Founder Bottlenecks, Leadership Lessons, & Scaling Without Chaos | E360

Market research used to take four weeks and cost $20,000. Steve Phillips built Zappi to turn that into four hours and $2,000—and he started 12 years ago, long before generative AI made this vision sound obvious. Now, with nearly 300 people and $80 million in revenue, he's challenging his organisation to double revenues in five years without adding headcount by pairing every employee with an AI agent to handle the annoying, time-consuming work.

In this episode, Steve breaks down why entrepreneurs can actually be lazy (in the right way), why you should never hire yourself, why innovation is a mindset rather than an age, and how going from 40 to 140 people in six months was utterly disastrous but created an amazing culture that propelled the business for years. He also shares why he stepped aside as CEO, how he maintains his role as Chief Innovation Officer, and why the future is already here—we're just not utilising AI to do amazing things in business yet.

What you'll learn:

💡 Why entrepreneurs can be lazy—and why doing "work" might be the wrong thing

🚫 Why you should hire for your weaknesses, not people who are just like you

🧠 Why innovation is a mindset at 56, not just for 23-year-olds in garages

🤖 How to pair every employee with an AI agent to automate administrative tasks

📈 Why going from 40 to 140 people in six months crashed productivity for a year

⚙️ How to challenge your organisation to double revenue without increasing headcount

Podcast recommendations:

A16Z (Andreessen Horowitz) - https://a16z.com/podcasts/

Hard Fork - New York Times / Platformer - https://www.nytimes.com/column/hard-fork

All In Podcast - https://www.allinpodcast.co/

About the Guest:

Steve Phillips is the founder and Chief Innovation Officer (and Chair) at Zappi, a consumer insights platform he started 12 years ago with the founding ambition of turning market research projects that took four weeks and cost $20,000 into four hours and $2,000. Zappi was AI-first from the beginning—using old-fashioned "if that, then this" automation to speed up and democratize consumer insights long before generative AI became mainstream. After merging with a South African technology company early on, Steve scaled Zappi to nearly 300 people and approximately $80 million in revenue, still growing at around 15% annually with growth rates now increasing as they focus more on AI deliverables.

The company has raised multiple rounds, brought in a PE firm about three years ago to mostly replace VCs, and subsequently added new senior leaders with different skill sets (like an MIT MBA CEO who thinks very differently than Steve). Zappi had one genuine pivot—moving from automating work for other research companies to building their own IP and data asset. Now they're using AI agents internally for everything from writing quarterly business reviews to creating client proposals, and externally helping clients use their data to generate new product ideas and advertising campaigns. Steve's challenge to the organisation: double revenues in five years without increasing headcount by pairing every employee with an AI agent to eliminate time-consuming administrative tasks.

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