Four Types of Agency Founder: Which Are You?

The myth of agency life used to be simple: build as fast as you can, scale a big team, and eventually sell to a holding company. Growth meant headcount. Success meant square footage. Bigger meant better.

But the agency landscape in 2025 (and beyond) looks very different. According to Agency by Agency’s research, most agencies in the UK are still small, with the majority employing fewer than 15 people. This isn’t a temporary stage on the way to becoming “proper” businesses. For many founders, it’s a deliberate choice. Small is agile. Small is profitable. Small means freedom.

The truth is that agency founders are not all cut from the same cloth. They don’t share the same ambitions, and they don’t define success in the same way. Some want to build businesses that give them freedom and fulfilment. Others are excited by the challenge of scaling, while some are already running larger teams and grappling with efficiency and leadership. And a growing number are actively building businesses with a sale in mind.

At The Agency Adventure, we’ve come to recognise four founder profiles that capture these different paths: Freestyle, Stepping Up, Scaling, and Exiting. Each comes with its own dreams, challenges and realities. Understanding which one you are can be a powerful way to set clearer goals and run your agency in a way that aligns with your personal vision.

But the reality is, over the course of your career as an agency owner, you may well jump between these different mindset profiles. Of course you may resonate with elements of all of them. But through our work with hundreds of agencies of the years, we think this is the simplest way of defining them. 

Read on to discover the Four Founder Profiles, or jump straight to our diagnostic tool to discover your profile now. 

The Freestyle Founder

Freestyle founders are often the ones who started an agency because they loved the work. They wanted to shape their own destiny, choose the clients they worked with, and build something profitable enough to support a lifestyle they enjoy.

For them, success is not about building an empire, it’s about balance. They want their agency to provide meaningful work, a good income, and the time to enjoy life outside of the business. A thriving agency doesn’t need to be big (although it can be!), but it does need to be sustainable, profitable, and fun.

The challenge for freestyle founders is resisting the pressure to grow for the sake of it or because that’s what their peers are doing. In a world that constantly glorifies scale, it can feel like standing still is a failure. In reality, for the Freestyle Founder it may be a conscious choice. Their biggest risk is slipping into survival mode: saying yes to the wrong clients, neglecting profitability, and burning themselves out. With the right focus on positioning, marketing, and financial discipline, a freestyle agency can be one of the most rewarding models to run. And if we’re honest, there should be at least a little bit of Freestyler in all of us! 

The Stepping Up Founder

Stepping Up founders have already built something that works. They’ve got at least a handful of employees, a healthy pipeline, and they’ve proven their model. But now they’re hitting the limits of being a hands-on founder. The business is too big to manage every detail, yet not big enough to run without them.

These founders are starting to think about structure. They need to build a management layer, delegate more, and create systems that allow the agency to function beyond their constant involvement. The dream is to step out of the weeds and spend more time on vision, positioning, strategy and growth.

The challenge is letting go. Founders at this stage often struggle with trust, fearing that quality will dip if they don’t oversee everything themselves. They can also feel pulled in different directions, wanting to grow, but not wanting to lose the agility and intimacy of being small. Stepping Up is about building confidence in others and learning that leadership is not about control, but about creating the conditions for others to thrive.

The Scaling Founder

Scaling founders are energised by growth. They want to build bigger teams, land larger clients, and see their agency become a significant player in the market. For them, success is measured in momentum, more people, more revenue, more opportunities. Some are driven by the possibility of a future exit, others simply by the thrill of expansion.

Scaling requires a different kind of discipline. It’s no longer enough to rely on the founder’s energy and network. Agencies at this stage need a strong marketing and sales function (Fuel) that works independently of the founder. They need clear organisational design, a senior leadership team, and a grip on data and financials that ensures growth is sustainable.

Not every Scaling Founder will take the same path to growth. Some will want to grow organically over a long period of time (sometimes decades). Others will want to hack their organic growth by acquiring other businesses to expand their reach and operation. 

The challenge is complexity. A ten-person agency can run on informal communication and gut instinct. At twenty or thirty people (or more), that approach quickly breaks down. Scaling founders must learn to think like business leaders rather than project leaders. They need to balance innovation with process, ambition with stability. Done well, scaling can unlock exciting new possibilities for everyone including the founder. Done badly, it can destroy culture and profitability.

The Exiting Founder

Exiting founders are those who are actively building their agency to sell. Some may have been through the other stages already and are now ready to cash in. Others start their agency with the end in mind, deliberately shaping it into a business that will attract buyers.

Their dream is clear: a successful exit that rewards the years of effort they’ve put into building the agency. But what that looks like varies. For some, it’s a sale to a larger agency group while for others, it might be a management buyout or even a merger. Exiting an agency is truly personal. The owner really needs to consider what is most important to them and their reasons for exiting in the first place. What they really want from a sale may change over time, but setting their agency up for this success will always remain.  

The challenge is in building an agency that is genuinely attractive to buyers. That means consistent profitability, strong systems, a management team that can run the business without the founder, and a clear proposition in the market. Many agencies fail to exit successfully because they remain too dependent on the founder or lack the financial discipline to prove long-term value. Exiting is as much about planning as it is about ambition.

It’s also important for Exiting agency owners to think about life after their business. Some founders find it difficult to integrate into normal life after their sale, not because they have so much money they don't know what to do with it (unfortunately!) but because they haven't planned what their vision is for the future, especially if they’re below retirement age. 

Why knowing your profile matters

Recognising your founder profile is not about putting yourself in a box, it’s about clarity. Once you understand your mindset, natural style and ambition, you can run your agency in a way that feels aligned with who you are, rather than chasing a model or worn out playbook that doesn’t fit.

A Freestyle founder who chases scale will quickly burn out. A Scaling founder who pretends they just want lifestyle balance will feel constantly frustrated. An Exiting founder who ignores the systems buyers look for will never achieve the sale they’re aiming for. A Stepping Up founder that tries to sell their business too soon will take their eye off a longer term prize. 

The industry is changing; big no longer automatically means better. Agencies of all shapes and sizes can thrive, as long as their leaders are honest about what they want and deliberate in how they build.

The first step is recognising yourself in at least one of these profiles. The next is building your agency intentionally, rather than by accident.

Take our Your Agency of the Future diagnostic tool now to discover your founder profile now.