Thinking About Leaving Corporate for Consulting? What Senior Leaders Need to Know First, with Coach Melisa Liberman

On this episode of Executiveland, Elizabeth Freedman sits down with Melisa Liberman, founder and CEO of Melisa Liberman Coaching. They explore how corporate leaders can successfully transition into independent consulting.

You’ll hear:

• How to navigate the identity shift from corporate executive to business owner and rebuild confidence independent of past titles
• Why starting simple with “foot in the door” consulting offers helps you land clients quickly and refine your business model
• How to leverage past experience without feeling like you’re starting from scratch and recognize patterns of success
• Practical approaches to pipeline growth, lead generation, and client acquisition
• Emerging consulting opportunities, including AI strategy and diagnostics, and how to identify high-value solutions your clients need

Making the leap into independent consulting starts with a decision, not a perfect plan. This episode gives you the roadmap. Share it with a colleague who’s ready to make the leap.

For more tools, insights, and strategies to lead with clarity and credibility, visit Elizabeth’s website, take the C-Suite Readiness Assessment, and subscribe to Executiveland on  Apple Podcasts and Spotify and so you never miss a new chapter of the unwritten playbook!

• Free C-Suite Readiness Assessment
• Website: https://esuiteleader.com/
• Forbes Column: https://www.forbes.com/sites/elizabethfreedman/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elizabethfreedman
• Twitter X: @‌esuiteleader

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hi, and welcome to Executive Land. I'm Elizabeth Friedman, and this is where top leaders go off script to share straight talk and the unwritten playbook about life in the C-Suite. For more ideas, visit East SuiteLeader.com. Now let's dive into today's episode. Well, hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Executive Land. And this is, you know, an extra, extra special episode today because I have the great pleasure of speaking with one of my favorite people and business coaches, Melissa Lieberman. Welcome, Melissa, to the podcast.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Thanks for having me, Elizabeth. So fun to be here.

SPEAKER_00 0:48

Well, it's an extra pleasure when I get to work with, you know, and interview those who have been my coaches on this podcast. And Melissa, of course, you have been that for me in such an incredible way as the CEO and founder of Melissa Lieberman Coaching. And so maybe we can start with a bit more of an introduction from you. Tell us about you, Melissa. Tell us about the coaching work that you do with entrepreneurs and consultants.

SPEAKER_01 1:16

Yes, absolutely. Thanks for having me. I am Melissa Lieberman. I am a business coach for independent consultants. And I work with independent consultants. So those are primarily people who have been in corporate, they've had corporate careers, really successful corporate careers. And one of two things happens. They are pushed out of their role and want and realize they want to do something different with their life and their and their career, or they intentionally leave corporate to start a consulting business. So one of those two things, or some flavor of those, have happened. And I work with them to help them to make the transition to owning a business. It's as you know, Elizabeth, so it can be so challenging, even when I we help our own clients with, you know, our own corporate clients with the types of uh functions that we um have to run ourselves, like marketing and sales and delivery and all of the things in between, can be so challenging when we have to apply it to ourselves when we have to start when we are as an independent consultant, we think we're selling ourselves. We think that um that you know, we don't want to be too salesy, we don't want to pressure people in our network. And so it all becomes a bit of a mind game. And uh I love working with independent consultants to help them be successful in their consulting businesses.

SPEAKER_00 2:42

Well, you know, that really does describe so much of my experience. And as some people listening to the podcast know, I made the decision to step away from a 20 plus corporate career to shift to really running my own boutique consultancy. And so, you know, Melissa, one of the reasons why I wanted to work with you and got so much value out of the partnership was one, you yourself had been on this journey. You were a senior executive and, you know, primarily technology-focused roles. And also you brought in, I think, the other critical component, which is you said, it's such a mindset shift. But maybe tell a little bit about your own journey because I know there are people listening who maybe considering a move into a full-time consulting career, they want to understand how do I bring my 20, 30 plus years of experience, you know, into the world in a new way. But how did you do this? What was your experience like for yourself?

SPEAKER_01 3:43

Yeah, this was completely accidental on my part. I was in a corporate role. I had started off at Accenture and then spent the bulk of my corporate career um in as an executive at a software startup. We took it to an exit. I was responsible for all the global delivery of the so the salespeople would sell something, usually something we didn't have.

SPEAKER_00 4:06

And then my role was uh oh, shots fired, shots fired to sales.

SPEAKER_01 4:11

Um my job was to uh bring that to life. So my team would implement uh, and this was procurement software that helps global 1000 companies to manage all of their external workforce, essentially. So it's still in business, but anyway, I my husband got an opportunity in Hawaii, and this was almost 14 years ago. It was a lot harder to manage a business unit that that far away at the time, and so I resigned and the CEO asked me if I would stay on as a consultant. So we were moving to Hawaii, we were transitioning to one income, a military income at that, and uh had one child on uh I think he was two. So it seemed like a good idea to have a little extra income. So I said yes. And I really didn't want to leave the position that I was in, so it was a great, you know, kind of soft landing in the sense of still being connected to the company. And that's really where it started. And I loved it. I loved the intellectual, you know, the stimulus, intellectual stimulation. I loved being separated from some of the corporate politics. Uh, I loved uh, you know, working on a lot of strategy and management type um uh projects. So that's really the beginning of what where this got started. And then I just started landing clients through my network. So when someone would come to me and ask me if I could do something, whether it was some strategy work or project management work or anything in between, I just said yes. And then after a while, I realized wait a second, I could make a lot more money doing this, I could have a lot more control over the types of clients that I was landing and the nature of the work that I was landing and the pricing that I was charging if I if I figured out how to intentionally create a pipeline for myself. And so that's the point at which I realized I was running a business. It didn't really dawn on me until that point, and um and started trying to figure out all of this, all of this stuff of running a business by myself.

SPEAKER_00 6:18

Well, walk us through maybe what that was like in that first year or two once that realization hit. Because Melissa, if I think about some of my corporate clients who are experiencing career transition of their own choosing or not, I think really they are there's a lot of fear around how do I do this? Can I make enough money? Um, how does this really work in practice? And so what have you found? And also, what do you notice that maybe your clients go through, particularly in those first, you know, year or two years?

SPEAKER_01 6:52

We can definitely talk about a lot of the mechanics of getting a business going, but I think it all can starts with identity. You know, when I left my corporate role, I I had a title, I had a corporate office, I could get calls with Nike or Northrop Grumman or Shell, our clients. Um, and it and and I had a huge team working for me. And then all of a sudden, I had none of that. I had no title, I had no corner office, I had uh no, you know, no uh clients on my roster beyond my former employer. And it, I didn't, I very much underestimated the amount of work it would take to really rebuild my identity and create a sense of confidence for myself that didn't wasn't attached to having all of those things, and to feel like I was capable of landing clients without any of those titles, that literally Melissa Lieberman consulting, um, which is now coaching, uh, behind my me. And so much of it came down to mindset and identity work that I always thought when I was in corporate, looking back, I was a terrible thought process, but I always thought that this was that was very fluffy, there was it was not tangible, it was not um it was really something what someone would do as a you know, as a uh smart business person. Um, but what I started to realize in running my own business and being responsible for generating my own income, generating my own opportunities, really wearing every single hat in my business, that that that was a most important part is to rebuild my identity in a way that didn't rely on someone else telling me that I knew what I was doing, that didn't rely on a title, and that where I could create confidence ahead of time in order to feel the courage to go approach, you know, a potential client and uh land business. So that was the first piece that honestly took me 18 months to create for myself is like really unwinding a lot of the corporate thought process, the corporate identity, and rebuilding that from the ground up.

SPEAKER_00 9:14

Give us a sense um kind of how does one do that?

SPEAKER_02 9:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:20

Even if we're not going, maybe Melissa, into a field of consulting. I mean, anytime you leave a big corporate career, what a massive identity shift. And all the things you described. I don't have the whole team or like the fancy corner office, who am I now? Right. So, how do we how do we establish a new identity and really live into it? How did you do that?

SPEAKER_01 9:42

I I mean, it's such a I wish I knew at the time. I didn't know at the time, I didn't even really realize what was happening. I was just trying to take sort of one step in, you know, one foot in front of the other. But I think it starts with just really noticing knowing that that is important, knowing that it needs to be done, um, and recognizing that as a critical success factor, and then getting really intentional about what's like who do you want to be? You can make up anything you want uh in your life and the way that you want to see yourself, the way you want others to see you, and creating that in a very, you know, for me, I create something that's called a who plan um that really that creates a visual around. Oh, tell us about that. What do I want to be when I grow up?

SPEAKER_00 10:32

Tell us more. That sounds cool. What is it? Tell us about it.

SPEAKER_01 10:35

It's essentially a mind map, Elizabeth, at the end of the day, where you you give your new identity a name. Like, what is the name that you want to be? Um mine for a long time was the million-dollar me. Like, what is that? What does that look like? If I'm running when I'm when I'm running a million-dollar business, what who am I? How am I thinking? How am I spending my time? Uh, what am I not thinking about anymore? What am I not doing anymore? How do I think other people view me? Um, and getting very building that into a mind map essentially of what are those characteristics, what are the actions, uh, what are the ways of thinking uh that that embody a million-dollar business owner as an example? And uh then I just love using it as a checklist in a way. It's like, okay, looking at this as part of my uh weekly and monthly and quarterly routines, how what what feels like it's ingrained now and checking that off? And what feels like it's still a little bit shaky? And what can I how can I be thinking in a different way that makes that it the new norm and treating it in a much more tangible way than then just like you to your point, what uh it's a big to a big, a tall order, I should say, to shift an identity. What how do you actually do that in practice?

SPEAKER_00 11:59

But you know, I love that just the awareness that that's an important question and actually a critical question we have to answer.

SPEAKER_02 12:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:06

And that informs everything, right? How we interact, how we engage, um, the things that we do on a day-to-day basis. And so once that gets formed, yeah, um, or at least some first version of that, Melissa, you it sounds like right, you're also thinking about where am I gonna focus my time? Where am I gonna focus this consulting business? And curious how you approach that. And so if we go back to you have 20, 30 years of experience in software startups or running IT or running finance, and maybe you want to keep doing that in this consulting environment, maybe not. Um, how do we think about what do I want to do with my expertise? How do I package it? What are some of the next steps too?

SPEAKER_01 12:55

You know, I love thinking about this from a startup mentality because it is a startup. When the more we sit in a lab, you know, I've I've got clients who come to me and say, you know, I've built out my business plan and I have a website and like all of these things in order. I'm ready to land a client, that's great. But at the same time, that work was unnecessary. When you when you get to the place of wanting to look at this business model and think about transitioning into consulting, it's a very nimble, a very fluid uh business to start up. And so I love to just encourage consultants or people who are considering consulting to dive into the deep end, make a one-pager, update your LinkedIn profile, make your best guess about what type of consulting you want to do. I was working with a uh client, uh, an executive from Intel. He uh left Intel and you know, in his corporate career behind and wanted to start a consulting company and had spent a lot of time working on all these assets. But as he started having conversations with potential clients and people in his network and people that could introduce him to potential clients, he really started realizing and had a few engagements under his belt through those conversations. He started realizing that he wanted to do something very different than what he had originally set out to do. And so I just like to encourage people who are interested in consulting to not get super caught up in the trap of wanting to recreate a corporate feel when they're not even sure yet what they want to pursue or what type of consulting is, you know, uh they're passionate about or where they want to, where what kind of company they want to build. You can land a handful of clients with a really simple business model and evolve it over time to get you to the place where ultimately you're sought after for and building a reputation for what it is that you do. So sometimes the bottom line here is sometimes we overcomplicate these things. Sometimes we think we need to recreate all those assets that were available to us in corporate. And it's just really not the case or this type of work that you can go out and land work in a really nimble way and start, you know, building a proof of concept for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 15:24

Oh my God. I think you, you and I were just having a conversation with me again, Melissa. Because, you know, I do remember having a lot of this discussion with you around what's actually important and necessary at a given stage. And I think so much of it for me, underneath it, it was a confidence thing. It was feeling like right, what you need to have decided and know and be certain about in order to be able to go to market. And none of that is really true. And even if you do, to your point, right, it's all going to evolve anyway as you learn and iterate. And yeah, you know, the other side of that was for me, something else I know we talked about. Now I'm imagining this comes up a lot is well, I know I could do it in corporate, but can I do it again, quote unquote, just for me or on my own, or in this representing this new business? And I think that was hard for me at first to use my past experience as inspiration and a way to boost confidence to say, no, you you did do that here, you can do that again. So I think that was just another element. I know early on I ran into kind of how do you use your past in a way that supports your success versus, well, I just, you know, I know, but that was just because I was part of a large company. I can't possibly do that again, right?

SPEAKER_01 16:42

It's so common. We discount, it's so common to discount. That doesn't count. I I was just talking to a consultant a minute ago. He had left corporate three years ago. He's like, I think I could make this business work. Like you literally have been making this business work for three years, right? But he hasn't given himself the credit yet to say this is working, or we don't give ourselves the credit. There's so many reasons we can find to discount something. I haven't done this type of work before. Well, wait a second. I know you've done this type of work before. It was just in a different way, in a different mode. Someone else is writing your paycheck. Our brain is not our is not engineered to go find the commonalities in these ways. It's go, it's designed to go find all the risks. And so it's about overriding the way that we're looking at this to figure out how have I done this before? And and in maybe a slightly different way. And I can um I've already I've got given myself a leg up here rather than feeling like you're starting from scratch.

SPEAKER_00 17:42

Oh wow. Yes. Yeah, it's like we're unable to see any of the patterns and recognize those. It's all no, none of that counts at all. Yeah. So that's such a great reminder. Well, so Melissa, then you've worked with lots of different clients across a whole range of industries. And so take us through maybe those first few months of really deciding what is an offer. I mean, what do I actually do? So I'm I'm trying to go out there in the marketplace and sell my services. How do I need to start to think about this?

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Yeah, there's really two paths that I see that most consultants are successful doing. The first is for most of us, our first set of clients come from our former employers, former corporate clients from our warm network. And so when you think about it that way, you can look at it as I'm going to go out and have as many conversations with my warm network as possible. Let them know what I'm doing, but get really curious. We're not pitching anything to anyone. We're not trying to somehow make this perfect uh description of what we do so that they say, Oh, I need that. Our company needs that. Instead, you're having a lot of conversations from a mindset of curiosity, understanding what are the challenges they're facing, why haven't the organization been able to overcome those challenges and making offers to help them in some form or fashion to accomplish objectives that they've got that are falling behind, or overcome internal challenges, or build out an AI strategy, help them get further ahead than they're able to do on their own as an example. That's the first. This is more of a bespoke consulting approach where you can go out and then you start to see those patterns. Like we were talking about a little bit ago, through all of those conversations, you start to see what you're gravitating toward as a consultant that you would love to be doing. But you're getting paid while you're doing this, right? You're you're generating uh engagements, you're figuring out what you like, what you don't like, what what uh feels easier to sell than what doesn't, and getting that real-time feedback. That's one path. And that happens for so many of us, like the story I was sharing with you. That's where my first set, six or so clients came from. And then on the, and and quite frankly, that's exactly what happened for me. I was working with these startups, helping them scale. And the thing I love the most was helping every time an executive would pull me aside and say, I'm having a challenge with the CEO. How do I navigate this? Or my team is underperforming, how do I navigate this? Like those informal coaching times were what really I started driving toward and help me to solidify my business model and helping other independent consultants start their own businesses. Compared to the other angle you can take, which is getting really, you know, exactly what it is that you want to be consulting on, and you have that clarity from the outset, then you want, then you can spend a little bit of time building up your offerings. But what I find is consultants spend a lot of time building out this whole offer suite and their messaging and their marketing and and it's all in a lab, and then they go to market and it and it's not working exactly the way they want it to. And so they've wasted a lot of time perfecting something that then helps them avoid the real thing, which is getting out there and talking about it. So if you do know, if you're someone who is listening to this and you know what it is that you want to be doing, I like to center this around what I call a foot in the door offer, make a simple offer that gets your foot in the door. It might be an engagement that's a two-week engagement or a six-week engagement, something that's short that gets you that you can center and basically reverse engineer. How do I where are these clients? Who wants this offer? Why would they care about it? Uh, at what point in time is it a trigger that they, you know, is it an MA event, for example, that would trigger their need for it? Um, and then building out a simple sales process to land those types of foot in the door clients. And then you can always uh expand from there into follow on engagements.

SPEAKER_00 21:59

Oh. I love that idea. So, I mean, this idea of foot in the door, sort of less risk for you, for them. And again, right, you haven't overcommitted to something that as you get down the road, you discover, no, I actually have no interest in doing this. This is not what I want to do now. You know, Melissa, if you think about the clients that you either you're working with right now or just over the years, I'm curious about some of the real highlights you've seen in particular that first year or so. Because I think, you know, what we discuss so often was, of course, this is possible. Yes, this can happen. And you just can't hear that enough from people. And for everyone listening, I just cannot tell you how great it was for me to have a partner like Melissa, because over and over I think she would remind me, right? Not only not to make it uncomplicated, but simple things I could actually do. So it felt very practical in nature as much as anything else. So the question of what are you seeing that people are really doing right, that for anyone listening, no matter what their background, they really could adopt too if they were starting out in consulting.

SPEAKER_01 23:05

Yeah, I think the first thing you alluded to this, but knowing what's possible for yourself. And I talk to consultants so often, and I did this to myself too, where they underestimate what they're capable of. I mean, we set a goal so often of I want to replace my corporate income. And that's just because we're used to making that amount, and it feels like we're capable of making it because we have the evidence from past, you know, paychecks that we made that amount or whatever. And the first is saying like uh that could be a great milestone to replace your corporate income, but so much more is possible for you to create a business that really generate that generates cash, that gives you flexibility and autonomy over your schedule, where that gives you the ability to work 10 months out of the year if you want to, or three days a week if you want to. Like you get to decide. But what I often see is consultants getting started and then they just end up recreating their job because that's what they're used to. I I ask people, well, what do you how many hours a week do you want to work? And it seems like a pretty simple question, but I almost always get 40, 40. I'm like, no, you don't. Wow, I don't want to work 40 hours a week. I mean, you can if you want. I personally love working, so sometimes it's a little bit harder for me to not work than it is to or to constrain myself, I should say. But you know, we get to decide. It could be 20 hours a week. And and then we think, well, I'm gonna have to cut back on my revenue goal because I only want to work 20 hours a week. No, you don't. You don't. There are so many of these mental constructs that we are taught that we are socialized with um through our corporate careers that are just simply not the case. And so being able to just decouple all of that and start building a business model that says, okay, this is what I how much I want to work, this is how much I want to make. I made, let's say I made 500K in corporate, I'm gonna make a million. Um and building a and I want to work 20 hours a week doing it. Let me figure out how I'm gonna make that happen.

SPEAKER_02 25:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

Rather than choosing something that's realistic, that seems realistic or practical to start off with.

SPEAKER_00 25:24

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:25

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, the other really valuable conversations, you know, that we had, Melissa, related to that, just the low-hanging fruit, the opportunity that is all around you, really helped me see that um, right, I don't have to do these like very, very difficult things that would just require massive amounts of effort, even just sort of mental effort for me to do. It was like, again, you're making this harder than it has to be. And that included even simple offers. Simple, sort of not overcomplicating. But can you say a little bit more about that? Because again, many of us come from these pretty complex workplace environments, complex structures, products and services. What works best if you're a small boutique consultancy or a solo consultant?

SPEAKER_01 26:18

Yeah, the more you can solve, I mean, really, this is the intersection of finding problems that you're that people you want to work with with care about solving at the time they care about solving it, such that it's a priority for them, both it from their own time perspective, their organizational uh priority, and um, and what the organization is wanting to pay for. And so finding those simple, simple solutions. Um, and the things that I find that we get caught up in are number one, well, this isn't big enough, it isn't important enough, it's too easy. This is something I can do easily, and so somehow we we don't value it, right? But it's those, it's finding those things that come really easy to you that are so valuable to other organizations, but you can't even see it because it feels it's so simple. It's something that comes naturally to you. So figuring out what those things are that come really naturally to you, that then your ideal client would find value in in order to solve a business problem that they have. So looking at what who are the types of clients that I want to work with, in what industry or maybe what role are they in? And what are they like getting in their head, figuring out what what's keeping them up at night? What are the problems that they don't even think are solvable that are solvable? What are the what are the challenges that they're creating for themselves that if they were alleviated could move their organization forward? And um, and a lot most of that comes through having conversations. I mean, you can certainly do a lot of uh thought work on your own or even talking to Claude or whatever AI tool you love. But at the end of the day, I find that talking with those ideal clients and just from a perspective of understanding what are their challenges creates little breadcrumbs and ultimately leads to uh the most amazing offers that are so simple. You look at it and you think, why didn't I think of this in the first place? Um, but it was so obvious that sometimes it's hard to see it until you have those types of conversations.

SPEAKER_00 28:30

I agree. You know, you never stop talking, right, to your market, to your clients, to yeah, that that that to me is the foundation for everything. And you know, Melissa, I I think the other place where you provide such good structure and rigor is around, I will just call it pipeline management, right? Growing your pipeline, keeping a healthy pipeline. I know for anyone listening who's in more of a commercial sales role, you understand, right? This is this is part of the vocabulary. I used to do this for a living and still coming into this in a new capacity, you have to think about it, I find in an even more clear, focused, and disciplined way. But I'd love your insights on just pipeline growth and management.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

Yeah, it's uh one of the topics I love the most, which I find to be really ironic because when I was in corporate, I was always um making fun of the marketing team, um, the the CMO. I was always giving and here I am, uh lovingly gen sales. Um, but nonetheless, I think that's it's and your story isn't isn't um you're not the only one, Elizabeth, who has done this in corporate. And then, you know, I was working with um a consultant the other day, and he's he was a 40-year corporate uh VP of sales, different sales leader roles, executive roles, and it was as if he got amnesia when he went to apply this to himself and to his own business. And so, even if you're someone who's got that background, it can be really challenging to figure out how to market and sell your own consulting services. And so, you know, for me, it's all comes down to four elements to build a client acquisition system, a demand, you know, demand generation. First is having a revenue leader mindset. A lot of times we go into this thinking that we're um back in an interview process, which we're not. Um, we get into more of a doer mode than the actual thinking about this from a CRO perspective, for example. So, first and foremost, it comes down to thinking about your client acquisition process as from a from that perspective. Like I'm gonna put my revenue leader hat on, and then setting targets. I can't tell you the number of times that consultants come to me and say, I don't, I don't know my revenue goal. I tell them before we meet, I'm gonna ask you your revenue goal, and they still say, I don't, I don't know what it is. I haven't said it yet. It's because they're nervous that they're not going to hit it. Right. They're nervous that they're going to be disappointed because they didn't hit their goal. Imagine you're in corporate right now and you aren't going to tell the CEO you don't want to set a goal because you're nervous you're not going to hit it. Like that just doesn't work, you know. But we do that to ourselves. So it's about setting those targets and getting really clear about the activity, amount of activity and type of activity required to hit those targets, and then putting a process in place that allows you to do a little bit of it every week. This doesn't have to be, you know, spending a whole day on marketing every week or a whole day on lead generation. It's about a little bit at a time and creating that in a consistent way so that you've got conversations happening and ultimately those turning into opportunities.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

You know, Melissa, I know in addition to the work one-on-one that you do with um consultants, you do offer a program centered around pipeline in particular. And so tell us a little bit about that, who attends, and again, what else gets covered in that? That are lessons that folks listening can think about and apply.

SPEAKER_01 32:30

Yeah. So I have a program called the Lead Gen Sprints for Consultants. And it's a sprint, it's uh seven weeks where we work together in a small group of consultants. Some of them are have been in business for a few years and are at the place where they want to have control over their pipeline and control over the type of work they're landing, um, versus just taking whatever comes to them. And others are brand new where they haven't yet acquired their first client and they want to set it up in a set up their client acquisition in a way that is predictable and repeatable from the beginning. So um the point of this seven-week sprint is to fill a pipeline, land clients, have opportunities in your pipeline, and at the same time to have a build a repeatable process that they can continue leveraging, you know, after that sprint is over. So they know exactly how much lead gen they need to do to hit their revenue goal, what that looks like, what it means on a weekly basis. Um, and it this isn't just about, you know, a lot of times we think, well, it looks like cold outreach. Now I've got to somehow open up sales navigator and and start figuring out how to, you know, spam a huge amount of people to land clients, but it doesn't have to look like that. It can look like, you know, speaking once a month that then generates inbound leads to create clients. It can look like uh being a member of an association that you're really intentional and and able to turn into clients or um or uh creating channel partnerships where those create clients for you. So there's so many amazing ways to generate client work that we overlook that you know, we aren't that um can build a business. I like to call it the your employer of choice. You're building your own employer of choice, which is your own company. Uh, and so you want to be putting business process in place that you want to actually execute.

SPEAKER_00 34:29

Oh, I love that idea. Be an employer of choice. You are the employer, right? But you know, this also does bring up for me, and I love all of these kind of, I'll call them startup activities, but but just that are so critical to establishing the right foundation. And then we do that, and now we're in it. And this is where the fun begins. And it's wonderful because you're working with incredible clients and also um, Melissa, I know something we talked about was just, you know, you're running the day-to-day, you're trying to do a lot of work, you're trying to think ahead, you're sort of doing it all. And so, how do you not make this turn into back to what we said, sort of a copy paste of I'm working a million hours a week? This is not why I wanted to leave my corporate role and come out on my own. So, how do you then, once things are up and running, really create something that is sustainable and manageable? What if what have you seen from clients, the good, the bad, and the ugly, maybe? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:28

You know, uh there's so many, there's so many different um pitfalls that we can fall into. And some of it comes down to again, not noticing or realizing that this is a business. For example, you can go hire an executive assistant anytime you want to. Um, you can go hire right now, you know. I think about this. I am an in I consider myself an independent consultant first and foremost. I work with independent consultants all day long. I tell myself I don't really want to build a team again. Um, I manage people for a long time. I just want to keep things simple and clean and and um no overhead. But the other day I was thinking about it. I actually have seven people on my team, but they really, yes, but they're not employees, right? So I see myself as someone who's solo, but I've got seven contractors who are amazing, who fill different roles, who run my podcast and who run my operations and and who do some graphics and different things like that. So the thing I would say is you get to decide. You looking at that, it may not be sustainable all over the long run to do wear every single hat. But that doesn't mean that you have to then evolve into a boutique consultancy, even unless you want to. It means that you can go get help for different functions. They don't have to be employees that you feel now I'm responsible for their paycheck. You can go hire other consultants to do functions in your business and to keep it sustainable. But it all comes down to asking yourself the question of like, what do I really want my work to look like? Do I want to work 30 hours a week and or have, you know, for me right now, I work three days a week with client facing, and the other two days I don't have any meetings. Um, it's a really good balance for me. But you ever you get to decide what it looks like and making that, you know, getting clear about what that is for you and then making it happen.

SPEAKER_00 37:27

You know, the other thing, Melissa, I mean, back to kind of leveraging the team, you know, one of the other things I think that's interesting as you get further into your business is what you can bring in, um, whether it's from a solution standpoint. So, as an example, I know one of the things that you really helped me appreciate was just the role of, let's say, the diagnostic or the assessment. And I I had done that previously in my past corporate life, but I think finding new and creative and interesting ways to bring that into the consultancy. And I know that's just one example, but there have been a number of ways that you've helped us, I think, see all the different revenue streams and possibilities that come with the consulting industry. But I'm wondering if you can share a few that you're seeing your clients tend to sort of deliver more frequently, maybe than others.

SPEAKER_01 38:16

Yeah, there are um right now I'm seeing a lot of AI-related offers, helping companies with AI strategy, helping companies with um AI, like assessing the AI building an AI strategy, assessing an AI strategy, um, even getting the first beginnings of an AI strategy implemented so that then that company can start um, you know, taking it from there and expanding. So there's a there's you know, that's of course an obvious trend in terms of the type of consulting that I'm seeing. The other are diagnostics. So companies just crave what does good look like? What does it look like in other organizations? Um, and so building out frameworks and diagnostics uh to help companies to see where their blind spots are and to build strategy and um process and roadmaps around that are also really valuable and can be that foot-in-the-door offer that we were talking about a little bit ago. Um, where you can start building a name for yourself. It makes acquiring speaking engagements uh easier. It makes um you start building a reputation so that ultimately you're sought after for what you do and those leads are coming to you.

SPEAKER_00 39:36

Yeah. I mean, I think Melissa, what working with you does is it not just shows people it's possible, but again, you really, really can have this life for yourself and it can be so much bigger than what you realize and imagine, even you know, not letting your corporate experience, as wonderful as it may be, create some artificial limitation in your head, whether it's about the revenue, the growth, or whatever it is. Um and so I'm wondering as you think about your clients today, if you could say to them, and I don't know if it's hey guys, right? From the very beginning, here are the things I want you to remember. And maybe Melissa, it's also the things that in hindsight you wish you had told, you know, uh you in the beginning. But what else do you want people to know about really what's possible here?

SPEAKER_01 40:22

Yeah. I mean, at the end of the day, it starts with a decision. And for so many of us, we kind of stay in this limbo. Like, is this going? I was I was just mentioning that conversation I had with someone who's been doing this for three years. He's still wondering if it's going to work. And so it's all about deciding. Like, I decided I'm not going back. The I burned the boats, I'm not going back. Right. I am figuring out how to make this successful. Yes. And then that opens up so much more for you because when you don't constantly, I mean, listen, I'm a human, I do this sometimes. I'm like, I think it would be a lot easier just to like be a barista or I don't know, you know, whatever, right? Right. There are some days where we all have this, which I'm not, I'm not trying to say that that job is easy because it's not, there's a lot of mean customers. But the point is, is that it can be really easy to go back and forth and and come constantly compare the grass is greener on the other side, versus when you get into this, if you decide to go into consulting, whether accidentally or on purpose, deciding for yourself, I am going, I'm not reconsidering what I'm doing for a year or for two years or for three years. Give yourself a time frame that says it's just not entertaining that back and forth of which is better. I'm going to go figure out how to make this successful. And it opens up so much more opportunity and so much more uh that's available to you when you do that versus kind of comparing and contrasting.

SPEAKER_00 41:57

Oh, that is so powerful, Melissa. I'll tell you, I over the years, just even in my own network of people who have been wonderful, let's say C-suite coaches and advisors, but maybe they play an in-house role and they want to go independent. And many of them will say, like, I don't know, and I'm not sure. And let's see how it goes. And you know what? I think I'm gonna go back into corporate. And listen, that may be the right move for some people, but I think what you're saying is that often at the heart of it, it's did we ever really decide this is what we're doing now? And then committing to that. Yeah. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 42:32

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 42:33

Well, so Melissa, tell us a little bit about what is it like to work with someone like you? I can say from my experience, how invaluable it is. I think just having a thought partner, having someone who provides the kind of guidance but also objective view, you know, helps us see when we're getting in our own way. But what is it like to work with someone like you? What do your clients experience through that?

SPEAKER_01 42:59

Yeah, the type of client that I love working with, and that um I think it's the best result when working with me as the client who understands that when they're starting a business, that investing in the business is incredibly valuable to help them to avoid, should, you know, avoid mistakes, those common mistakes that we all make to uh and to put a process in place that is appropriate for an independent consulting business that's not recreating corporate. So knowing what the that looks like and how that applies to them and their expertise, and then also that can help them to see where they're getting in their own way and build that mindset and that identity that we were talking about to help them to think of themselves as a business owner as the new norm, not as an employee, as a former employee who's trying out something that they're they're getting to the place where they truly understand and see. themselves as a business owner, and that drives so many different types of decisions and their willingness to take certain risks and um and the courage that's required to run this type of business.

SPEAKER_00 44:13

And I love what you said that replicating what you did in corporate, I mean, of course it's gonna be different, right? When you're a solo person, but I remember in the beginning, some of my offers, I thought, yes, if I had a team of 40 people, that would be an excellent thing for me to deliver. Not gonna happen when it's, you know, a small crew over here. Um and I, you know, the other thing I just want to mention is the way I got to know you, Melissa, was through your podcast, which is fantastic. And not just your podcast, but everybody, Melissa has an excellent book, Grow Your Consulting Business. And Melissa, is that also the name of the podcast that you have? Grow your consulting business business.

SPEAKER_01 44:53

The podcast is called Grow Your Independent Consulting Business.

SPEAKER_00 44:55

Independent Consulting Business. Okay. But I mean, such good resources because I think, right, we need this balance of thinking and feeling on purpose deliberately to support absolutely a life that we can have. And then all the practical elements that come with that, sure. But I think it's that blended model that you bring. Um, how else can people get in touch with you, Melissa? Work with you, where can we send them? And I have to tell people, Melissa, I know you spell your name a little differently, so tell us about that.

SPEAKER_01 45:30

My name is missing all the letters. Um, you can find me on LinkedIn. Uh, you can also find me on my websites. My name is spelled M-E-L-I-S-A. So all one of each letter. And my last name is spelled Lieberman, but without an E. So it's L-I-B-E-R-M-A-N. Um, and uh, I think I own the domains of all the different combinations, so they redirect if you make if you misspell it. But uh you can find me in those two spots and on my podcast, which, like you said, is called Grow Your Independent Consulting Business. If you're interested in uh learning more about what it looks like to run, start a consulting business and run a consulting business. I have a book. It's called, uh, as you said, Elizabeth, Grow Your Consulting Business. And in there is a 14-step roadmap to launch and grow a consulting business, including a lot of stories about different clients that I've had and their experiences and my own experiences. I think it's so important to hear those and and to know that this journey is it's normal to be afraid. It's normal to have imposter syndrome, even if you have the most impeccable corporate uh resume. It's so normal to feel like as if you're uh, you know, a a uh recent college graduate again, uh, when you're starting over uh with consulting. So to me, the book and the stories that are in there um is maybe even more valuable than the actual steps to grow a consulting business. So if you want to grab that, it's on Amazon and also on my uh website.

SPEAKER_00 47:07

Well, we will link to your podcast and the book and your website too, Melissa, all in the show notes. Um, before we wrap up here, any final words for people that are listening today, corporate leaders that really are thinking about maybe making consulting as their next step.

SPEAKER_01 47:23

Yeah, I I'm obviously I'm biased, but uh to me it's unimaginable to that this is available, that you that there is the ability in this day and age to write your own ticket, to figure out to make as much money as you want to make, to work the amount of hours you want to work, to make the impact for your clients that you want to be making, to get your foot in the door at a client that you thought would be never, you know, would be out of reach when you were in corporate, and to really design the way that you want to live. Um, and whether it's because you have kids or because you're you want to travel and or any reason in between, um, getting really considering this that it's possible for you to create this life. And even though it feels like a huge leap, um, there's it's this isn't a better time to do it than now.

SPEAKER_00 48:16

Absolutely. Well, listen, Melissa, uh I'm inspired once again. Thank you. And I know this is really gonna just strike a chord with so many people listening today. So thank you, and thanks everybody listening today on Executive Land. Well, that's all for today in Executive Land. Thanks for listening. And if you're looking for more, check out my website, eSuiteleader.com, where you'll see all kinds of free resources and take the free executive readiness assessment. It shows you exactly where you're strong and where to focus next in your own leadership. And don't forget, subscribe to this podcast so you never miss an episode. I'll see you next time in Executive Land.