What It's Really Like Going Back to Corporate

🎧 BTW: If you’d rather listen to Modern Mavericks as a podcast, click here!

Welcome to the most hotly-requested edition of Modern Mavericks over the past 6 months!

As you heard last week and when I first made the decision, I really leaned into my brand of “doing work differently” when I decided to jump back into the corporate world after being a solo-entrepreneur for a few years. 

And when I tell you I’ve received upwards of a dozen messages in the seven months since asking about the transition? Not an exaggeration.

This tells me that a lot of us are questioning the assumption that you’re either a corporate go-getter OR you’re an entrepreneur, and that there’s no wiggle room to create your own hybrid.

FALSE. 

Seven months into this multi-hyphenate career, I can say confidently:

I still AM an entrepreneur.

You can be an entrepreneur even with a 9-5 job.

It’s all about your entrepreneurial spirit and what you choose to create as your own.

You have permission to start calling yourself an entrepreneur right now. 

Now, onto the the more specific FAQs you’ve sent me, including:

• What a day and week in my life looks like now

• What my business model looks like now

• Highs and lows of balancing corporate + entrepreneurship 

• Do I ever feel like a failure?

• My 2024 career and life goals

📅 What a day and week in my life looks like

I’ve gotten a lot better about sticking to a schedule that supports both parts of my career, but here’s the most important reminder for any self-employed person thinking about reentering the 9-5: 

Your work split cannot be 50/50.

When you agree to a corporate job again, you’re most likely agreeing to a 40-hour work week for someone else (depending, of course, on the type of job you take- you can always find part-time gigs or different ways to “work for wages” that aren’t self-employment).

I, for one, am not about to work two 40-hour work weeks in one, trying to make my entrepreneurial business “equal to” my corporate job. That would negate the whole reason I made this pivot in the first place (more balance). So, I work less on my business than I did before. I have less time and energy to give to it. It feels more appropriate to call it a side hustle now, and I’m OK with that.

A day at a glance: 

• Morning workout from 7:30AM-8:30AM, come home to make breakfast, shower, and “get ready” for my remote job.

• Log into my corporate job from 10ishAM-6ishPM 

• Publish a LinkedIn post around 12PM most days.

• Evenings after closing my work laptop are reserved for business building! I know that Modern Mavericks comes out on Fridays, so I usually spend more time on Thursday evenings wapping it up and making sure it’s set to go out. I chose Fridays because it gives me the mentality of having most of the week to plan the “big topic,” choose personal stories that bring it to life, and have time to check off the admin to-dos, like editing/publishing/marketing.

The other evenings of the week are spent on things like:

• Filming short-form videos for TikTok

• Outlining future LinkedIn posts (loose outlines, not the entire post)

• Coordinating a brand partnership or speaking opportunity over email

• Actually preparing for said partnership (creating a workshop, outlining interview questions, brainstorming content ideas)

This feels like it’s working for me right now, and it’s huge for my (probably a little neurospicy) brain to have blocks of the day dedicated to my different work “personas.” Corporate Janel and Maverick Janel work different hours! 

✍️ What my business model looks like now

From 2020 to the beginning of this year, my business model was mostly live coaching. Whether in a group of career pivoters or one-one-one, I sold career coaching that was done live in the moment. 

But I learned that I don’t particularly enjoy that as a long-term model. Instead, I prefer to create something once and have it available for someone to consume or purchase whenever they need it (this newsletter/podcast, PWP as an on-demand course, etc.). I still offer 1:1 career strategy sessions, but only one day a week. That’s a much more sustainable energy commitment for me, and is therefore more fun and enjoyable for me to actually do!

While I took away most live coaching, I doubled-down on public speaking! I’ve grown my confidence to charge for my more in-depth speaking sessions and workshops, and it’s starting to pay off (literally). 

Business offer suite at a glance:

• Digital products (Pivot With Purpose – and a new one for side hustlers coming soon)

• 1:1 Coaching Calls

• Speaking & Hosting (I’m announcing an upcoming live event on Instagram today!)

• Brand Partnerships (a super fun one is coming so soon!) → Transparently, this is a new frontier for me, and it comes with a learning curve. Most of my brand partnerships have been “paid” in free products, but I’m working to move away from in-kind payment and toward actual payment bit by bit. The ultimate goal is to collaborate with long-term sponsors for the newsletter! 

🎢 Highs + lows of balancing corporate + entrepreneurship 

The lows?

1. So. much. self. doubt. I lost a lot of traction in content creation this year, because I was convinced there was a “right” and “more strategic” way to create and share content. I bought courses on how to schedule months worth of LinkedIn posts in advance, and spent hours choosing between new newsletter platforms (Substack, ConvertKit, Beehiive). 

None of them made a difference. 

There is no right strategy– only the one you’ll stick to. Most of the content I create for Modern Mavericks, LinkedIn, and TikTok starts in my notes app and gets flushed out off the cuff. That’s what works for me, and trying sooooo hard to ~strategize~ last year ultimately just stifled my creativity and left me uninspired to create and share.

2. The fucking job search. 

The highs? 

1. I’ve met so many other Mavericks who are craving this kind of variety and balance in their careers and are making it happen! Once I shared my decision to make yet another pivot and pursue a new career model, I heard from tons of people I haven’t heard from in a while who all either did the same thing or were strongly considering the same thing!

2. The breathing room to do things my way. As I mentioned above, in what I think of as my “first iteration of entrepreneurship,” I held on too tightly to the “right” and “strategic” way to build something. Now that my livelihood is not attached to decision that favor quick growth, I can do things that might not seem strategic but make sense to me– like making Modern Mavericks a newsletter and a podcast. Would it make more sense– and probably make it easier to grow– if this were just one or the other? Maybe. But I want it to be both. And so it is! 

🙃 Did I ever feel like a failure?

Yes and no. 

When I first made this decision and set the pivot into motion early last year, I definitely cared about what it “looked like” to other people. I was afraid of being seen as a failure for making an informed decision and reprioritizing my goals, because it looked like I was moving backwards.. 

But I knew my “why” and I’m happy I had the courage to make a change instead of sticking it out in a situation that drained me (sound familiar, corporate pivoters?).

We all may pursue entrepreneurship for different reasons, be it time flexibility, putting your name on something, or solving a problem in your unique way. For me, it’s about building something that fuels my passion and lets me express my strengths in a way that makes me happy. My business wasn’t facilitating that before, but it can now.

🎯 2024 career and life goals

Consistency + intuition are the name of the game this year. 

Showing up consistently, recognizing that great things aren’t necessarily built in 366 days (did you forget this was a leap year?), AND remembering that consistency doesn’t need to mean following rigid rules or someone else’s guidelines.

Funnily enough, “consistency” was my Word of the Year for 2021, and that year I was so consistent with my personal brand and continuing education that I quit my corporate job and made a full-time income on my own! 

Sure, the things I want to be consistent with this year look different than in 2021, but I saw how powerful the compound effect is– building something you’re proud of, brick by brick. 

More specifically, though:

• High performance at my day job (!)

• Offer Pivot With Purpose on-demand again (for the most accessible price point ever!)

• More paid speaking and working with dream brands

• Getting this love letter out to all you Modern Mavericks every week – and shifting these issues to be more personal, diaristic, and behind-the-scenes

• Personal website overhaul to reflect my business evolution 

• Take a vacation on a beach

What, like it’s hard? ;) 

LOL JK, we can do this!

What other questions do you have about career pivots, going back to corporate, or creating a multi-hyphenate career? Respond to this email or shoot me a DM on IG or LinkedIn.

KGYGT (keep going, you got this),

Janel

💥 Ready to take your career power back? Here are two ways I can support you:

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