From the outside, companies at similar stages can look identical. Same headcount, same revenue, same years in market. But the product work they require can be radically different.
Consider four companies, each four years old, around 20 people, generating 2-3M€ ARR. On paper, they're peers. In practice, they need completely different product organizations.
This company sells quality management software to pharmaceutical manufacturers. They've found a strong niche: mid-sized pharma companies underserved by enterprise solutions. Retention is excellent. Customers renew and expand. The problem is that the product still requires too much manual configuration and customer success handholding.
The path to 10M€ ARR isn't acquiring radically more customers or entering new markets. It's making the existing product dramatically better: easier to configure, more automated, more self-serve. Every improvement to the core product increases margin by reducing customer success costs and accelerates sales by shortening implementation time.
Mode balance: 60% Feature Work, 20% Growth, 20% Scaling
The company needs PMs obsessed with product polish and user experience. Deep discovery work, continuous refinement of core workflows, relentless simplification. Growth work focuses on activation and expansion within existing accounts—not top-of-funnel acquisition. Scaling work addresses the technical debt accumulated during early product-market fit exploration.
The mistake to avoid: premature PMF expansion. The temptation is to chase adjacent verticals (medical devices, cosmetics) or new buyer personas (enterprise pharma). But the core product isn't yet efficient enough to scale. Expansion now would stretch the team thin and dilute focus.
This company built a procurement automation tool initially focused on indirect spend for mid-market companies. The wedge worked: they've proven the value proposition and have a repeatable sales motion. But the product addresses only a fraction of customer procurement needs, and competitors are circling.
The path to 10M€ ARR is expanding the product surface: direct spend, supplier management, contract lifecycle, spend analytics. Customers are asking for it. The technology foundation is sound. The risk is that if they don't expand, a competitor will offer a more complete solution and displace them.
Mode balance: 50% PMF Expansion, 35% Feature Work, 15% Scaling
The company needs PMs comfortable with ambiguity and new product development. They're effectively building v1 of several adjacent products while maintaining a working core. Feature work continues on the original wedge to protect the base. Scaling work is minimal but necessary to ensure the platform can support multiple product modules.
The mistake to avoid: over-investing in growth. The sales motion works, and it's tempting to pour fuel on acquisition. But acquiring customers into an incomplete product creates churn risk. Better to expand the product first, then accelerate growth with a more compelling offering.