From Layoff to Finding True Fulfillment as a Solopreneur in Product Management Coaching, With Nancy Chu

Full video podcast interview on YouTube https://youtu.be/fDFbbdcxqZ4?

How would you introduce yourself as if you were catching up with an old friend?

The biggest update is that I became a coach full-time last year in 2023 and I'm still in the Bay Area. I’m learning a ton from solopreneurship, especially on self-awareness and mindset shifts!

How did you decide to become a full-time interview coach??

Let me tell you what happened. And I'm also going to give you a visual. This piece of paper was from my journal. In my journal, after I got laid off from Roku, which was right before Thanksgiving 2022, it was the week after the first Facebook layoff.

So it was very early and at that time layoff was very new. It's not like now - back then it was not normal. I was very sad, very defeated because I really, really loved the Roku job. It was the best job I have ever had in my nearly two decades of career. At that time, my coach recommended that I just write down everything that I want in a job on a piece of paper. And because I loved the Roku job so much, I really just wrote down things that I loved about Roku. So I'm going to read you what I wrote down back then.

My primary objective is to establish emotional connection with my end users. I wrote that down because the product that I was working on at Roku was focusing on emotional connection, which I thought was just so thoughtful, so purposeful compared to the work that I was doing at Facebook. My work at Facebook only focused on engagement and session. Roku cared about emotional connection. I loved that work.?

The second thing I wrote down was a feeling of fulfillment, ease and joy. That's because that was exactly how I felt when I was at Roku. It was very fulfilling, easy-flowing, and joyful. I want recognition from my users, peers, and leadership. Because again, that's what I had at Roku. So I was just writing down the things that I loved.?

The very last thing was not what I had at Roku that I wish I had, which is a flexible schedule whereorking hours are in my control and I can work from anywhere. I didn't have that at Roku. So I wrote these things down and my coach at the time said, okay, I want you to visualize how it would feel to have all of those things and do it 12 times. So on this piece of paper, I drew 12 check boxes and I was on a mission to visualize having all of these things 12 times. And every time I visualize, I would check it off and I put a date next to it. The very first time I did the visualization was in December. So the layoff was before Thanksgiving in November. So I did the visualization early December and I did the visualization five times in December and then once in January. I've done this visualization six times out of 12 times. I didn't finish the exercise that my coach asked me to do. But looking back, all of these things came true. It's just that at the time I didn't know that it was going to be through a coaching career, I thought it was going to be another PM job. And I wanted to have these things.?

What happened was I went on trips after I got laid off, I decided that I was just going to enjoy my time off and not worry about job hunting. And serendipitously, someone said that they're looking for an English tutor in a professional working environment. Because I was traveling, I was not taking life very seriously, I just said, oh yes, sure, I will do it. It was a post in a Facebook group. So a lot of people raised their hands. And then the person said they wanted to interview me. And then I got on Zoom and then he told me that he was a PM at Facebook, where I used to work. So I became the perfect English tutor for him. Our engagement started with me helping him with his English. And then it turned into a coaching thing because he was new to the company. He needed help on how to understand and how to operate in the Facebook environment. And I was helping him navigate that type of environment. I love that experience. Meanwhile, I was only doing this for fun. And I was also in between two trips. I was only in the Bay area for about three weeks in between two trips. And I said, all right, I can only meet you for three to four weeks because I'm going back to Taiwan. Then when I was in Taiwan, he continued messaging me and asked if we could meet. I said, okay, I guess we can meet. I'm not doing anything anyway. So I was coaching him when I was in Taiwan and it was really cool to be able to work from anywhere and say things the way I want to say it.?

As a PM manager at Facebook, I couldn't really say certain things in an authentic way. But now that I don't work for a specific company anymore, I am free. I can say anything I want. So when? I first felt this freedom in Taiwan, I thought, oh, this is really fun for me and I really enjoy doing this, maybe I could try to get more clients. And then I posted on LinkedIn and then people were asking me for my website. I was like, ooh, I guess I should go make a website. So the website that you see right now today, https://www.coachnancychu.com/ was created when I was in Taiwan. And one thing led to another, I got two more clients. It was really cool, really fun. I came back from Taiwan and I was thinking, okay, I guess I have to be serious now, I have to find a job. But the job search process was not pleasing. It is just not cool because they wanted to do interviews after another interview. And then it's like, at some point I was thinking, I get that you have to evaluate fit, but why can't you just trust that I have been a PM before and I could do this job? And that was really irritating to me.?

Meanwhile, I was trying to grow my coaching business, which felt really fulfilling, really fun. So I just did more and more of the thing that felt really good and less and less of the job search thing that felt really bad. And then I went on another trip. I was in Japan in April, and then the recruiter emailed me and wanted to do another interview. I'm like, no more interviews, let's just stop with this nonsense. And in that moment in April last year was when I decided to give myself a chance to try this coaching thing full-time because I was just having a really good time doing it.

What’s the biggest challenge in your solopreneurship right now??

The biggest mindset shift is the opposite of collecting paychecks. When you are collecting paychecks, you don't really have to think about whether the check is coming. It just always comes. As long as you have the job, your paycheck will come. But as a solopreneur, that paycheck doesn't come anymore by default. you always have to go get your next paycheck.

That's the biggest difference. And the size of the paycheck is different every time. But it also means that I no longer have to get promoted to make more money. So it's just very, very different from the employee mindset and the employee lifestyle.

What does a “typical” day look like for you??

It comes down to how I want to spend my time. There's marketing work that I have to do. There's selling that I have to do. Then of course I have to do the actual coaching. So it's really just these three things. And it depends on how I want to spend my day. I could just spend that day doing coaching only and nothing else. That means I'm not marketing and I'm not selling and I'm just coaching or it could be zero coaching and only marketing or only selling. So it's really just one of these three things. The day is made up of either marketing, selling or coaching.

I don't really have a system per se. I used to not do more than three coaching calls a day. That used to be my maximum, but now my new maximum is five coaching calls, which is five hours of coaching. That is actually pretty tiring because it takes a lot of energy, especially if you're doing a group coaching call. It requires a lot more energy to hold a group together compared to just a 1:1 conversation. I used to think that I could go from meeting to meeting to meeting because that's what PMs do. We're just in meetings all the time, but attending a meeting, even if you're hosting a meeting, is still very different from doing a coaching call because in a coaching call, you have to deeply listen.

A mentoring session is mostly a one-way thing. It's just me giving you advice and I'm just like giving you my brain dump. That is a mentoring session. But a coaching session is different from a mentoring session because if I just give you all the information, you won't really absorb it. I have to give you bits of information at a time. And the best way for you to actually experience a breakthrough moment is when that insight comes from within. And how you get that insight is through me asking you really good questions that make you think deeply. That is a coaching session. That's the difference between a mentoring session and a coaching session. And so it takes a lot of energy to host coaching sessions and my maximum right now is five a day. But if I'm doing five coaching calls a day, that means I don't have any more energy left to do any marketing and any sales.

I was in Taiwan in February for two weeks. I was still working but because of the time zone overlap, I was only able to take coaching calls in the morning in Taiwan, which is afternoon here, Pacific time. And so I was only taking two or three coaching calls. But in the entire afternoon, I was able to work on my marketing and selling if needed. there's a lot of flexibility around your schedule. And that's basically the bullet point that I wrote down on my paper here, flexible schedule and that I get to actually control it.

Do you think you can eventually catch up to your FAANG salary being a solopreneur? What’s your plan to get there??

Yes. I started my coaching business full-time in April last year. And by July, I hit my first 10 K month. So it's not a long timeframe. We're talking three months. And that to me is product market fit and it has a similar horizon as onboarding onto a new job. You're going to take about three months to onboard anyway. It's the same time. It's just the difference is you're getting paid during your onboarding, but as a solopreneur, you're not going to get paid. So there's trade-offs.?

In the June-July timeframe, I hit my first 10K month and in October, I hit 30K. That is FAANG's salary in terms of base minimum, you already exceeded the base right there. So no, if I were to look at the total compensation, base plus, stocks, RSUs, I'm not there yet. But I actually don't need to make as much money as I used to at FAANG. I don't need that much to actually enjoy my life. everything is an exchange. You're compensated for your work. You're compensated for your time. Employees at FAANG have to put up with certain things in exchange. They compensate you for your time and for your energy. But right now, I don't have to put up with, let's say, toxic managers. I don't have to put up with toxic performance review processes. I don't have to put up with work bullies who have more power than me. So there are a lot of things I don't have to put up with. And so I'm okay not making the same in terms of total compensation.?

I'm very happy just making a base salary on my own terms.

When I was at Facebook, I had mysterious health issues. I had stomach pains for years and it didn't go away. And my doctors didn't know what was wrong with me. they did all kinds of tests, urine tests, kidney stones. At one point they thought I had bladder cancer. It was just weird. They could not figure out what was wrong. And it was this stomach pain that just, always stayed on in the background of my life. And I had terrible sleep. But all of those things are no longer issues now. And my mental health is also a lot better now compared to before. So it's a different lifestyle that has benefits and also, I mean, everything is a trade-off which has pros and cons.

Any advice for people who want to be a Solopreneur and leave the 9-5 grind?

Step 1: You need a new mindset. The employee mindset is not the mindset that will help you be a successful solopreneur.?

Step 2: You have to be okay with being seen. That's how you get clients and that's how you get projects. You have to be seen.

If you're willing to do these two things, then solopreneurship is a very good option. And the mindset shift, I would say, is basically going from employee mindset to CEO mindset.