Every January, millions of people resolve to get healthier. They join gyms, hire trainers, and put themselves in environments engineered for progress. The formula is obvious: the right expertise, the right structure, and the right people make improvements inevitable.
Yet when it comes to our businesses, the engines that employ people and shape industries, we often operate in isolation. We grind away alone, convinced that needing input is somehow an admission of weakness. And after building multi-million-pound companies, we tell ourselves we should have all the answers by now.
But the founders who scale fastest understand something important. Business health requires continuous investment, expert insight, and a community strong enough to hold you accountable to your ambitions.
Running a scale-up company means facing decisions that are rarely simple and never something you can solve through a quick internet search. Should you expand internationally? How do you keep a key hire who is wavering? What capital structure will get you through the next phase of growth?
Is now the moment to acquire, or the moment to be acquired?
These are not questions you eventually figure out through trial and error. They are questions that grow heavier the longer you hesitate. Meanwhile, competitors who seek support, challenge their thinking, and move with speed advance.
I have watched exceptional founders spend months debating a move that a peer, someone who has already navigated the same crossroads, could have helped them resolve in a single afternoon. That lost time is not hypothetical. It is lost revenue, lost positioning, and lost momentum. And momentum, once gone, is incredibly difficult to regain.
When you consistently engage with other founders who operate at your level, everything shifts. Problems that felt overwhelming shrink down to size. Blind spots become visible. Opportunities you would have missed suddenly come into focus. You begin to recognise patterns because you are learning from the lived experience of others who have already paid the price for those insights.
This is not networking in the traditional sense. It is not swapping business cards over canapés. It is about building a trusted circle of people who carry the same weight, face the same pressures, and understand the stakes in a way no investor, adviser, or team member ever can.
Inside our community at Helm, I have seen founders cut their time to decision on major strategic calls by more than half. Not because they rush, but because they move with clarity. They pressure test assumptions, tap into collective intelligence, and learn in hours what would have taken years to uncover alone.
The gym analogy is more literal than it sounds. Turning up once changes nothing. Showing up consistently changes everything. The founders who get real value treat peer engagement as a discipline. They block time for Forums the same way they block time for investor meetings. They show up prepared. They contribute. They understand that a community only works when every member is committed to the health of the whole.
As you set your priorities for the year ahead, ask yourself a simple question: are you investing in the health of your business with the same intentionality you invest in your own?
If you want to accelerate in 2026, working harder in isolation will not get you there. Surrounding yourself with the right people will. Founders who have overcome the challenges you are facing. Founders who challenge your assumptions and push you to think bigger and execute better.
The businesses that will dominate the next decade will not be led by lone wolves. They will be led by founders who understand that speed comes from shared intelligence, and growth accelerates when you stop solving every problem for the first time.
Your business deserves the same commitment, discipline, and care that you give your body every January. Make 2026 the year you invest in its health properly.