What does it really take to build a $3B company?Sometimes, it means starting at the very bottom — even after you’ve already “made it.”In this episode of Behind Numbers, I sit down with Andrew Smith, Founder of Savory Fund, to unpack the unconventional choices behind building one of the most successful hospitality investment platforms in the U.S.After years in tech, Andrew made a counterintuitive move: he went back to the dish pit. Not for optics, and not as a stunt — but to truly understand the business he was about to scale from the inside out.We dive into:• Why failure and rejection are part of every founder’s daily reality• How the skills that drive early traction can become liabilities at scale• The mindset shift required to let go of control and ego• Why unlearning is often more important than learning• How starting from the bottom shaped Savory Fund’s path to a $3B empireThis is a raw, honest conversation about leadership, resilience, and the kind of lessons you only learn by doing the work — not managing it from a distance.If you’re a founder, operator, or leader navigating growth — or questioning what real leadership looks like when the stakes rise — this episode is for you.🎙 Behind Numbers is the podcast where leaders share the decisions, failures, and insights that don’t show up in headlines — but define success.#Entrepreneurship #Leadership #Founders #StartupLife #behindnumbers