Mo Hussain is the founder of Accel Mobile in Boston, Mass, and a member of the MIT EMBA class of 2013.

I’m the founder of a mobile technology company and a few years ago, I found myself negotiating a potential multi-million dollar contract with the head of a telecom conglomerate overseas. The conglomerate was hesitant to sign the deal due to my company’s small size, but I finally found some leverage. I had reviewed their quarterly reports and the one line that I could understand involved the number of users, which was increasing but at a rate that was lower and lower each quarter. Pointing this out, I made the case for how my technology would provide an innovative solution, avoiding the trend towards a growth plateau, and they signed the deal. At that moment, I realized...