Mistakes I Made Transitioning To Self Employment

This month is my six-year anniversary of being self-employed for the last 6.5 years.

The 0.5 of a year was the initial business I started with my boutique agency in international education.

I called it my ‘Transition Business’, because it was the easiest business for me to start from my career background in that industry.

I had spent a lot of time, energy, and money to start that first business.

Six months after I secured projects and started getting a flow of clients (which was awesome), I started to feel depressed and burned out about my work (not so awesome).

I was so busy trying to replace my corporate income and start a business, that I failed to gain a deeper awareness of what meaningful work meant to me.

Instead, I had created a job I didn’t enjoy doing (even though I made money), and I had to eventually fire myself and close down the business.

Of course what I experienced became the catalyst for what I now teach and mentor professionals on in my coaching practice, so that others don’t make that same mistake.

There are many things I would do differently when I think back about my own personal journey transitioning from working for someone else to working for myself.

And that is just one of them.

In this week’s video, I’m sharing the mistakes I made when I transitioned to self-employment, and how you can use what I’ve learned to create your next career shift.

I wish I took the time to understand my personal ingredients for meaningful work.

In hindsight, I wished I took more time to evaluate the kind of work I wanted to build in the next chapter of work.

Not just my skills.

But details like the model of work best suited for my personality and work style, the deeper interests I need to have to ensure sustainability in my career, and what role I was best suited for in my own company.

What I wish I did differently.

– Evaluating the type of work my skills and deep interests connected to so that I’m using my genius zone ingredients more often.

– Preparing my finances better so that I didn’t feel panicked about paying the bills as a new business owner.

– Promoting my services and telling people I’m ready for hire (and not waiting till I had the perfect brand or website first).

– Doing way too many things that didn’t move the needle in my business and what I should’ve focused on instead.

– And why I wish I systemized my business sooner than later to ensure I could hire a team down the road