This is the first blog post you’ve seen from me in a while, I know. I’ve been quietly going through a professional evolution right alongside you.
Pondering. Introspecting. Strategizing.
As you may know, up until this point, I’ve focused almost exclusively on helping mid-career professionals navigate a career crossroads. That work entails helping clients define the next chapter of their professional story and the direction they want to take, then supporting their quick shift onto that new path with clarity and confidence.
But that’s where our work together typically has ended.
And I realized that this left me feeling... well... like something important was missing.
So, I got to thinking about that...
According to a recent article, I read that work is reported to be the Number One stressor for more than 25% of American professionals. That statistic made me sad, because work is one of the stressors that affects the other parts of our lives. Yet work is one of those stressors that we can control, but many people don’t see that.
Instead, most people feel owned by their corporate careers. Limited. Frustrated. Powerless.
In my crusade to empower professionals to gain more control over their professional life (so it stops controlling them), I could no longer overlook the fact that so many experienced professionals skip over the single-most empowering decision they can make in their career.
A decision that gives you professional autonomy. A decision that liberates you professionally and empowers you to fully unleash your strengths and talents in a way that bring a deep sense of work-life fulfillment.
That decision is to start your own online coaching or consulting business as part of your career strategy.
I started my consulting business in 2017 while I was working in my corporate job. As soon as that business was born, so was my professional freedom. There was an immediate mindset shift that happened because I knew that from now on, there was a net to catch me if, and when, I decided to leave the corporate space.
It changed the way I viewed my job. I no longer felt used in a one-sided kind of way. Once that business was born, we were using each other to achieve our own goals in a way that felt much more balanced. They were using me for the purposes of my job function, and I was using them to gain exposure and the experience I’d need to be successful as an independent consultant.
The single shift of starting my own online consulting business totally shifted the dynamic! It was a power play of the best kind.
In 2020, I stepped out of my corporate career altogether to run that consulting business full time. And from it, my second business was born—my career coaching business. Now, I own multiple income streams and am fully in charge of my professional life.
Fast-forward to present day, I spend most of my time helping professionals who often feel the same way I did all those years ago before I started my consulting business. Trapped. Used. Defeated. Weary. Confused.
Yet, there is a power play that is underutilized by so many.
A power play that diversifies your career strategy. A power play that creates a new stream of income for you. A power play that creates a way to safeguard your livelihood should you ever be laid off or decide you’ve outgrown the corporate world.
It’s starting your own online coaching or consulting business.
Start it. Establish the foundation. Set your direction. Learn how to build and grow it. Then use it when you want or need it.
Not everyone wants to start their own business, and that’s ok. The main illusions that people believe when they convince themselves that starting their own business is not a strategy they want to use includes things like:
Time: “I don’t have the time to do something like that.”
Fear, Uncertainty, and Self-Doubt: “It will fail like so many other businesses fail. Besides, I don’t have anything of value to offer someone who would actually be willing to pay for it.”
Limited Access to the Right Resources: “I don’t know how I would even begin doing something like this.”
As the old saying goes, “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.”
Those three items listed about are truly illusions. They’re not real unless you believe them.
What is real is that:
You don’t have the time to throw spaghetti at the wall. Nor do you have the time if this isn’t something that interests you in the least. But if it does interest you, you can find the time to learn how to do this and make it work.
If you take your time to set things up the right way—establish a strong foundation for your business and build a pipeline of the right clients—your chances of long-term success and growth are dramatically improved.
If you have easy access to targeted learning materials that teach you how to do things the right way, and if you’re surrounded by a supportive community of other on the same journey—people who share knowledge and wisdom with each other—the entire process flows faster and easier for you, thus your confidence and motivation levels increase.
After much introspection, I noticed that my light truly turns on full brightness when my clients conclude, on their own through the process of our work together, that they want to start their own business.
When I stepped back to re-evaluate my program offerings, I realized that my clients would greatly benefit from the valuable knowledge I’ve accumulated in all these years as an independent business owner.
Strategically creating a “multi-pronged approach” to income generation, as one of my clients put it, and helping clients create their own professional freedom by starting their first online coaching or consulting business is an underutilized power play that I intend to weave into my program of services.
You will start seeing more content from me on this topic. If it doesn’t interest you, please share with someone who might benefit.
If it does interests you, I invite you to engage with it.
In fact, come join us on June 17, 2024 at 5:30pm ET for a free Q&A session where we’ll talk through how to get started with your own online business, and how to avoid some of the common mistakes many new business owners make when they’re first starting out.
Register to attend on my website at www.griselscarantino.com. See you there!
Cheers to your success and professional freedom,
Grisel
Grisel Scarantino, MA, ODPC is a Career Strategist. She empowers people-centric, caring, creative, big-picture thinkers to strategically reinvent their careers and achieve a healthy work-life flow.
Grisel is an award-winning coach, certified consultant, best-selling author, speaker, course creator, home chef, Bigfoot enthusiast, and lover of life. If you are ready to take charge of your career and better enjoy the life you work so hard to support, visit her website and connect with her on LinkedIn for inspiring content. Send her a message, she loves to chat about career strategy.
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