Leadership, Growth & Chaos: What It Really Takes to Scale a Business | Ed Jarecki

In this episode, host Reed Hansen, Chief Growth Officer at MarketSurge, sits down with Ed Jarecki, a seasoned business growth coach, leadership advisor, and COO, to unpack what it really takes to scale a business without burning out your team—or yourself.

This isn’t fluffy “feel-good” leadership talk. Ed brings real-world experience from the operator’s seat, sharing how founders and executives can:

Build teams that actually execute

Lead with clarity during growth and chaos

Create systems that support scale instead of slowing it down

Whether you’re a founder, CEO, or growth-minded leader, this conversation delivers practical insights you can apply immediately.

💡 What You’ll Learn:

• The biggest leadership mistakes that quietly stall growth
• How operators think differently than founders (and why you need both)
• Systems, structure, and decision-making frameworks that scale
• Why clarity beats hustle every single time

👤 About the Guest:

Ed Jarecki is a business growth coach, leadership advisor, and COO who works closely with founders and executive teams to align strategy, execution, and leadership.

📧 Connect with Ed:
Email: [e-mail]

📈 At MarketSurge, we help you turn tools into systems — and systems into growth.
If you want automation and strategy that performs like a team of 10, you’re in the right place.

🧠 Want to talk strategy or see what MarketSurge can do for your business?
🎯 Book your 15-minute Value or Free Coffee Call:
👉 https://link.marketsurge.io/widget/bookings/15minutevalueorfreecoffee

🔗 Useful Links
🌐 Website: https://marketsurge.io
🎙️ Podcast: https://marketsurge.transistor.fm/
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/marketsurgeio
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100035121171654
🐦 X / Twitter: https://x.com/marketsurging

Creators and Guests

Host

Reed Hansen

Reed Hansen is a seasoned digital marketing executive with a proven track record of driving business growth through innovative strategies. As the Chief Growth Officer at MarketSurge, he focuses on leveraging AI-powered marketing tools to help businesses scale efficiently. Reed's expertise spans from leading startups to Fortune 500 companies, making him a recognized authority in the digital marketing space. His unique ability to combine data-driven insights with creative solutions has been instrumental in achieving remarkable sales growth for his clients. ​

What is Inside Marketing with MarketSurge?

Welcome to Inside Marketing with MarketSurge — your front-row seat to the boldest business insights, marketing breakthroughs, and entrepreneurial real talk.

Hosted by Reed Hansen, Chief Growth Officer at MarketSurge and a digital marketing veteran who's helped scale everything from scrappy startups to Fortune 500 giants, this podcast dives deep into what’s really moving the needle in today’s marketing world. Find us at Marketsurge.io

Each week, we’ll break down the latest marketing and business news (minus the fluff), explore tech trends you actually need to know, and feature unfiltered conversations with the most interesting minds in entrepreneurship and marketing.

Whether you're a founder, a marketer, or just a curious hustler looking to level up, this is where growth happens—loudly, smartly, and with just the right amount of sass.

Subscribe, tune in, and let’s scale something legendary. 🚀

Speaker: Welcome to Inside
Marketing With Market Surge.

Your front row seat to the
boldest ideas and smartest

strategies in the marketing game.

Your host is Reed Hansen, chief
Growth Officer at Market Surge.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hello
and welcome back to Inside

Marketing with Market Surge.

My guest today is Ed Rei, who is a
business growth coach, leadership

advisor, and COO of Valor.

US.

Ed's built his career helping
SMBs and mid-market companies

unlock hidden profits, streamline
operations, and build high performing

teams that even love Mondays.

He's a master at blending people first,
leadership with data-driven systems.

And today we're diving into how businesses
can simplify processes, scale sustainably.

And even integrate AI in a smart way.

Ed, I'm so glad to have you here.

Welcome to the show.

In your writing you talk a lot
about unlocking hidden profits.

So where would you say that a
business could start with that?

Why are businesses overlooking
these hidden profits?

Where are some of these main
pitfalls for business owners?

Ed Jarecki: where they're spending
their money, how they're spending their

money, better options, elimination
of things that aren't needed.

Changing the rates and scale things
that they're doing on a regular basis.

Going to annual subscriptions
versus month to month.

On the operational side it's similar.

Looking at those end-to-end processes,
where are the bandaids and the bottlenecks

at, how to remove those constraints.

Replacing bandaids with seamless,
intuitive, end-to-end processes.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

You know what an interesting thing
that and I actually think this is

true, but a little counterintuitive.

You say a lot of small, medium sized
businesses overcomplicate their systems,

and I guess intuitively we think like
small and medium sized businesses

have overly simplistic systems.

Why do you think that is?

And how can leaders take a
mindset shift to simplify and

not lose the control they want?

Ed Jarecki: syndrome.

There's some incredible tools out
there, but the questions that we need

to constantly ask ourselves is based on
our vision, mission, values, or goals.

What is it that will enhance
our journey to reach those

goals, to reach that vision?

And often that allows us to really
take that step back and focus on

only those items that can help us.

In addition, basically scheduling
a certain amount of time each week,

two hours on a Friday and focusing
on any innovation reach outs and

stuff like that at that time.

A lot of cases, and I've done it myself.

I want this.

I'll test them on a monthly basis,
which is something I had to shift to

because I thought I was gonna use it.

I've had several different situations
where, I'm not using that anymore or

something more advanced has come out.

Taking that time to go month to month
and then go to the annual can save

us, heartburn relative to having
subscriptions that we don't want.

Then of course, once we're sure where
they're gonna be part of our core process.

Getting the savings associated with
those annual subscriptions, There's also

bundling options and things like that.

Opportunities like that exist

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: I definitely
fit in that category of the shiny object

syndrome and I, think that's great advice.

I tend to let it derail me a little
too often and I do this allotting time

and a set time where I'll explore.

One of the mantras you have, and
I mentioned in the intro is you.

As a business owner should build
teams that actually love Mondays.

So what does that look like in practice?

that's a big question.

But how do you get a team

Ed Jarecki: aligning on

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
to be excited for work?

Ed Jarecki: evenings, right?

as soon as your mind starts to shift from.

Whatever your good weekend was, your good
day was to, what do I gotta do tomorrow?

If you're starting to feel real issues,
the question is how do you shift that?

for me, what I do is I
make Monday's project days

I still work plenty of hours.

But

Focus my time there and then only work on
the projects Tuesday through Thursday in

particular if I've got solid open time.

But my focus there is my clients and of
course my business development activities.

it's making sure that I'm
prepared and ready to support

them in any way I possibly can.

And then Fridays is my mix day.

that allows me to do is on Monday
mornings, I'm not waking up and

dealing with, meeting after meeting.

After meeting right away.

I'm giving myself time to prepare for
the week to advance the capabilities and

solutions that I'm providing my clients.

just giving myself a breather
as I get into the week.

And then Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday are packed.

Usually very long days,
and then Friday is my day.

Sometimes I don't have meetings
on Fridays either, which I

just take that as a blessing.

As small business owners, we rarely
get full vacations, so I just

consider that that earn the time off.

If I've met the goals that
I've set for myself that week,

take the time, go to the pool.

Go to the beach, do what
you do, what's fun for you.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: That's awesome.

You have obviously you're
very organized and you.

Block off time and have
some repeatable processes.

What happens when you get pushback?

'cause you're working with clients,
you're not alone in this equation.

Maybe needs of contractors or
partners or employees intrude

on some of that structure.

How do you balance that?

Like, how do you push back?

how do you negotiate those

Ed Jarecki: like

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: exceptions?

Ed Jarecki: on Mondays and I still

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

Ed Jarecki: meetings on Mondays.

But those are the
exceptions that breakthrough

I need to have those conversations
or those people need to

have conversations with me.

My clients, I'm often going back.

Through WhatsApp, through email, through
whatever form that makes sense for them.

So reviewing their documents and
providing 'em feedback so we get into

rhythms of communication that makes
sense for them, but it doesn't always

have to be a phone call or a Zoom
meeting to make those things happen.

For established relationships is pretty
easy and most people will respect the fact

that you, this is how you've organized
your time and so what, unless it is

an emergency, I've never had an issue.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Okay.

That's great.

A lot of what you talk about is reducing
complexity and you had a post recently

where you said simple systems beat
fancy software, headaches every time.

So why is it that businesses keep.

Trying to add complexity to things.

It does seem like it's a trap
and it's really hard to avoid.

But why do we keep, and when we say it
out loud, it's yeah, of course we wanna

avoid complexity, but, why do we keep

Ed Jarecki: got

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
falling into this cycle?

Ed Jarecki: I didn't expect, but

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah,

Ed Jarecki: pause one

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: that's fine.

We'll come back to that.

Ed Jarecki: About minutes.

Okay.

I didn't think it was till next week,
but they were here a week early.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: No problem.

That's the miracle of post editing.

So we'll be fine.

Just to touch base, so basically, my
question is why is it that business is.

keep falling into the trap of
adding complexity to their systems.

Ed Jarecki: there's always
something new, and you think about.

What they're dealing with.

I just built a brand
new blueprint platform.

It's called Mid Business Growth Blueprint.

In short its blueprint and
it's using all AI agents now.

It took about six months to do it.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Oh wow.

Ed Jarecki: month and a half was all about
design, and I learned a ton about it.

What I learned is that
AI isn't standalone.

It's not a do it for you service.

It's a collaborative service.

And so when we talk about that, there is
a true reality, I could go into details

we get all these tools, we try them,
and then they evolve to the next step.

At the beginning of this year, my question
to the world was, when are AI agents

going to hit the market, and What splash
are they gonna make, and how do I make

sure my business stays in front of that?

That kept me on the alert, and then
I ran into some obstacles and all of

a sudden I'm talking to some people
and they gave me those solutions.

So what do I do?

I go check out about a
half a dozen solutions.

Of those solutions, I actually
licensed four of 'em and then wind

up later on reducing that list
of two that I decided to keep.

To just once again, focus on what's
really needed for the business.

this particular case, these tools
actually help me realize my vision

of truly trying to find a myriad of
ways to meet these small, midsize

business owners where they're at.

And so if I've got a tool out
there that will help me for that.

The next question is what does it
do for me and how do I seamlessly

integrate it into my system?

Where does it save me
time, hours, and energy?

And where does it reduce
my overall maintenance?

If it can do those types of things, and
there's a lot of tools out there that

can, but not all of them are the right
fit for that particular organization.

So the way I've built my model to
help small business mid-size business

owners is first it's foundational.

are they foundationally doing?

Each one of eight pillars.

That includes behaviors, mindset,
having the right understanding about

themselves and how they relate to people,
having the right positive attitude.

And then I move into the core
business functions, strategy, metrics,

customers, marketing and sales.

But the key is to make those complex
as to really simplify what are they

doing in each one of those areas
to ensure that they're promoting

themselves in the right way without
overcomplicating their situation.

It also means starting in a manageable
way and then expanding out as

you're ready for that next step.

The next level of that is
automation and scalability.

So I leverage a go high level

There are others out there, and the
idea is to create seamless, end-to-end

from lead generation all the way
through feedback, retention, refinement.

and then integrating that into the
system, so it's one seamless system.

I actually can go in and modify at
different points to enhance with

AI solutions or whatever I need.

But for the small and mid-sized
business owners out there, that's the

point where they're setting the stage
for their transformational growth.

And that's where tools like the AI
agents I use to build the blueprint

platform really come into play.

And so focusing on the foundation, then
the integration across those pillars.

One example I use is marketing to sales.

Everybody out there knows
that marketing's important.

Not all of them do it.

Not many of 'em do it well at all,
but at least they're out there trying.

What I find interesting is when they
get to sales, they don't do anything

they're expecting in B2B sales that
they're gonna have conversations,

and those conversations are gonna
draw customers and without a process

that extends their marketing.

They're at risk of actually
losing a whole lot of sales.

So what's the most simple, basic
way of having a consistent process

in place aligns from marketing
through sales to accomplish

whatever their business goals are?

And like I said it's first building
the foundation and the pillars.

And what I find is a lot of those
small business owners have an

issue in one or two areas, focus
there, build the capability.

So if it's marketing,
what do they need to do?

To find their unique value proposition
in alignment with their vision,

mission, values, and goals, and then
they need to create a marketing plan

and then build that marketing plan out.

It can be that simple and then
the support that they need for

content and stuff like that.

They either can learn it, leverage AI
solutions, or hire someone to fill those

in, but keep it basic, whatever you're
doing, and then grow and expand as you

gain that knowledge and understanding.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

That's a great framework to work with.

I'd be curious now, with all the
work and the diligence you've done

on looking at different platforms
and ai, you, you've built these

AI agents, you've got a framework.

Are there places in a small, medium
sized business where you don't think

that these AI agents are very effective
currently, or, this should be avoided?

Maybe just from, an
operational standpoint.

Any, I'm sure you tried a few things
that, like some dead ends for you.

What, any, anything we
can learn from that?

Ed Jarecki: what I said up front
I'll reinforce it isn't about

looking at AI as a replacement

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: You still have work in there.

I could mention a couple of

Tools.

They are absolutely incredible
saving hours and hours of time.

I went through the learning process to
understand, oh no, this isn't just do it.

I've gotta go through, learn their
system to make my modifications and

my edits, and then put them in place.

For that?

Are you ready for that

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: of work within your business,
or do you wanna keep it more basic?

So I really think, again, it's where
are you at, what are you looking

to accomplish and being realistic
with how you're gonna get there.

be honest with you, I was not
realistic in building my blueprint

platform the first part was so easy.

I didn't

What those next pieces
were gonna be around.

We're talking about security
architecture and authentication.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: And.

Ed Jarecki: Those things
actually took a turn on.

There's other parts too, e-commerce,
lot of different hooks and stuff

like that with e-commerce and of
course the security around it.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: for those types of
things, those are not the places

to go in and delve yourself.

There are some quicker solutions
out there that can provide you those

capabilities without you directly.

Stepping in to do those I've been
testing voice avatars for videos.

And I'm struggling with it.

So I've got a test out there, and quite
honestly, my test did really well.

I normally average 14 to 1600

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yep.

Ed Jarecki: on my videos recently,
and I put not one out with an avatar.

Voice removed my mug.

And I generated, 2.2,

two point 4,000 videos.

So it actually went up
using a voice avatar.

Now, is that telling

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Wow.

Ed Jarecki: But in some cases, if I can
use that and it's an effective tool that

will save me an enormous amount of time.

But what's right for that person

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: I've got a client,
the videos aren't their thing.

So the voice avatars became the go-to,
and ultimately we will, look at the

video avatars as well, but he is not
ready for that at this particular point.

So what's the need and what's the
right solution to fill that need?

That's the question that each
business owner has to really make.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

Let's zoom out a little bit.

Now you have a nice career.

You've got multiple roles.

You've got a coaching business.

how have you arrived to this point?

Do you achieved a balance that
I think you enjoy in life.

And do you feel like at this point in your
career, you define success any differently

than you did earlier in your career?

Ed Jarecki: one of the first

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: Define success today
versus how you've defined it before?

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: yeah.

Ed Jarecki: years, twenties
and early thirties, it

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Great.

Ed Jarecki: power, money,
and responsibility.

I wanted as much as possible, had
all the ego and the confidence in

the world that I could handle it all.

of course found that I had
limitations in that at certain points.

Some of those limitations were the
fact that, having money in a good

financial life is great, without
the people part of the equation,

it really doesn't mean anything.

And so like many, I go
through those struggles, I've

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: ups and those downs, and
I got to a point where, you know,

yes, I want a healthy financial life,

Wife of 40 plus years, my kids,
my grandchild, my friends.

The business owners that I meet
every day, that's my focus.

did I make this final transition?

Tired of the narcissism and
the lack of really caring.

In large corporations, regardless of what
they say, in short, they're lying because

it's gonna only be about their money,

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ed Jarecki: employees are a
priority, they're distant.

Distant third.

What I love about the work that I
do today is I get to help people

who have true dreams and are trying
to help other people as well.

That makes it incredibly fun.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
That's fantastic.

And I agree with that wholeheartedly.

My personal satisfaction has been a lot
greater working with small and medium

sized businesses and the people that
are involved in those just seems to be.

More gratifying.

Final question.

Can you tell us about a book or a podcast
that you really enjoy, that you would

endorse as even something you've read
recently that would be something you'd

recommend for a business leader to absorb?

Ed Jarecki: three foundational

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

Ed Jarecki: relationship marketing.

80% relationships, 20% marketing,
information marketing, and

supportive relationship marketing,

Because it's about providing
meaningful value, add information

on a consistent basis that addresses
the problem going on in their mind.

Then the third piece of that is building
a StoryBrand, the book by Donald Miller.

And there's two parts to that resonate
most are put in the customer at the center

your business and the hero of their own
story, and you as their trusted guide.

And then on the relationship marketing
point, relative to relationship marketing,

of Human Connection by Cody Bateman is
the book that I use as my primary guide.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

Ed Jarecki: I'm watching news, reading
articles, et cetera all the time, to

provide different insights and ideas.

But when it comes down to it, those
provide some fundamentals that every

business owner today really needs to
drive long-term sustainable growth.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Thank you.

Now, ed, if people would like to work
with you, whether with it's with, from a

coaching standpoint or with your AI agents
and AI blueprint where can they find you?

Where are the best
places to, to reach you?

Ed Jarecki: anybody can email
me at [e-mail].

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

Fantastic.

Ed, it's been a real pleasure.

Obviously you've got a lot to share
and I think that I've learned a lot

over the course of our conversation,
so thank you very much for being

so generous with the audience.

And please reach out to Ed.

Speaker 2: Want to stay ahead of what's
actually working in marketing right now.

Head over to Market surge.io

and see how we're helping businesses
grow smarter, faster, and louder.

That's market surge.io

because your next breakthrough
shouldn't be a guess.