CarvingYourOwnPathThe Next Act series is dedicated to helping later-career professionals explore and succeed beyond the corporate walls and their historic career boundaries.

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I’ve done this twice—moved beyond the relative comfort of corporate walls and defined benefits and golden handcuffs—and both times I took a ride on an emotional roller coaster.

The first time was my own choice, but it was complicated. The sale of a firm, my intense disdain for the non-culture and characters of the acquiring firm coupled with a good parachute made my choice easy. I volunteered and they said “yes.”

The backstory was that with my mother’s cancer, I doubt I could have concentrated on another job. Too many emotions around this event to make it a test case for our series. The one moral to the story is once the disease took its course and we began to move forward again, I spent a long time re-inventing myself. Given the twenty-years of corporate life, I had no great idea how to consult, coach, teach a course, write a book, manage a website or market without a crack team to lead the charge. It was a rich period of learning, but it hardly represented a focused endeavor.

The second time—still fresh in my memory, followed a multi-year return that never fit me. It was like putting on a great quality suit and finding the sleeves on the jacket too short and the buttons in the wrong place. It was me, not them.

This time, I planned my escape with the support of my boss. I defined my areas of business focus. I invested in coaching to help hone my skills in those specific areas. I invested in training and began the hard work of reversing the self-inflicted damage that occurred over a couple of decades of corporate life. I also navigated the emotional roller coaster.

Graphic image with the words, It's Your Career and other related professional development wordsThere were and are some hard feelings from the people I left behind. Good people that I helped recruit. They have good jobs and after a career of serving and developing and building and promoting, just once I put myself first. If that creates hard feelings for a few, so be it. (There are also some great people who supported the move. I’m thankful for them.)

I was and remain exhilarated over the freedom to create and to work in areas meaningful to myself and my target audiences. I have an intense and unyielding sense of purpose and a seemingly endless well of energy.

I remain confident but anxious over the challenges of building a sustainable business that provides security and reward for those involved. It’s hard work. Good work, but challenging. The knot in the stomach that so many long-time corporate dwellers describe is replaced by a new one with a different, more personal focus. This is not a day at the beach.

I feel liberated to be able to choose the type of work and the clients that I care about. I say “no” to work and to clients that aren’t right—something we typically don’t have the liberty of doing in our corporate lives.

The setbacks, when they occur are much more personal than those we experience when sheltered inside a bigger firm. The victories are muted just a bit. One thing I truly miss is the sense of achievement that occurs when a group of people succeed against all odds. This is lonelier. Victories are best celebrated in groups.

So what does this biographical diatribe mean for you or anyone else considering their “next act” beyond a traditional job. Some of the advice sounds time-worn, but there’s a good reason for that—it’s true.

Hard Won Wisdom on Stepping Away to Do Your Own Thing:

1. Be prepared for an emotional roller-coaster. It’s important for you to have fierce resolve about stepping out from behind corporate walls, and it’s ideal to have a solid support network, from your significant other to your accountant, your web developer, your marketing help and of course, your customers.

2. Take the time ahead of your departure to identify those core skills that will be the difference-makers for you in your new endeavor. For many, they’re speaking, facilitating, writing and of course marketing. Find help. Invest in yourself through skills focused coaching. It’s not an expense…it’s an investment in your most important asset.

3. Know where you will find your initial customers. Much like all of the “before you leave your job” articles and books suggest, it’s ideal to have customers lined up, even if the work may be one or two degrees off of center of where you want to focus. I have been too selective initially in the work I took on and as any sales executive can relate to, over-qualification can create a “lumpy” revenue stream.

4. Leverage the power of mind and body. I’ve said it in every post in this series and I’ll keep saying it: get to the gym and get in shape. The physical exertion, goal setting and daily successes—not to mention the visible reshaping of your physique all provide the psychic energy you need to sustain and strive over the long haul. Fail to invest in your body even if you are investing in your mind and you increase your odds of failing. The cure is simple. Move your butt!

5. Don’t sentence yourself to work prison. Build a work routine, but take advantage of the flexibility and new found discretionary time. Don’t make your office or workspace a prison cell and get over the fact that you have the flexibility to go to the gym at 10 or 2 or midnight and that you can take a sidetrip with your wife. You’re always accessible in this world if a client or prospect needs you, and no one is looking over your shoulder at how many hours you are putting in. And don’t worry, you’ll work harder than you ever have in your life, you just won’t notice it. Nonetheless, leverage the discretionary time and flexibility.

The Bottom-Line for Now:

If you’ve decided it’s time for something new in your professional life, and if that something new goes beyond a simple job change to a vocation change, it pays to be prepared. You’ll be balancing simultaneous equations that include: reinventing yourself and your skills; starting up and building a client base or book of business, and navigating an emotional roller coaster with some high-highs, step drops and the occasional corkscrew that will find you momentarily upside down and disoriented. If this sounds unappealing, you might want to reconsider your plans. Otherwise, start the hard work of preparing your mind, body and business before you say goodbye.

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Art Petty serves senior executives and management teams as a performance coach and strategy facilitator. Art is a popular keynote speaker focusing on helping professionals and organizations learn to survive and thrive in an era of change. Additionally, Art’s books are widely used in leadership development programs. To learn more or discuss a challenge, contact Art.