There is no shame in asking for help. No one does great, important things on their own. I remind our clients of it constantly. So when I read psychologist Angela Duckworth’s recent New York Times guest essay, my immediate reaction was: she’s proving my point. Duckworth spent years studying high performers across fields and landed on the same thing: the habit they all share is that they ask for help. Not reluctantly, not as a last resort. Proactively. Readily. Without shame.
It sounds simple. It isn’t.
We live in a culture that celebrates the lone founder, the self-made success story, the gritty entrepreneur who figured it all out on her own. That narrative is pervasive, and for small business owners, it can hold them back in real ways. The pressure to appear as if you have it all together, to not need anyone, to bootstrap through every obstacle keeps many brilliant people stuck.
There is no shame in asking for help, and there is no shame in not knowing. Big companies have boards, advisors, and teams of consultants surrounding them with expertise and support. That infrastructure exists because no one person, no matter how capable, can see every angle of a complex problem on their own. 36 million small business owners in America keep our economy moving. Many of them are under-resourced and rarely have access to that same kind of support. They deserve it.
The founders TAP works with have great ideas. They have drive. They have a superpower, a secret sauce that is uniquely theirs. Founders are often so focused on their area of expertise, and so immersed in the day-to-day demands of running a business, that finding the time and space to step back can be difficult. Yet that outside perspective can be incredibly valuable. It creates room to question assumptions, identify blind spots, explore new possibilities, and make better decisions. We also help business owners think bigger: to understand the importance of growth, income, and savings, and to build toward all three with intention.
Asking for help creates that space. It is not about replacing what makes a founder exceptional. It is about surrounding that expertise with the perspective, tools, and support that help turn it into a stronger business. That’s exactly why TAP exists.
Kalyn Romaine is a perfect example. As founder of Forward Collective Group, a consulting firm based in Conyers, Georgia, specializing in business transformation, learning design, and executive coaching, Kalyn grew up in Detroit navigating real hardship and came out of it with a deep determination to build a career defined by purpose and prosperity. In 2016, tired of stiff, dry workplace culture, she left her government HR job in New York City to start a business helping people and organizations work in a more human way, becoming the first entrepreneur in her family.
By 2025, she had built genuine momentum. But nearly all of her revenue came from business and government clients, with very little direct-to-consumer income. Growth had stalled. Her social media content was active but not converting. She had the expertise and the vision. What she needed was a clearer strategy and the structure to execute it.
When Kalyn joined TAP’s Deep Dive program in September 2025, we worked with her to sharpen her audience, niche, and brand positioning and to build a social media approach that could actually drive sales. We helped her shift from frequent posting to higher-quality content, introduced stronger hooks and better video formats, and used benchmark analysis to guide her presence on TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
The results speak for themselves. Her revenue mix shifted from roughly 90% business and government clients to an even three-way split across B2G, B2B, and direct-to-consumer. She generated $8,000 in sales in just three months from content created after completing the program. From January through May 2026, 100% of her sales came through social media channels.
But what stays with me most is what she said about the experience:
“Ideas can come from anywhere, but you need structure to implement them. TAP gave me the methods, systems, tools, and support to move forward. My whole life, I have been advising and supporting others. With TAP, I finally had someone advising me. As a solo entrepreneur, I needed that support system.” - Kalyn Romaine, Founder Forward Collective Group
That last sentence says it all. TAP gave her the structure her ideas needed, the methods, systems, and tools to move them forward, but it also gave her something she had never had for herself: someone in her corner. Here is a woman who has spent her career helping organizations work in a more human way. Yet she was doing what so many founders do, pouring energy into everyone else while going without the support she needed.
Duckworth writes that people broadly suffer from what cognitive psychologists call “the illusion of self-sufficiency,” a tendency to overlook how much we owe our skills and progress to other people. She cites research showing that entrepreneurs are more successful when brought together to learn from one another, that college students who seek help outperform those who don’t, and that people consistently underestimate how willing others are to lend a hand.
The data backs up what we see on the ground every day at TAP.
Asking for help is not a workaround for people who can’t figure things out on their own. It is the strategy. It is what separates founders who break through from those who keep hitting the same ceiling year after year.
If you are a small business owner who’s been grinding alone and wondering why things aren’t moving as fast as they should, I want to offer you what Kalyn found: someone who sees your business clearly, asks the right questions, and gives you the clarity and confidence to act.
That is why TAP exists.
You don’t have to have it all figured out before you ask for support. In fact, asking is often what makes it possible to figure it out.
Jane Veron is the CEO and Co-Founder of The Acceleration Project (TAP), a nonprofit that provides free, high-impact consulting services to under-resourced small business owners nationwide. Learn more at theaccelerationproject.org.