For 20 years, more revenue meant more payroll. That's how services work. More people, more work, more billing.

Then I read about stan.store.

$40 million ARR. Around 60 employees. Only 10 engineers.

Stan builds online storefronts for social media creators. Co-founder Vitalii Dodonov shared these figures on X on August 31:

2022: $1 million in revenue. 4 engineers.
2023: $10 million in revenue. 4 engineers.
2024: $25 million in revenue. 7 engineers.
2026: $40 million in ARR. 10 engineers.

Look at 2022 and 2023.

Revenue went from $1 million to $10 million. The engineering team stayed at four.
Dodonov also says every engineer still answers customer support tickets.
Today, employees are expected to use AI to write code, build products and test them.

I understand that Stan is software. Services have different economics. Delivering more work often requires more people, and I cannot simply apply Stan’s numbers to my business.

But Stan made me question the link between headcount and revenue. My business still lives inside it.

When more business comes in, how quickly do I calculate how many people we need to hire?

And how often do I first ask how much more our existing team could deliver if we changed the way the work gets done?

I know how to grow revenue by adding people. I have done it for 20 years.

What I don’t know yet is how much revenue I’m leaving on the table by never testing the other way.

I strongly believe the way we judge a business needs to change too.

For years, when we wanted to know how big a company was, we asked:

“How many employees do you have?”

In the the present era, that question is no longer enough.

Krishna Lakamsani | Serial Entrepreneur | Investor | I write at the intersection of AI, capital, and the future of the human job market,
sharing my life lessons, reflections, and honest takes from the founder-investor's seat.