Traction isn't the time to celebrate. It's the time to clean house.
Founders hit PMF and think they can finally breathe. Nope.
Because the shortcuts you took to move fast? They're about to kill your growth.
I've seen it too many times:
❌ Features take 3X longer to ship after months of debt ❌ The team burns out patching instead of building ❌ Scaling stalls because the foundation can't handle it
The fix isn't attractive. But it's simple: Invest 10-20% of your dev budget into cleaning debt when traction hits.
Not later. Not "when we raise." Now.
Debt compounds just like interest. Ignore it, and you'll rebuild when you should be compounding growth.
Congrats. You've proven demand. Now it's time to prove discipline.