Hardware, Software, Self: The Three Pillars
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~ongoing to results
- Steps
- 6
- Confidence
- —
Partaker's core coaching model, which he says he introduces from the very first session with a client. The business is the hardware. To get the hardware to operate correctly you have to code the software correctly, and the software is two further pillars that scale in parallel with the business: your leadership, and the self. The three scale together rather than sequentially — a business cannot outgrow the leadership running it, and leadership cannot outgrow the personal foundation underneath. Partaker also uses the model as the architecture of his own product portfolio: each pillar can become its own value ladder with low, mid and high entry points — one for scaling a business, one for someone in a leadership position who isn't an entrepreneur, and a peak performance program stripped out entirely as its own ladder. He treats the resulting multi-ladder structure not as complexity to eliminate but as a more robust portfolio with different entry points for different people.
Origin
Extracted from Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal
How to run it
- 1
Diagnose the hardware
Assess the business itself — its systems, structure and performance. This is the visible layer and usually the one the client presents with.
Pro tip A scale-up assessment showing where the business is strong, weak, and where to focus next is one way to make the hardware layer concrete.
- 2
Recognise the software runs the hardware
Accept that hardware performance is downstream of how it is coded. Fixing business problems without touching leadership and self produces temporary results.
- 3
Code pillar one — leadership
Work on the client's capability as a leader, which must scale in parallel with the business rather than lag it.
- 4
Code pillar two — the self
Work on the personal layer, closing the gap between current self and best self across several dimensions. A peak performance assessment is the diagnostic Partaker uses here.
- 5
Scale the three in parallel
Treat all three as simultaneous rather than staged. The two software pillars scale in parallel to the business, not after it.
Watch out Advancing the hardware alone is what produces a business its leader can no longer run.
- 6
Map each pillar to its own value ladder
If productising, give each pillar low, mid and high entry points. Partaker keeps a business-scaling ladder, a leadership ladder for non-entrepreneurs, and a fully separate peak performance ladder.
Pro tip Multiple ladders are a more robust portfolio with different entry points for different people — judge them by whether they serve the mission and energise you, not by whether they are simple.
In the wild
Partaker used his own business as the worked example. The three pillars each map to a ladder: one to help someone scale a business, one for a person in a leadership position who is not an entrepreneur and wants to scale as a leader, and the peak performance program which is completely stripped out as its own value ladder. He deployed this specifically to counter Ali's conviction that a single value ladder is always simpler and therefore better, pointing out that Apple does not have a single value ladder either.
→ Ali softened his simplification position, later conceding that reaching $10 million would likely require a blended product portfolio rather than one product.
Partaker's lead-gen assets mirror the three pillars directly. His site offers a free download of his book The Three Alarms, a scale-up assessment that shows where the business is strong, weak, and where to focus next, and a peak performance assessment that helps determine how to close the gap between current and best self across several dimensions.
→ Each pillar has a free diagnostic entry point, letting prospects self-identify which layer they need before any paid ladder is involved.
Common mistakes
Treating the business as the only problem
Clients arrive wanting hardware fixes. Working only there leaves the code that runs the hardware untouched, so the same business problems regenerate as the company grows past its leader.
Collapsing ladders for the sake of simplicity
Ali's instinct was that one value ladder with escalating support levels is inherently better. Partaker challenged this — anyone can communicate an idea compellingly enough to make you think that's it, and you always have the freedom to reserve your own judgment. The real tests are whether it serves the mission and whether it energises you.
Judging a ladder solely on whether the founder enjoys it
Partaker was careful here: if you don't find something energising, that does not automatically mean you should stop doing it. There may be others on the team who find it energising, and responsibilities and flows can be changed instead.
From the transcript
“I always say you know the business is the hardware and if you want to get the hardware to operate correctly need to code the…”
“so I don't see issue with having these these different things and to me it just builds out from my point of view for myself…”
“I think it just comes down to does it serve your mission do you enjoy it does do you find it energizing if you don't…”
From the episode
A Brutally Honest Conversation With My CEO Coach - Eric Partaker
Eric Partaker