Lessons Learned from Living in the Transitions

Work, as with life, is lived mostly in the transitions.?We spend a lot of our time and focus much of our attention on an outcome, a job title, a destination.?Yet it is in the journey between one destination and another, mastering one role and moving into another, that we are most alive, most awake, and learn the most.

Over the last five years, I’ve built and led a consulting and coaching business. It’s been successful in ways I never thought would be possible, for far longer than I imagined. And it’s been challenging in ways I never anticipated. It was in these unplanned, unanticipated successes and challenges that I found I did my best work and grew the most.??

Many of you have asked over the years, and especially the last few months, about what it's like to go out on your own as a consultant.

So I want to share some of the lessons I’ve learned building this business and working for myself over the last five years, as I embark on my next chapter.??I did it in a different time, and of my own choice. But regardless how you come to the decision to start your own company, I hope some of these will be useful.?

• Communicating and leading are things we can all get better at and all need help doing.?No matter how good you are or how practiced you are, all of us can get better at communicating more clearly, more directly, more respectfully, and leading in a way that inspires and transforms. None of us can do it alone.

• Kindness and curiosity are more valuable than just about anything else in business. Start, continue, and end there.

• Writing a book on your life’s passion and your vocation is both deeply personal and a calling card that pay dividends long after it is published. Taking the time to organize and share your thoughts and feelings in a form for others to use is a major undertaking and has helped me clarify and explain what I do, what I believe, and what my point of view is.

• How can you keep learning?? It's important to keep yourself sharp, when you are working on your own and when people come to you to be the "expert."?I invested pretty seriously in various executive coaching training programs and certifications. But it could be anything that supports you and your clients, and keeps you sharp.

• Related, the best business development is organic and useful. Write a newsletter or articles or provide some value to the world that helps people to see what you offer and what your perspective is, and the good work will come. Offer a free version of your workshop to help people see you in action.

• For every successful project or every winning job offer, behind it is a list of failures. Most of which you may never understand. Learn to live in the unknown, with a lack of answers or feedback.?Being grateful for what is, as it comes, is the best way to survive and thrive. Learning to get good at failing, to learn what you can from it, and not to take it personally is hard. But it is at the core of the foundation on which you build a career of meaning.

• Surround yourself with a community of like-minded, supportive people. Commiserating, supporting, challenging, connecting, referring is really valuable and reminds you you are not alone. I always came from the point of view that there was more than enough good work out there for good people, so I always tried to be good at referring people to good coaches and consultants.?Good people find each other and good work finds good people.

• Get ready for lots of flaking and professional ghosting. It’s an unfortunate reality of the way many people work today that those who often stand to gain the most from your help and expertise may not show up or follow through or ever respond. Not taking those un-returned emails and calls, or those unresponded-to proposals personally is hard, but will save you if you do. It's not about you, it's all about them.

• Communications, and the ways we communicate, has never been more important than it is right now. As an industry, a discipline, a community, we communications professionals aren’t always valued in the ways we should be. And thankfully more and more leaders are seeing the value of effective communications as a core part of their business, and the power of connections between and among employees and leaders in hard times, as well as good ones. The best businesses are making serious investments in this space.?

• You don’t always get what you want…but you’ll get what you need. It’s true. The universe really does provide. It may not be exactly what you thought you wanted, or exactly how or when, or how you thought it should be. But for all the worry and angst that goes into running your own business, especially when you’re in client-services work, to trust that the universe will provide is both a great relief and I’ve learned over time one of the only things I really know to be unwaveringly true.

• Begin and end with gratitude, always.