Wednesday, November 11, 2026
Spark and the Icehouse run free AI workshops, the AI Advisory Pilot co-funds up to $15,000, and paid programmes start at $5,995 + GST a person. Here is who each suits, and five questions to choose your first step.
Last updated 13 November 2026. Published by Simple-Growth (Motherbase Limited). Market: United States.
The business paid everyone this month — the team, the suppliers, the landlord. You paid yourself what was left over, which this month was less than last month, and you've stopped mentioning it out loud. You want growth that actually shows up in your own account, not just the business's. What you've actually built is a company that's getting bigger while quietly training you to expect less for yourself, one skipped pay run at a time.
62% of US small business owners have reduced or skipped their own pay at least once in the past year, and 21% have done it four times or more, according to Bluevine's 2026 research (Bluevine, 2026). "Things settling down" isn't a milestone that arrives on its own — it's a decision, and most businesses are structured so there's always a plausible reason to put it off one more month. Growing revenue without growing what lands in your own account isn't really growth. It's a bigger version of the same squeeze.
Mike Michalowicz's Profit First approach flips the usual order of operations. Instead of Sales minus Expenses equals Profit — where owner pay and profit are whatever's left after everything else — it forces Sales minus Profit (and owner pay) equals Expenses, by physically moving set percentages into separate accounts the moment money comes in.
Kevin didn't learn this lesson purely from the outside looking in. Even as a coach, he hired an Icehouse coach of his own to accelerate his growth — a reminder that this isn't about willpower or sacrifice; it's about having someone outside the business enforce a structure you won't reliably enforce on yourself, under pressure, every single month. He's also open with clients that his own run of nine companies founded or co-founded includes genuine failures as well as wins, and that the discipline of paying yourself properly is one of the lessons that cost him real money to learn the hard way, so his clients don't have to.
"Kevin's knowledge and intellect on all things business — no matter what industry it is — he just seems to find gems that you can focus on. I catch up with Kevin once a week and it is definitely the highlight of my week. He just sees different opportunities so clearly."
John Roberts
Co-owner & COO, Oragene
Paying yourself properly feels like it should wait until the business can "afford" it — but the business will always find something else to spend on if the money's sitting there to be found. This isn't for you if you've genuinely decided to reinvest everything deliberately for a defined period with a clear end date — that's a real strategy, not avoidance. It's for owners where "once things settle down" has quietly become the plan itself, with no date attached.
A cash management approach from Mike Michalowicz that allocates profit and owner pay first, as a fixed percentage of revenue, then runs expenses on what remains, rather than paying the owner last from whatever's left over.
The money isn't removed from the business — it moves to a separate account and stays there as profit and reserved owner pay, which forces more deliberate decisions about the remaining expenses.
Start with a modest, sustainable percentage you can actually hold to every month rather than an ambitious one you'll abandon after one tight month.
If you've paid everyone else properly this month except yourself, that's the number we fix first.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Owners chase new leads every Q4 while a cheaper, warmer list of past customers sits untouched. Here's the four-step Win-Back Sequence and the real economics behind it.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
SME websites and pitches default to telling their own story. The research says customers skim past most of it looking for themselves - here's the StoryBrand framework that fixes it.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Most SME growth plans default to out-competing everyone else on the same crowded turf. Blue Ocean Strategy's own data says that's the lower-profit path - here's the four-question grid that finds the faster one.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Most SME owners blame a lost customer on price. New 2026 research says it is almost always one unresolved issue instead. Here is the three-step audit to find your real loyalty leak.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Revenue is not the same as profit, and a small slice of your customer base may be quietly cancelling out your best accounts. Here is how to find out which ones.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
The coaching industry has more than doubled since 2016 to over 232,000 coaches. With that many choices, here is the single question that tells you who is worth hiring.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
AI is saving small business owners 10 to 13 hours a week, and most have no idea what they gained. Here is the four-question method for pointing AI at the hours that matter.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
You nailed the pitch and the buyer loved it, then the deal went quiet. The reason is usually a meeting room you were never invited to. Here is how to sell to a buying committee you cannot see.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Customers don't buy products, they hire them to do a job. Here is the framework that explains why an inferior competitor keeps outselling you, and what to fix in your marketing today.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Most SME owners have one growth plan: get more customers. There are actually four distinct ways to grow, and the cheapest one is usually sitting in your existing customer file.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Small business confidence just rose, but growth expectations are falling for almost everyone. New 2026 data reveals the one decision separating owners still growing from owners just waiting it out.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
A 1 percent price increase lifts operating profit by an average of 11 percent, McKinsey's Global 1200 research found, far more than an equivalent rise in volume. Here's how to raise prices without losing your best customers.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Some coaches build a business out of being needed forever. Here's the Graduation Test: three questions that reveal whether your coach is transferring real capability, or just keeping you on retainer.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Most owners respond to a bottleneck by fixing something else entirely. Eli Goldratt's Theory of Constraints explains why that backfires, and documented case studies show a mean 69 percent lead-time reduction once the real constraint is found.
Sunday, October 04, 2026
Roughly four in ten B2B purchase attempts end in no decision at all. It's rarely about price. Here's Alex Hormozi's Value Equation, in plain English, and why it explains almost every stalled deal in your pipeline.