CEO Mama Newsletter: 44th Edition

Bottom Line Up Front

Your ability to excel at everything is the exact thing preventing you from scaling anything. High-achieving entrepreneurial mothers are trapped in a competence prison where being capable of doing something means feeling obligated to do it. This cognitive burden of being "the one who can handle it" creates a business bottleneck disguised as expertise. The most profitable CEO mamas aren't the most competent: they're the most strategically incompetent.

Hey ,

Last week, I had a conversation with Sarah*, a brilliant consultant who built her business to $750K annually by being exceptionally good at... everything.

She could design her own graphics, write her own copy, manage her own social media, handle her own bookkeeping, AND deliver world-class strategic consulting to Fortune 500 companies.

But here's where it gets interesting.

When I asked her what she wanted to delegate first, she said:

"I know I should delegate the design work, but I'm faster at it than training someone else would be. And the copywriting... I could outsource it, but I know my voice better than anyone. And the bookkeeping is just basic math, it would cost more to hire someone than to just do it myself."

This woman was making $750K annually and spending her Saturday mornings reconciling QuickBooks.

This isn't a time management problem. This is a competence paradox.

The Competence Prison

Here's what happens to high-achieving women who become mothers and entrepreneurs:

You've spent your entire life being rewarded for competence. In school, at work, in relationships… Your ability to figure things out, solve problems, and exceed expectations has been your greatest asset.

Then you have a baby and start a business, and suddenly that same competence becomes a prison.

The logic trap goes like this:

• I'm good at this thing

• I'm faster at it than anyone else would be

• It would take too long to teach someone else

• Therefore, I should keep doing it

But here's what this logic misses:

• Every minute you spend doing something you're "good at" is a minute NOT spent doing something only you can do

• The cognitive load of managing 15 different competencies depletes your strategic thinking capacity

• Your "speed" at tactical work is preventing you from building systems that create exponential leverage

The Motherhood Amplification

For entrepreneurial mothers, the competence paradox gets amplified in devastating ways:

At home: You're competent at managing schedules, so you become the family's default project manager. You're good at remembering details, so you become the household's memory bank. You're capable of emotional regulation, so you become everyone's therapist.

In business: You're competent at content creation, so you never build a content system. You're good at client communication, so you never train anyone else to handle client relationships. You're capable of strategic thinking, so you never develop frameworks that others can execute.

The result: You become the bottleneck in both your family and your business.

And because you're so competent at being the bottleneck, everyone (including you) mistakes this for leadership.

The Real Cost of Competence

Let me be specific about what competence is actually costing you:

Revenue Ceiling: When you're the only one who can deliver your core service, your revenue is capped by your hours. A $300/hour consultant working 20 hours a week (realistic for a mother) maxes out at $312K annually. Period.

Cognitive Overhead: Managing multiple competencies creates what psychologists call "task-switching penalty." Every time you switch from strategic work to tactical work, you lose 15-25 minutes of cognitive efficiency. For CEO mamas juggling business and family, this cognitive fragmentation is devastating.

Innovation Stagnation: When all your mental energy goes to executing current systems, you have no bandwidth for improving them. Your business becomes a sophisticated version of a job.

Emergency Vulnerability: When you're the only competent person in every domain, any disruption (sick kids, family emergencies, your own illness) threatens the entire operation.

Team Development Stunting: When you can do everything faster and better than your team, you rob them of growth opportunities and create learned helplessness.

The Strategic Incompetence Framework

The most successful CEO mamas I know have mastered something counterintuitive: strategic incompetence.

They become deliberately "bad" at things they could be good at, in service of becoming exceptionally good at the few things that matter most.

Here's how it works:

Phase 1: Competence Audit
List everything you're currently competent at in your business. Include everything from high-level strategy to checking your own email. Rate each item:

• Can only I do this? (10)

• Could someone else do this with training? (5)

• Could someone else do this better than me? (1)

Phase 2: Strategic Abandonment
Anything rated 1-5 goes on your "Strategic Abandonment List." These are competencies you will actively choose to lose.

Phase 3: Competence Redistribution
Systematically transfer these competencies to team members, systems, or external partners. The goal isn't to delegate tasks - it's to redistribute cognitive load.

The Motherhood-Specific Implementation

For CEO mamas, strategic incompetence requires addressing both business and domestic competencies:

In Business:

• Stop being competent at graphic design, hire a designer and stick to brand guidelines

• Stop being competent at social media posting, create templates and let someone else execute

• Stop being competent at client onboarding, build a system and train someone else to run it

At Home:

• Stop being competent at remembering everyone's schedules, use shared calendars and make others responsible for their own appointments

• Stop being competent at meal planning, rotate responsibility or hire meal delivery

• Stop being competent at being the family's emotional regulation center, teach others to manage their own emotional needs

The Resistance Patterns

Every high-achieving mother will resist strategic incompetence. Here are the most common patterns:

"But I'm faster at it"
Yes, you are. Today. But your speed is preventing someone else from becoming competent, which means you'll be fast at it forever.

"It would take too long to train someone"
Training someone to be 80% as good as you at something takes 10-20 hours. Continuing to do that thing yourself for the next five years takes 500+ hours.

"No one cares as much as I do"
Correct. And that's exactly why they might be better at it. Your emotional investment in perfection often prevents efficient execution.

"What if they mess it up?"
They will. That's called learning. Your job is to create systems that minimize the cost of mistakes, not prevent all mistakes.

The Competence Recovery Plan

If you recognize yourself in this competence trap, here's your recovery plan:

Week 1: Complete the competence audit. Identify your three highest-value competencies (the ones that directly generate revenue or strategic advantage).

Week 2: Choose one low-value competency to abandon. Start with something that feels "easy" to give up.

Week 3: Create a basic system or training for that competency. It doesn't need to be perfect, it needs to exist.

Week 4: Transfer ownership completely. Resist the urge to "help" or "fix" their approach.

Repeat monthly until you're only competent at the things that matter most.

The Plot Twist

Here's what I've learned from watching hundreds of women make this transition:

The most successful CEO mamas aren't the most talented. They're the most boundaried.

They've learned to distinguish between "I can do this" and "I should do this."

They've developed comfort with imperfection in low-stakes domains so they can pursue excellence in high-stakes ones.

They've stopped trying to be good at everything and started being exceptional at the few things that matter most.

Your competence is not your competitive advantage. Your strategic focus is.

The question isn't "What are you good at?"

The question is "What are you good at that no one else can do, that directly impacts revenue, and that energizes rather than depletes you?"

Everything else? Get strategically bad at it.

Your profit margins will thank you.

👭 I'd love to hear from you. What competencies are you holding onto that might be limiting your growth? What would happen if you became strategically "bad" at one thing this month? Hit reply - this conversation is reshaping how successful women think about delegation.

💌 Know a CEO mama trapped in the competence prison? Forward this to her. Sometimes the most powerful thing we can do is give each other permission to be strategically incompetent.

✨ P.S. If the competence paradox is showing up at home too… aka you’re meal planning, managing calendars, and carrying the mental load because you’re “the best” at it - that’s exactly why I created the Home Harmony Handbook. It’s your step-by-step playbook to systemize (and delegate) the home side of things, so your competence doesn’t become another bottleneck. Grab it here at a special discounted rate (just $47 for our CEO Mamas).

The most profitable CEO mamas aren't the most capable…they're the most strategically selective about where they apply their capabilities.

*Name has been changed to maintain client’s privacy