owners should be spending their time on once they reclaim their calendar. They close on the conversation every own...

The fear of losing a customer is rarely the real fear. In this episode of Grow With Purpose, Joey Brannon sits down with Tommy Rohrlack to work through what’s keeping founders in every decision, and what it costs every day they don’t let go. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • Why loss aversion makes the risk of delegating feel bigger than it is. • The org chart signal that says you’ve capped your gr...

What if financial independence isn’t the destination—but the starting point for something greater? In this episode of Grow With Purpose , Joey Brannon sits down with Alan and Nicholas Irving to rethink wealth, retirement, and what it means to build something that lasts beyond your lifetime. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • Why wealth should be viewed as a tool—not a trophy • The difference between...

What if the most expensive decision you're making isn't a bad hire or a missed deal — it's the conversation you keep postponing? In this episode of Grow With Purpose, Joey Brannon and senior advisor Tommy Rohrlack get into the mechanics of high-stakes performance conversations at the leadership level, so you can lead with clarity instead of avoidance. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • Why delaying...

In this episode, the Axiom team debriefs a framework from behavioral researcher Vanessa Van Edwards on the three levels of human connection — moving from the throwaway questions that generate noise to the deeper ones that reveal how someone truly sees themselves — and talks through how business owners can apply it with their teams. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • Why most questions don't build co...

You can exit your business one day — but will it be planned or forced? Joey and Cameron unpack why exit conversations can't wait, and what most partners discover too late about what their business is actually worth. Listen now so you can protect your largest personal asset before urgency — and emotion — take over. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • Why every exit is either planned or forced — and wh...

In Part 3 of the Partnership Series, Joey Brannon and Cameron Earhart shift from structure to vision—exploring how assumptions, expectations, and misalignment create friction over time. They unpack how partners can stay aligned as businesses grow, roles evolve, and priorities change. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: •Why shared vision matters as businesses grow and evolve • How assumptions and expec...

What happens when partners blur ownership and operational roles? In Part 2 of our Partnership Series, Joey Brannon and Cameron Earhart explain how unclear roles create friction and why separating the employee and owner hats matter. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • Partnerships need structure before conflict • Define decision rights, ownership, and compensation • Capital planning and buy-sell agree...

In this episode, Joey Brannon and Cameron Earhart explain why every partnership needs a clear operating agreement before pressure exposes structural gaps. They discuss decision authority, ownership vs. compensation, capital contributions, and buy-sell planning. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: • partnerships need a clear operating agreement before conflict • How to define decision authority, ownersh...

What if you could create a buyer for your company without selling to private equity or a strategic acquirer? In this episode of Grow With Purpose , Joey Brannon sits down with Jason Miller of Berman Hopkins to demystify Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) so you can understand how employee ownership works as a real exit option before ruling it out. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: ･What it means...

This is Part 3 of our 3-part Exit Series. In Episode 175, we discussed clarifying your motivation before going to market. In Episode 176, we explored financial readiness, valuation, and Quality of Earnings (QoE). In this episode, Joey Brannon and Cameron Earhart explain what happens after signing a Letter of Intent (LOI), when buyers begin due diligence and evaluate risk across financials, contrac...

What actually changes a business from a 7x multiple to 5x during diligence? In this episode of Grow With Purpose , Joey Brannon and Cameron Earhart explain why clean financials alone aren’t enough—and how understanding buyer risk can protect valuation long before you go to market. IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: ･ The difference between clean financials and buyer-ready financials ･Why a Quality of...