The Operationary Blog
Reading for
Founders and operations leaders running companies under 50

On the record. The kind of writing that earns its read.

Practical writing for founders and operations leaders running companies under 50. The things worth knowing before they become expensive to learn.

Founders Operations HR No jargon
Small Business HR Sylvia Awuah-Gyan Small Business HR Sylvia Awuah-Gyan

The Firsts That Define Your Business (and How to Nail Them)

Everyone remembers their first sale. Not as many talk about their first hire, their first payroll run, or (and this one tends to come up fast) their first termination. These moments don't just shape how your business operates. They set the tone for everything that comes after them. Getting them right matters more than most founders realize, and this post is a practical guide to doing exactly that.

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Small Business HR Sylvia Awuah-Gyan Small Business HR Sylvia Awuah-Gyan

The Hidden Price Tag of DIY HR (And Why It’s Hurting Your Business)

It looks like a cost savings on paper. Handle HR yourself, skip the overhead, keep things simple. The problem is what doesn't show up on the spreadsheet: the compliance fines, the turnover costs (50-200% of someone's annual salary, by the way), the hours you're spending on admin instead of growing the business. One poorly worded policy in a handbook you copied from the internet can undo years of hard work. This post lays out what DIY HR actually costs.

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Small Business HR Sylvia Awuah-Gyan Small Business HR Sylvia Awuah-Gyan

The Founder’s Time Trap: Why Doing HR Yourself Is Costing You Growth

Every hour a founder spends processing payroll or sorting through onboarding paperwork is an hour that didn't go toward closing a deal, improving the product, or building something that scales. That trade-off sounds obvious when you say it out loud, but it's easy to miss when you're deep in the weeds. This post makes the case, pretty clearly, for why your time is the most expensive HR tool you could possibly use.

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