Episode 150
Build your career like an entrepreneur
Can you learn to be more creative, courageous, and resourceful when it comes to pivoting your professional life?
On this episode, Carlos and Laurence are joined by Iesha Small, a career pivot coach and seasoned communications professional, to talk about how we can adopt an entrepreneur’s mindset when thinking about following a new professional path.
Iesha shares her inspiring journey from maths teacher to career-change champion, and what she needed to do to navigate that transition.
Iesha isn’t just about making bold moves; she's about making smart, strategic decisions that lead to personal freedom and fulfilment. She explains her unique approach of treating career development like an entrepreneur, focusing on experimentation and creating opportunities that offer more choice.
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Transcript
So my name's Iesha Small and the quick version of what I say
Speaker:to people is I, um, a kind of communications professional, uh,
Speaker:with a side hustle or a business depending on how you wanna frame it.
Speaker:And that business helps people to basically, to career pivot, but to,
Speaker:I kind of coined it recently to build their career like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:Um, and.
Speaker:The reason why I'm interested in that is because it's something
Speaker:that I've done myself, uh, many times without realizing it.
Speaker:And people ask me about it all the time and I didn't think
Speaker:it was anything special, but apparently it's a, a skillset
Speaker:that I've developed in doing it.
Speaker:And then because my friends and family ask me about it and
Speaker:colleagues and I thought, oh, okay, there's something interesting other
Speaker:people are interested in this.
Speaker:So a quick poet history, and we can go into it in more detail is, uh.
Speaker:Back in the day I was an engineer actually.
Speaker:So I started off as eng as an engineer that was my degree in and in university.
Speaker:And I did that for a bit and it wasn't really for me.
Speaker:Then I became a math teacher, which is not too much of a jump.
Speaker:Like that's fairly straightforward.
Speaker:Uh, my family were a bit surprised 'cause they weren't
Speaker:expect me to go into teaching.
Speaker:I was only gonna go there for a couple of years and I ended up staying
Speaker:for like 14, got promoted and I was like a senior leader in schools.
Speaker:And then I just was, I hit a wall basically.
Speaker:Um, we had young kids teaching is.
Speaker:In many ways a wonderful profession, but it's surprisingly unfriendly to parents.
Speaker:Actually, if you talk to any teachers, it's, it's not that
Speaker:flexible when it comes to parenting.
Speaker:And I was just a bit burnt out.
Speaker:I always worked in very particular kind of schools that required a lot of energy
Speaker:of you and a lot of your time and life.
Speaker:And I also knew I didn't wanna be a head teacher, so it was like, well, you know,
Speaker:at that time I was in my mid thirties.
Speaker:It's kind of, well, am I gonna do the same thing exactly day
Speaker:in, day out for another however long it is until I retire?
Speaker:And I thought, that didn't sound like a fun existence for me.
Speaker:I wanted to do something else.
Speaker:So I.
Speaker:Um, I went from teaching and I didn't really know what I wanted to do.
Speaker:I eventually got involved in kind of policy and helped to influence
Speaker:policy at a national level.
Speaker:Then I did kind of strategy for a national charity, and now
Speaker:I'm a head of communications.
Speaker:And I, along that, along that way, I kind of was using the
Speaker:internet to do what people fleshly call now personal branding.
Speaker:I wouldn't have known it as that.
Speaker:Um, and people started to give me opportunities, so they started
Speaker:to ask me to come and speak.
Speaker:They asked me to do consulting.
Speaker:They asked me to do, and I was like, oh, this is interesting.
Speaker:Yeah, like, why not?
Speaker:And I had, I did all that stuff alongside my day job.
Speaker:And then I quit my day job last year, uh, for a variety of reasons
Speaker:and thought I'd take some time out.
Speaker:And at that timeout ended up being about five months.
Speaker:And I thought maybe I should try and do something a bit more serious.
Speaker:Like I'd always just done consultancy 'cause people ask me,
Speaker:you know, they just came to me.
Speaker:And that.
Speaker:And that's, uh, on the surface of it, a great thing to have,
Speaker:but it's also kind of bad.
Speaker:You don't learn how to market, you don't really know how to be intentional.
Speaker:inbound leads, as people talk about, is not as wonderful as everyone
Speaker:thinks it is because you don't know what's working and you don't know why.
Speaker:So when you try and get more intentional, uh, as is often
Speaker:the case with freelancers, you come a bit unstuck.
Speaker:And I realized, ah, if I wanna try and do this something that I could
Speaker:eventually transition to myself, I have to learn how to have a proper business.
Speaker:Not just something that I, you know, get a commission
Speaker:here, get a commission there.
Speaker:And that made me be a bit more serious about things.
Speaker:Um, so nowadays I'm a head of communications for a charity.
Speaker:I do that part-time, but I also run my own business,
Speaker:which is called Cute Fruit.
Speaker:And the focus of it is generally.
Speaker:Like I said, helping people to build a career like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:But, um, my clients would not understand if you said personal branding,
Speaker:that's not how they think of it.
Speaker:But what they come to me and talk to me about is, you know, I've got
Speaker:all this experience and I wanna create new opportunities for myself.
Speaker:I wanna get promoted, or I kind of got this side thing I wanna try.
Speaker:How can I get it out?
Speaker:That thing, talk about, I've wanted to invest in myself for so many years
Speaker:and I've had all these kind of things and I just keep putting it as a back
Speaker:burner, but now I wanna do something where I can make my own decisions.
Speaker:That's, that's the kind of thing they tell me.
Speaker:So it's, you know, I dunno.
Speaker:Career development, learning how to become an entrepreneur, all sorts
Speaker:of things, if that makes any sense.
Speaker:Um, how to market yourself.
Speaker:'cause that's my skillset as well, 'cause of my day job.
Speaker:So it's a bit of a mishmash of things really under the
Speaker:umbrella of career pivoting.
Speaker:But that means different things, different people.
Speaker:It feels like quite, um, fluid and creative space you in at the moment.
Speaker:There's lots of opportunity, lots of energy, lots of curiosity.
Speaker:I'm hearing also of connection where you're talking about this co-creation
Speaker:space of being able to, not just sell something but be in relationship with
Speaker:the people that you are serving and then through that something new coming about.
Speaker:and it feels very much in contrast to this.
Speaker:I, well, I heard you say with teaching is the way I sometimes phrase it.
Speaker:Like, is this it?
Speaker:Am I just gonna do this for the rest of my life?
Speaker:And I'm curious, given your experience of people working on
Speaker:those kind of transitions and you having done the various transitions,
Speaker:some people may ask that question but not do anything about it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And others will push themselves to do something.
Speaker:And I'm just curious for your experience, what's the difference
Speaker:between people who do something about it and those that don't?
Speaker:Not in any judgment way, but uh, uh, uh, personal feelings level.
Speaker:The number one thing is fear.
Speaker:You know, you guys will experience that.
Speaker:In terms of entrepreneurs and stuff, the thing that's
Speaker:really holding us back is fear.
Speaker:And I can say this with a lot of compassion because
Speaker:I was also that person.
Speaker:You know, I, I spoke to you about the, the quitting my job and
Speaker:then starting my business about.
Speaker:A few months before that, I, I told you before Carlos, I talk
Speaker:about like the 3:00 AM gremlins.
Speaker:I was like, what are you doing Iesha?
Speaker:You've wanted to start something for years and you're basically
Speaker:just like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:You're not doing anything.
Speaker:You're just listening to all these podcasts.
Speaker:You're leading all these books.
Speaker:Like, well, what have you done?
Speaker:And done anything.
Speaker:So I unsubscribed from everything.
Speaker:I stopped looking at all the YouTube stuff.
Speaker:I was just like, looks, you're just wasting time.
Speaker:It's like entertainment for you.
Speaker:Why are you bothering?
Speaker:And um, you know, I had my kind of sole trader thing via HMRC and I
Speaker:was like, oh, I'll wind that up.
Speaker:I'm not gonna do anything anymore.
Speaker:I'm not gonna talk about it.
Speaker:And then what happened was I.
Speaker:I got, um, a text from a friend of mine who I used to work with, and
Speaker:she's like, I got this text from, it was this guy who was the CEO
Speaker:of a kind of multi academy trust.
Speaker:So in my, in the education sector, that's kind of a group of schools,
Speaker:um, he was pretty influential and he'd read something that I wrote like
Speaker:five years ago and he was like, you know, I heard that, you know, Iesha,
Speaker:I read this thing that she wrote.
Speaker:I would love her to come and do some training for my staff.
Speaker:And I was like, Hmm.
Speaker:And I wasn't doing anything 'cause I was off for five months.
Speaker:So I thought, okay, this is great.
Speaker:This will give me another month's worth of like runway, so why not?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I hadn't, you know, I hadn't written it as a talk, it was just my own
Speaker:thoughts about social mobility.
Speaker:I'm very kind of interested in that.
Speaker:My own background had a chat with him, like, you know.
Speaker:What, like we spoke about basically the co-creation thing.
Speaker:I was like, oh, this is just a talk.
Speaker:Like it's just a, something I wrote, why are you interested in it?
Speaker:And he told me about his personal background, how it really resonated,
Speaker:how he thought teachers, um, like someone, teachers in his school could
Speaker:do with hearing it because sometimes they had the good intentions, but
Speaker:he didn't send their communities.
Speaker:And then we came up with what the out, out outline of the torture piece.
Speaker:So I did that.
Speaker:And then I also got contacted by another organization who I'd worked
Speaker:with, with my previous organization and used to do judging for this
Speaker:entrepreneur thing for young people.
Speaker:They asked me to do that again because I've done it for them.
Speaker:And I was like, look, you know, usually I do it under the umbrella
Speaker:of my organization, but I'm, I'm freelance at the moment.
Speaker:Would you mind paying?
Speaker:And they were like, yeah, sure, whatever.
Speaker:And then that was the consultancy that I said I was gonna chuck in
Speaker:the bin started again, basically.
Speaker:And then, I think the thing was, I.
Speaker:I was not so scared anymore because like, what was there to lose?
Speaker:I already wasn't working.
Speaker:Uh, and I knew that I had some money saved up because of the
Speaker:previous consultancy I'd done.
Speaker:So it was just like, well, if I can't do it now and I can't give it a go,
Speaker:all the things that I was worried about before, they've already happened.
Speaker:Like I'm not currently working.
Speaker:You know, I, in my head I told myself that all my friends and that
Speaker:thought I was a bit of a waste of space 'cause I wasn't doing anything.
Speaker:They didn't.
Speaker:But, you know, that's what I told myself.
Speaker:And so I thought, well if I can't do it now, then I'm never gonna do it.
Speaker:So it was kind of that, and I, I get that sense from people that
Speaker:end up working with me, which is, it doesn't have to be like a big
Speaker:thing, you know, most of them have still got their existing jobs.
Speaker:'cause I actually don't advise people to give up their roles.
Speaker:They tend to be people who are in their thirties upwards.
Speaker:They have responsibilities.
Speaker:You can actually be much more creative and free if you
Speaker:have your base stuff covered.
Speaker:That's my personal advice to people.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:It's very different if you're in your twenties or whatever.
Speaker:Um, and my approach is pretty creative, so I think you can't
Speaker:really be creative if you're still dealing with your base needs.
Speaker:It's, it's just not possible to do.
Speaker:Um, so even if the job is not like the one that you're gonna end up
Speaker:doing, which generally it isn't for people, just having that gives
Speaker:you a certain sense of security.
Speaker:But yeah, something, generally something's happened.
Speaker:So, the lady I was talking to today, she's, she turned up to like
Speaker:a freak Q and a I did on LinkedIn ages ago, like months ago actually.
Speaker:And then she joined my newsletter, you know, um, we
Speaker:chatted on and off, whatever.
Speaker:She sent me a response and then I realized I hadn't spoken to her.
Speaker:I sent a message back to her and she goes, you know, in the
Speaker:time that we last spoke, I've actually been made redundant.
Speaker:I'm ready.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I was like, oh, okay.
Speaker:Um, so, you know, or sometimes it's kind of, something's happened.
Speaker:People thought that a promotion that was gonna come through suddenly changed.
Speaker:Or the other thing I get is, um, I.
Speaker:Some life event.
Speaker:You can't really detangle life and work.
Speaker:So for one person, she's had the bereavement and then she'd been going
Speaker:through that and she's like, okay, I'd be looking after this family member,
Speaker:and I've put all my time and effort into that and that was the right thing to
Speaker:do, and now I wanna invest in myself.
Speaker:Like I'm ready to invest in myself now.
Speaker:Like I hear that a lot.
Speaker:It's kind of, I've been doing all this for my organization, or for
Speaker:my family, or for whatever, and now I feel like I'm ready to invest.
Speaker:And then that's it for whatever reason.
Speaker:So sometimes it's a big event, sometimes it's small.
Speaker:Um, sometimes it's people who, they're kind of a bit, they're a
Speaker:bit aimless, you know, they're not sure what's happening, but they know
Speaker:that with a bit of direction and support, or a bit of structure, they
Speaker:can make it go, make a go of it.
Speaker:And also, I don't tell people what to do.
Speaker:You know, it's kind of, it's very much a, um, a.
Speaker:We spoke about how it's quite fluid.
Speaker:It is, but I have a structured process just because I've found that the number
Speaker:one thing that stops people doing things is I don't know what to do.
Speaker:You don't really know.
Speaker:You don't need to know.
Speaker:Uh, people are overthinking it, mm-hmm.
Speaker:It's, you just need to get, you need to have action and the action helps you.
Speaker:I couldn't have told you six months ago that I'd be doing this.
Speaker:There's no way I could have told you that a year ago.
Speaker:I would've laughed at you.
Speaker:So it's just, you do like the, a bit of career pivot Pros
Speaker:called your Next Best Step.
Speaker:Like it's based on this talk I saw by Oprah and it just stuck with me.
Speaker:And it was kind of, you just do one thing and then when that
Speaker:thing goes, you see what happens next, you do some other thing.
Speaker:And I basically wrote it like that.
Speaker:So you, as you go and develop, then you start to find out what the
Speaker:answer is as you go, but you can't possibly know at the beginning,
Speaker:it's like the compound effect of small actions sounds like
Speaker:precisely that.
Speaker:And it's kind of, I think people, like some people, if they know what they
Speaker:wanna get to, you know, it's simple.
Speaker:I, I grew up one of my childhood friends, she always knew she
Speaker:wanted to be a journalist.
Speaker:In that case, you just find someone who's done that and
Speaker:you kind of reverse engineer.
Speaker:It's simple, but a lot of people don't really know what they wanna do.
Speaker:And the other thing I get is people who thought they knew what they
Speaker:wanted to do, they got to it.
Speaker:You know, like me, when I was in the leadership school, leadership, I got
Speaker:promoted, I got the thing I wanted.
Speaker:And then it's like, well, like you're saying Carlos, is this it?
Speaker:You know, you are on the tabletop and the mountain, whatever, and
Speaker:you're like, okay, it's not mm-hmm.
Speaker:Quite what I wanted or actually it, it is what I wanted, but I'm
Speaker:a different person now, or there's still another 20 or 30 years of my
Speaker:working career, 40 years or whatever.
Speaker:Um, now what, like, you know, so sometimes it's.
Speaker:You used to know what you wanted and you're trying to get to something
Speaker:else now and to explore it a bit more.
Speaker:I dunno what the equivalent is of, uh, a sister from another mister,
Speaker:but then it's like everything you're saying, like Yep, yep.
Speaker:Get it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:It's, it's so much what we've seen.
Speaker:I know Laurence, if you had anything to add to that,
Speaker:well, tied to what we were talking about this morning, a bit of timing.
Speaker:It sounds like when people, you know, there's a time where people
Speaker:are ready in time where people aren't and sometimes it might not
Speaker:be when you, when they think it is.
Speaker:Um, but building those relationships sounds key.
Speaker:So even if at the time they don't, can't work with you, something happens like
Speaker:redundancy or bereavement or something, like, they just think, yeah, you are
Speaker:the person that I wanna work with.
Speaker:I trust you to, to sort of help me navigate this mess.
Speaker:Messy bit really.
Speaker:'cause it is, like you said, trying to give some structure and a sea of
Speaker:uncertainty really isn't some safety as well, I think is key to that.
Speaker:Yeah, the relationships piece is so key.
Speaker:I mean, um, obvious as a teacher, I taught maths.
Speaker:Maths is most kids, not, not most kids' favorite subject, especially not in
Speaker:the kinds of schools that I taught in.
Speaker:I love maths.
Speaker:Obviously.
Speaker:People need to understand that maths is amazing, but not everybody does yet.
Speaker:So that's okay.
Speaker:And a lot of me kind of persuading the young people to do stuff was
Speaker:first they needed to feel safe and have structure around them.
Speaker:So there's that.
Speaker:But the second thing, which is relevant to this conversation is relationships.
Speaker:Like, a lot of the time they would do it for me because I ask them
Speaker:to, and then I would help them to understand the relevance of their
Speaker:life or if it wasn't relevant.
Speaker:Because sometimes it's hard to help young people to understand
Speaker:that, you know, algebra is gonna be super relevant.
Speaker:Um, it was more, okay, this is a system.
Speaker:It's a way of thinking and it will help you to do various things.
Speaker:And also you're gonna have to be in school anyway.
Speaker:We can make it interesting and go with it, or you can fight all day
Speaker:long, like, which one do you want?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So, you know, it was very much about relationships.
Speaker:And then, um, pretty much all of my roles since I've left
Speaker:teaching, have involved building relationships in some way.
Speaker:So I worked in policy, that's relationships with kind of
Speaker:high level policy makers.
Speaker:Um, at national level, uh, I worked in kind of strategy and so on.
Speaker:Again, the same thing with external stakeholders.
Speaker:My job now is with, you know, politicians and, um,
Speaker:various other types of people.
Speaker:So, uh, donors, all that kind of thing.
Speaker:So it's all about building relationships.
Speaker:I just had, I had, I was on the panel for fundraising interviews for a head
Speaker:of fundraising, and their job is all about if you wanna get high level
Speaker:donors, it's all relationship building.
Speaker:So all these kind of skills, um, it's, I think sometimes in business
Speaker:people can be quiet, short term.
Speaker:Like we Carlos and we were chatting.
Speaker:I remember something that jumped out.
Speaker:Um, I read this book and the phrase that I keep coming back to is
Speaker:long-term games with long-term people.
Speaker:And that is a hundred percent my approach.
Speaker:It's kind of someone might wanna buy something now,
Speaker:cool, maybe I can help them.
Speaker:They might not wanna buy something now.
Speaker:Cool.
Speaker:They know where to come.
Speaker:And, um, my, I used to have like a small newsletter and I wrote about education
Speaker:'cause that's what I was working in.
Speaker:And then obviously now over time it's changed.
Speaker:And going back to the fear thing, I was worried that if I shifted it,
Speaker:people wouldn't wanna read it anymore.
Speaker:Or they'd be like, oh, she's kind of switched and now she's like,
Speaker:got super salesy and all this.
Speaker:Like, it's gonna be weird.
Speaker:So obviously some people stopped, reading it, but interestingly my
Speaker:newsletter subscribers have gone up.
Speaker:I, I cut some actually because they weren't very active and
Speaker:I was like, look, I only want people who really wanna be here.
Speaker:I don't wanna force people.
Speaker:So thank you so much.
Speaker:If you wanna opt in, call and if you don't also call, you know, and
Speaker:it's interesting 'cause my next.
Speaker:Two or three kind of students I'm working with on my kind of next
Speaker:cohort were people who I knew from a few jobs ago from that version
Speaker:of the email list who stayed, and then they just reached out to me.
Speaker:They're like, we know that you've been talking about this stuff.
Speaker:Uh, we worked with you before.
Speaker:Do you remember me?
Speaker:I'd love to do some work with you now because their
Speaker:life circumstances to change.
Speaker:And that's, one of them is a like seven year relationship now.
Speaker:So they're following you, not the topic necessarily.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Which was a, a very surprising realization for me to understand
Speaker:actually that sometimes if you build a relationship with people they're
Speaker:interested in, not even so much me, like maybe my worldview or,
Speaker:'cause I'm evolving as they are.
Speaker:Like, you forget sometimes that, people might not wanna do this 'cause they
Speaker:don't, like, they're also changing.
Speaker:Like she's not still in that same place that she was in before,
Speaker:Oh, just a quick question 'cause I listened to an old interview you
Speaker:did and you talked about, I think you said you were gonna study an
Speaker:English literature and your dad said, no, you're not gonna do that.
Speaker:And see then you chose engineering.
Speaker:Is that, is that true?
Speaker:And also if that sounds like a pivot, like a sliding doors moment, do you
Speaker:feel like, because a part of this for me is about expectations and family
Speaker:and how we're perceived in terms of our, how we evolve in our careers.
Speaker:I dunno if just talking to that thing of like trying to listen to
Speaker:our, uh, parents and elders and then also doing what we want as well.
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:What interview was that?
Speaker:You're, you are right.
Speaker:So it is true.
Speaker:My, um, my parents are my dad.
Speaker:I was just saw him like last week actually.
Speaker:My dad's super supportive of me these days and whatever
Speaker:I'm up to, he always has been.
Speaker:But, um, you know, my background is my family is from the Caribbean
Speaker:and, uh, my grandparent came here in the sixties and pretty much will
Speaker:do a, you know, like medical school or be an accountant or something.
Speaker:Very traditional careers, uh, lawyer, that kind of thing.
Speaker:at school I really loved sciences and maths, but I also loved English.
Speaker:Like I loved it.
Speaker:I loved reading, I loved writing, I loved English literature.
Speaker:And so there was an option.
Speaker:It was like, okay, do I do English lit or do I go and do, you know, something
Speaker:else, like medicine or whatever.
Speaker:And I remember talking to my dad about it and he's like, literally, Iesha,
Speaker:you can read books in your spare time.
Speaker:That was his response.
Speaker:It's not a career choice.
Speaker:Yeah, it's not a career choice.
Speaker:He's, it's like, what you gonna go to university to read books?
Speaker:Like you can read books in your spare time.
Speaker:Go and do something that's gonna get you a job.
Speaker:Which is very, very funny because I can see where he was coming
Speaker:from and from his point of view.
Speaker:That's true.
Speaker:Um, but interestingly now I kind of make money from writing in a way.
Speaker:Yeah, that's what I was gonna
Speaker:say.
Speaker:It sounds like it's gone full circle.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's funny and I'm, you know, kind of like, I wrote a book
Speaker:behind me, that unexpected leader.
Speaker:I've got my friends one as well 'cause I'd like to promote both
Speaker:of my friends' books as well.
Speaker:But yeah, I, I, it's funny, the thing that he was worried about has also
Speaker:helped to become my safety net in a way.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, just because if you can write, then you can communicate.
Speaker:it's really a super, anybody here to, if their writing is not, they're
Speaker:worried about their writing, just to kind of really double down on it.
Speaker:And it doesn't have to be academic style.
Speaker:A lot of my stuff is quite colloquial.
Speaker:Um, yeah.
Speaker:It's just how you communicate with people.
Speaker:That is a massive superpower for people who want to be entrepreneurs
Speaker:or are entrepreneurs or want to build relationships with people.
Speaker:I like what you said before, and this is one something I want, one of
Speaker:the threads I wanted to pick up on.
Speaker:Um, you were saying about, uh, thinking out loud.
Speaker:Uh, you were talking about people who had read your writing several
Speaker:years in the past and then coming back to you to talk to you.
Speaker:Um, one of the challenges I feel a lot of people within our community
Speaker:have is this idea of thinking out loud is this idea of putting
Speaker:things in public either because they say, who am I to write this?
Speaker:Or, someone else has already written this, or someone's gonna come at me with
Speaker:it because I've said something wrong.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And so for someone thinking like that, what, what would your response be and,
Speaker:and how did you approach this idea?
Speaker:What was your framing for writing, particularly if you had a newsletter?
Speaker:And it sounds like you were writing quite, not say weighty, but you
Speaker:know, if they are particularly specific thought pieces.
Speaker:there are, in your community, there'll be a lot of very skilled people.
Speaker:Um, I'm constantly astonished at people who you're like, wow, you're
Speaker:worried about writing online and you've got so much experience and
Speaker:great stuff to share with people.
Speaker:Very, like people.
Speaker:You'd be very surprised that I, um, I ran a workshop and the workshop was
Speaker:called something like Confidence Clients Career Pivots and, um, cash Online.
Speaker:And I thought people would be interested in the making money bit.
Speaker:The things that people asked me about was nearly everyone was
Speaker:talking about the confidence bit.
Speaker:That was the bit, how can I be brave enough to write online?
Speaker:I'm scared about writing online.
Speaker:That was the bit, people didn't really care so much about the money
Speaker:bit, uh, and even the clients.
Speaker:It was definitely the, the confidence.
Speaker:And then, so in the end, I kind of span the workshop to cover that more because
Speaker:that seemed to be what, what people.
Speaker:Were more worried about, which I was very surprised by actually.
Speaker:Um, 'cause I was like, oh, that's kind of the easy bit, like for me.
Speaker:But I then I realized I'd been writing publicly for a long
Speaker:time without thinking about it.
Speaker:So, to answer your question, I seem pretty confident online.
Speaker:Uh, it's, it depends actually.
Speaker:So there are still things that I worry about writing.
Speaker:Um, and my journey of writing online is kind of been a long and convoluted one.
Speaker:I, I used to write a blog, so people that really do blog so much anymore.
Speaker:But, you know, I used to write a blog and it was anonymous because I was
Speaker:so worried about what people might say and it was a photography block.
Speaker:So I, um.
Speaker:Basically I'd been off work for a bit because, um, of like
Speaker:work-related stress when I was a, when I was a teacher and, uh, I got
Speaker:like a coaching, uh, not coaching, like a therapy package basically.
Speaker:And as part of that package I did some art therapy, which was a
Speaker:little bit woo for me at the time.
Speaker:Now I'd be like, I'd love it, but at the time I was like, um, but it was really
Speaker:helpful because I did some painting and then it made me be distracted.
Speaker:So I talked to the therapist and I wanted to take up painting, but the
Speaker:thing was, we didn't have enough space in our house for me to do
Speaker:anything with these paintings.
Speaker:So I was like, what can I do that's creative still that won't take up space?
Speaker:So I took up photography 'cause I was like, I can put it on the computer.
Speaker:Um, and then I had them on my computer.
Speaker:I was like, I wanna do something with these photos.
Speaker:Like, they're just sitting around.
Speaker:I, I find for myself, if I give myself a project, I'm
Speaker:more likely to stick with it.
Speaker:So I can learn things and teach myself things, but I have to have something
Speaker:to do with it or as I don't bother.
Speaker:So for me it was like, okay, if I have a public thing to do with it,
Speaker:no one's gonna read it, but I know I'm gonna put something out there.
Speaker:So I did.
Speaker:So I started this little blog and it was basically like my
Speaker:reflections of what was going on.
Speaker:And it was really a vehicle to put my favorite photographs of the week up.
Speaker:So I did that and then I started writing with it.
Speaker:'cause I was like, well, it's just photographs, so why don't
Speaker:I write a little bit with it?
Speaker:And then what happened was that a few other little, uh, I had
Speaker:some like this camera that had a bit of a cult followings.
Speaker:Like if you were into street photography, you had this camera.
Speaker:And so all the other geeks who liked this camera, it's called a Rico gr.
Speaker:And there's like different versions of it.
Speaker:Then you search for it online, right?
Speaker:And then you'd find the other blogs that had it.
Speaker:So I had like maybe five or six people.
Speaker:We had a little community where we'd comment each other's blogs and you
Speaker:know, we'd meet up and go for photo walks around London or wherever,
Speaker:like, you know, built these little, this, this gee community of people.
Speaker:And um, but I was still writing online and we'd support each other's stuff.
Speaker:And then what happened is I realized photography had helped me in my, um.
Speaker:You know, with my mental health and I realized, oh, I wanna write a, I
Speaker:wanna do something with this because I wanna find out what other people have
Speaker:done to improve their mental health.
Speaker:And that span out into a side project of just doing stuff about mental health.
Speaker:And then, because I'd got a bit more confident and I'd started
Speaker:taking pictures of people that I knew and all this, I thought, why
Speaker:don't I document other people who have some kind of a hobby that
Speaker:helps them with their mental health?
Speaker:And then that will be a standalone project.
Speaker:So then I was like, you know, this is a cool hobby.
Speaker:I'll spend a bit of money on it.
Speaker:So I got a, a website and I thought, this is where I'll put them up.
Speaker:And my photography had improved by this point.
Speaker:So anyway, what ended up happening was I, I did like a two year
Speaker:documentary project basically.
Speaker:documenting different people over time.
Speaker:So I think I maybe had like six or seven people who allowed me
Speaker:to come and talk to them and, um, you know, take photographs of them
Speaker:and write a little bit about them.
Speaker:And then what happened was that I ended up, one time, I,
Speaker:I put my phone on, I was like, look, can I, um, interview you?
Speaker:And I just did an interview because I'd be kind of doing interviews a bit.
Speaker:Um, you know, I, I listened to podcasts and I'd like to
Speaker:interviews and I listened to it.
Speaker:And that I wrote up the interview was, oh, this is great.
Speaker:Like, I'm just gonna do it in, in this person's words.
Speaker:And then I edited it a bit to make it flow, but I put that up and
Speaker:I was like, well, this is cool.
Speaker:I should do some more of that.
Speaker:So it ended up being like a multimedia project where it was
Speaker:photography and then writing to describe in their own words.
Speaker:That was really important.
Speaker:And then I did a collab with like a young, um, a friend of mine
Speaker:who's a teacher, his student, uh, who was, uh, a music producer.
Speaker:And we basically made this project where he, so he'd
Speaker:composed music to go with it.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:That's how I started writing online.
Speaker:It was, and so throughout these two years, again, I was
Speaker:still anonymous at this time.
Speaker:Like if you could, that website's still up.
Speaker:If you went to it, you wouldn't see my face on it at all.
Speaker:'cause I was still a bit embarrassed.
Speaker:And also it was mental health.
Speaker:So at the time I was probably a school leader.
Speaker:I worried about what colleagues might say, dah, dah.
Speaker:But what I did do is I wanted people to, I wanted it to help people basically.
Speaker:So again, like going back to the, getting out of your own way, I was
Speaker:worried about people finding out about me, but I knew that it was
Speaker:something that might help people.
Speaker:So I set up a separate Twitter account.
Speaker:I was using Twitter per, like, for my work, but I set up a separate
Speaker:account and via a very random route.
Speaker:Um, I was a teacher obviously, so there are other teachers who
Speaker:have mental health, uh, issues.
Speaker:They contacted me and talked to me about it and they asked to be
Speaker:volunteers and that kind of thing.
Speaker:And then, um, an education publisher saw it and like really
Speaker:loved the project and was like.
Speaker:Uh, and I used to go and speak at like, these, they used to have these,
Speaker:these events called Teach Meets, which were basically, it was like a
Speaker:homegrown event where teachers would talk about what they're learning.
Speaker:You try and help people out.
Speaker:You go on a Saturday, uh, and just, you know, share your learning.
Speaker:And I spoke about this project and someone saw me talk about it
Speaker:there basically, and this publisher was like, we'd like to have you
Speaker:thought about writing a book?
Speaker:And I was like, nah.
Speaker:Because in my identity at that time was, I was still a math teacher.
Speaker:Um, I didn't see myself as a writer.
Speaker:I saw myself possibly as a photographer a bit, but not as a writer.
Speaker:It, I just happened to write.
Speaker:anyway, so the long and short of it is over time we worked out.
Speaker:How to do a book and we switched a topic.
Speaker:So this is ironic now because a lot of people write about mental health,
Speaker:but at that time they couldn't see a market for it, which is very funny.
Speaker:Um, and we ended up doing it about leadership in schools,
Speaker:but taking a different aspect.
Speaker:So I ended up having a, a mental health chapter but using the similar approach.
Speaker:So there was photography in it and there was writing and people's
Speaker:stories, and then they were like, we want a bit of you in it as well.
Speaker:And I was like, ah, I don't really wanna write about myself.
Speaker:But he was like, no, like your stories really interesting that you should
Speaker:have your stuff in there as well.
Speaker:Um, and I kind of like did some, like bits of research and,
Speaker:you know, it was all, all the bits of me basically in there.
Speaker:And then that's that book, the Unexpected Leader, that that's what
Speaker:ended up happening as a result of that.
Speaker:And that's how I started writing online.
Speaker:Then after that I got a bit more confident and I started to,
Speaker:like you said, the think pieces.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:That was more just me thinking through issues in education.
Speaker:It was very sporadic.
Speaker:Like it wasn't anywhere near as frequent as I do now.
Speaker:Now.
Speaker:And again, I'd be like, oh, I went to this thing.
Speaker:I'll write about that.
Speaker:Or, you know, I'll do this.
Speaker:And again, back to community, which is why it's so important that we are in
Speaker:this community now with your community.
Speaker:Um, each time I'd found people who were doing something similar and,
Speaker:you know, that we could encourage each other, like just a few people.
Speaker:So I was part of this group called hiphop ed, which was basically
Speaker:teachers who loved hiphop.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And, but what, what, what we loved was like the approach hiphop, which
Speaker:is more, you know, now rap is a multi-billion dollar industry, but
Speaker:when it started it was a grassroots thing, challenging, uh, convention.
Speaker:And we wanted that.
Speaker:So it was kind of challenging some of the stuff in the educational
Speaker:establishment and taken our ideas and writing about it.
Speaker:So we'd write about music, we'd write about how it was applicable
Speaker:to our students, and then we'd like, basically in a, in a way have like.
Speaker:I, it's almost like a, like a debate battle.
Speaker:I dunno.
Speaker:Like you, you'd present and then people would ask you questions and
Speaker:there'd be like 10 of us in this primary school in East London doing it.
Speaker:But, um, of that group, one of them is now a very well-known author.
Speaker:So Jeffrey, er, he, um, is got like a, a load of, um, books that he's published.
Speaker:Another one, Darren Chetty.
Speaker:He, um, was a co-author of a book called The Good Immigrant, which did
Speaker:really, really well a few years ago.
Speaker:So this group has been a group of people that supported each other and
Speaker:basically improved our writing together.
Speaker:And then we've gone off and done other things and
Speaker:supported each other over time.
Speaker:Um, like I chatted to Jeffrey the other day and, um, Darren I saw
Speaker:a few months ago, so this is a very long way of me saying that.
Speaker:Um, I was just slowly building up confidence and I was writing for.
Speaker:My friends really, I was writing for me and I was writing for
Speaker:people who I thought I might help.
Speaker:Um, and I wasn't expecting like a massive audience.
Speaker:I still don't really have a massive audience, but it was about relationships
Speaker:and things that were important to me.
Speaker:Um, and then you never know who is around and watching and you are kind
Speaker:of creating conditions for luck.
Speaker:So because I was thinking about other people and how it might be useful for
Speaker:them, it solved problems for them.
Speaker:And that, I think that's the key.
Speaker:So I was writing for myself, but I was also thinking, how does this, this
Speaker:have been useful to me a few years ago?
Speaker:Like that was the approach for my book is like, I wish I had this book when
Speaker:I first started school leadership.
Speaker:And I knew there was a different way to be a leader.
Speaker:I wish I had that.
Speaker:Um, and then partway through the book I realized I was gonna leave schools
Speaker:and I was like, this is my parting gift to people Then, um, eventually I
Speaker:set up like my website with my name.
Speaker:'cause by now I was, um, happy enough to write publicly with my own name.
Speaker:Um, yeah.
Speaker:And I wrote stuff on there.
Speaker:But you know, if I were writing someone, I'd be like, choose
Speaker:the thing that you like doing.
Speaker:If it's writing, then you should be on Twitter or LinkedIn.
Speaker:If it's video, you should be, I dunno, Instagram or TikTok or whatever.
Speaker:Choose the thing that you like.
Speaker:And then just do that.
Speaker:Like, you know, I talk about books and blogs, like really it started with me
Speaker:tweeting or writing very short form and writing a caption under a photograph.
Speaker:That's really where it started.
Speaker:And then Twitter was just me literally writing any nonsense
Speaker:that I wanted to and people finding it amusing or interesting.
Speaker:But, you know, within the genre of the stuff that I was, you know, I talk about
Speaker:work a bit, but I'd also talk about, you know, other things that I had saw.
Speaker:And yeah, like my Twitter account.
Speaker:Allowed me to be asked to be on Radio four and be on tv.
Speaker:And also sorts, 'cause journalists are on Twitter, so they see it.
Speaker:For me it's a, an illustration of this, an emergent process.
Speaker:You were, I'm linking it to before where you're talking about not pushing
Speaker:people to leave their jobs in order to keep them in that space of creativity.
Speaker:And through that consistency of following a creative practice, following
Speaker:a flow and energy, not putting too much weight on it, it evolved, it sounded
Speaker:like, and it changed and it grew and it took you to different places.
Speaker:I get caught between this, oh, it's strategy to get work.
Speaker:Yes, that can happen.
Speaker:But I think what you are saying is that you are creating luck.
Speaker:You are putting yourself sewing the beds of serendipity, and if
Speaker:something came up then it come.
Speaker:But if it's a classic thing, if you didn't do it, nothing would happen.
Speaker:If you do do it doesn't necessarily so mean something will happen.
Speaker:Uh, and ultimately you said it was for you, but also I like
Speaker:the idea of like, it was for you, the you a few years back.
Speaker:So it's not all about me and it's all about me.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:Like it, uh, basically it's kind of, you know, there's a thing sometimes
Speaker:when you see authors, they talk about writing the book that they
Speaker:wish that someone had left for them.
Speaker:And it's kind of, you know, writing a book is a pretty long ass process,
Speaker:so you have to really wanna do it.
Speaker:And there has to be a point if the book already exists,
Speaker:like, why would you do it?
Speaker:So it is more, um, when I think about.
Speaker:Like career Pivot Pro or whatever.
Speaker:It's funny what you said, Carlos, about it being serendipity, but
Speaker:also a, a process to the strategy.
Speaker:Now I'm able to look back at what I've done and see the common threads
Speaker:and help people do it much quicker.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:Because I can see, well, I've written it down.
Speaker:Like I, I've, I've written the process and I can take people through it because
Speaker:when I look back now I'm like, okay, I've done this four or five times.
Speaker:What were the common, uh, traits?
Speaker:And there are common traits all the time that ex the exact
Speaker:tactics are different per person.
Speaker:But the, the overall strategy.
Speaker:Definitely it works.
Speaker:And you know, when I talk to other people who have this kind of approach
Speaker:or work with, you know, part of their job is having to create
Speaker:opportunities or relationships.
Speaker:They all have a similar thing, but they don't think about it.
Speaker:The difference for me is just that I've thought about it because people
Speaker:ask me all the time, and then, you know, people ask me to work with them.
Speaker:So I was like, okay, well what is it that works for me so
Speaker:I can make it work for them?
Speaker:And that forced me to actually go through, oh,
Speaker:okay, what did I do that time?
Speaker:Oh, I did this, I did that, I did this, I did that.
Speaker:Like, you know, and, um, you know, even when I realized the other day, well, I
Speaker:said to you about giving up my job and stopping and not knowing what to do.
Speaker:I had no idea what I wanted to do.
Speaker:But um, now I look back at it, I basically took myself through the
Speaker:process that I've done several times now and great stuff happened.
Speaker:Like you can't, you can't guarantee what will happen, but I
Speaker:can almost guarantee people that something interesting will happen.
Speaker:Like it's, it's almost impossible for it not to, you just don't know what
Speaker:it is because like you said, you are.
Speaker:Diligently chipping away at things and you are creating the conditions for
Speaker:luck, you're creating the conditions for opportunity and you're just
Speaker:maximizing that in a more strategic way.
Speaker:That's what I would say it is, but you can't know what those
Speaker:opportunities are going to be.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:I dunno, like I couldn't have told you I was gonna be doing this.
Speaker:That's as a result of Vanessa.
Speaker:And also because I got brave enough to talk about what it was
Speaker:I wanted to offer in the world.
Speaker:And so as a result, now friends and colleagues and just like random
Speaker:acquaintances refer people to me.
Speaker:But if I wasn't brave enough to talk about it, how would they know?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But you talked to the start about confidence.
Speaker:You know, people want to be instilled with confidence rather
Speaker:than necessarily the outcomes.
Speaker:So I wonder how much, well, you talked about this as it
Speaker:sounds like you're getting more confident with your own voice.
Speaker:' cause it is interesting, you talked about like the book, publishing a
Speaker:book helped you to be more confident to talk in your own voice, in your
Speaker:own story, which is normally kind of the other way around, right?
Speaker:People spend years getting to a point where they get
Speaker:published, but it sounds like.
Speaker:Yours was almost, you got that opportunity quite early
Speaker:in your writing journey,
Speaker:Yeah, I mean, it's funny 'cause it's, um, it's early, but I guess
Speaker:it's not because at the time that I wrote the book, I'd already
Speaker:been writing online for probably four or five years, so, right.
Speaker:Um, so it's kind of, it's quick, but it's also not, um, but I had
Speaker:to teach myself how to write, like how to write a, a book.
Speaker:A book is a very different thing from a few blocks.
Speaker:Um, and also a book that people want to read is, you know, we were talking
Speaker:about English literature and that, um, I was a good writer before in
Speaker:terms of like a good academic writer or a, you know, my staff made sense.
Speaker:But that's a very different kind of writing to the kind of thing that
Speaker:builds relationships with people.
Speaker:That invites them in.
Speaker:That's kind of writings night and day.
Speaker:It's very, very different.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, so it's kind of like, I'm not trying to win a Booker prize.
Speaker:I'm trying to build relationships with people and make them feel seen.
Speaker:That's different.
Speaker:so there's this, this very creative emergent path and then layered
Speaker:onto this, this idea of kind of a more strategic, it seems like,
Speaker:evolved into a more strategic way of doing things, having reflected and
Speaker:seen what worked and what didn't.
Speaker:Uh, and now this idea of like building career, like an entrepreneur,
Speaker:what I'd be curious to hear, just put that con to just to,
Speaker:let's put that con into contrast.
Speaker:So there are people who build careers, not like entrepreneur, and the people
Speaker:who build careers like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:so for kind of people who work with me, I, um, you know, we've
Speaker:got the structured thing, but there's also like a telegram group.
Speaker:So we have a chat, whatever.
Speaker:I drop things in there just like as they come up based on what
Speaker:people have been saying to me.
Speaker:And I did this cuff thing one time because of a one-to-one
Speaker:session that I'd had with someone, and then I was like, okay.
Speaker:It was just, I was walking along the road and I thought, let me record
Speaker:this for these guys and pop it in.
Speaker:And it was, it was called, employee mindset versus entrepreneur mindset.
Speaker:And it was literally me just riffing 'cause of it.
Speaker:We just come off a call and we got talking about it and I was like, okay.
Speaker:And I thought, let me write it down, um, and, and do it.
Speaker:So I can't remember off the top of my head now, but I'll
Speaker:give you the essence of it.
Speaker:So it was like employee mindset, looking at skills and then just
Speaker:kind of fitting yourself to that.
Speaker:The job description, entrepreneur mindset, is looking at the
Speaker:problems that you can solve.
Speaker:Employee mindset, it's, uh, attaching your time to money.
Speaker:So you have to be that kind of person, team, something entrepreneur.
Speaker:Entrepreneur mindset is about the outcome and the, um, you
Speaker:know, what the deliverables are.
Speaker:employee mindset is thinking about, you are waiting to be told what
Speaker:it is that you need to be doing.
Speaker:Entrepreneur mindset is like, well, what's the problem you need solving?
Speaker:And we got talking about it.
Speaker:And they just like, say more about that.
Speaker:Say more about that.
Speaker:Like our next session where they were like, I want you to talk more about it.
Speaker:And they made me like, build out this idea.
Speaker:And it's so funny because, um, every time I mention it to people,
Speaker:they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So I need to do something more of it.
Speaker:They're like, could you put, so can you put something
Speaker:together on the PDF for us?
Speaker:Da da.
Speaker:I was just like, okay.
Speaker:Yes, like off the cuff thing.
Speaker:But also, um, the interesting thing is you can have an employee
Speaker:mindset as an entrepreneur.
Speaker:Like, I've spoken to people who like, on the surface of it, they're successful
Speaker:entrepreneurs and they're like, no.
Speaker:Like I'm still there thinking, I feel guilty about taking holiday.
Speaker:I feel bad about this.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:There's no boundaries.
Speaker:And it's, you know, yeah.
Speaker:There's no boundaries.
Speaker:'cause they're just like, I'm, and I think it's being linked,
Speaker:thinking that your productivity is linked to you doing things.
Speaker:That's the essence of it, I think, as opposed to No, it's the value
Speaker:that you're creating in the world.
Speaker:Um, and equally you can be in an organization and still have
Speaker:quite an entrepreneurial approach.
Speaker:Now I.
Speaker:You know, I still have a day job part of the time.
Speaker:Uh, and for most of my life I've had a day job of sorts, but I have quite
Speaker:an entrepreneurial approach to things.
Speaker:Um, and you can tell if you're that kind of person where, I dunno, like you're
Speaker:the person, they always ask to come and set up new projects or, you know, set
Speaker:up a new division or whatever it is.
Speaker:You're always looking for those kind of opportunities.
Speaker:so it can work both ways.
Speaker:Like you're not necessarily automatically entrepreneurial minded
Speaker:'cause you're an entrepreneur, nor are you necessarily just somebody
Speaker:who thinks employee style because you are, um, uh, in an organization like,
Speaker:you know, it can switch and change.
Speaker:And also I think it's a, a life's work sometimes because if you
Speaker:think about the culture that we are born into, it's very much the,
Speaker:you get paid to do a thing, you get paid for your time, um, you know.
Speaker:Covid, I'm glad has shaken that up for some people.
Speaker:But you have to go into your office and then that's what's seen as valuable
Speaker:by people's bosses, dah, dah, dah.
Speaker:Like that.
Speaker:That way of working is wild to me 'cause I've worked hybrid for many, many years.
Speaker:But like I still hear people in my circle.
Speaker:It's like, oh, I have to go in mate.
Speaker:Your team's all in India.
Speaker:Why are you going in?
Speaker:It doesn't make sense.
Speaker:But um, okay.
Speaker:So the other thing I would say, which is the kind of evolution of my
Speaker:thinking, 'cause someone pushed me on it was if you are somebody in an
Speaker:organization and you are doing kind of your entrepreneurial stuff on the side,
Speaker:which is also totally valid by the way.
Speaker:Like people think, oh, I'm not as good an entrepreneur if I'm doing that.
Speaker:May do what you need to do.
Speaker:Like, it's fine.
Speaker:Um.
Speaker:There are very successful people who've done that for a long time
Speaker:before they span off their own, uh, business because it's a risk
Speaker:mitigation exercise for them.
Speaker:So, you know, the, the aim of being in business is to
Speaker:continue to be in business.
Speaker:So do the thing that requires you to do that.
Speaker:And if that means you have to take your job for a bit, then, then do that.
Speaker:Like, um, I got on my clients to reframe their role, their job as their
Speaker:benefactor, as one of their investors.
Speaker:'cause it's paying them to be able to do the other stuff they wanna do.
Speaker:And they were like, I hadn't thought about it like that.
Speaker:I was like, yeah, like, think about it like that.
Speaker:Like, you know, it's, it's one of your funders I think the thing that will help
Speaker:people definitely helped me is to, if you are an employee, an organization,
Speaker:consider it as a partnership.
Speaker:That is how an entrepreneur would do something with another organization.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:It's kind of, um, like one of my roles was about partnerships and kind
Speaker:of joint grant agreements and stuff.
Speaker:And you are very much thinking about.
Speaker:You wanna get the best out of it for your partner, but you also wanna
Speaker:get the best out of it for you.
Speaker:And I think that's the main key for somebody who's
Speaker:still in the organization.
Speaker:It's, I think sometimes we can give everything to our paid employment and
Speaker:it's right and proper to do a good job.
Speaker:Like, I'm not saying you shouldn't do a good job, they do that, but also
Speaker:people then don't really think very much about their side of the equation.
Speaker:Is the employer or that partnership fulfilling what
Speaker:is required for you as well?
Speaker:If you think about things in that, it really shifts
Speaker:how you think about things.
Speaker:Um, more than just the money because obviously, you know, that's the
Speaker:thing people immediately think about.
Speaker:But the other stuff as well, like, um, thinking about it as a partnership.
Speaker:That you can then assess and see.
Speaker:You just come with a completely different energy when you're,
Speaker:when you think about it like that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, and I definitely, I many people do.
Speaker:I've been guilty of it in the past.
Speaker:And the reason I say it is, um, back to the entrepreneur thing,
Speaker:and you mentioned creativity, Carlos, I realize that I, you
Speaker:know, this is fresh for you guys.
Speaker:I think about building your career like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:But I was like, actually, I also think about sharing your work like an artist.
Speaker:You know, as I spoke about my story, there's a lot of, my approach
Speaker:is very much portfolio sharing, which is very common for artists.
Speaker:And it's because I've been in the creative zone for my personal projects.
Speaker:But I think I meld the approaches and the reason why what I just said is
Speaker:very important is because, and this is something that I'm kind of working on
Speaker:building out now, is we can often think about a company and the assets for it.
Speaker:So if it's a company that you work for and it's not your own, and
Speaker:then you put everything into that.
Speaker:Then as soon as you leave, where are your assets?
Speaker:And you're starting again from scratch.
Speaker:So you end up with people who are extremely experienced and
Speaker:they have nothing personally to show for it, and they're starting
Speaker:from scratch every single time.
Speaker:And really, that's not a position that we wanna be in.
Speaker:You, you know, I do a good job for my organizations, but I also have
Speaker:many personal assets now that are distinct from them, are, are, and
Speaker:that are my own, and allow me to get other jobs or to create opportunities.
Speaker:And if people take away one thing, I would say that's it,
Speaker:um, for yourself, but also for your personal business as well.
Speaker:Like, what are your assets?
Speaker:You know, I, I offer a service, but I'm also building out assets.
Speaker:Um, and I think that's very important.
Speaker:That's wonderful.
Speaker:I love this idea of the connection of the artists and these assets
Speaker:that you're creating, these creative things that become something that.
Speaker:Of value to you, not just the client that you are, you are
Speaker:making for, there's, there's a couple of strands I wanted to
Speaker:go down briefly before we close.
Speaker:So one of them was like this idea of being seen,
Speaker:thinking in public, creating.
Speaker:And then at some point, because I think this is an interesting bit, and
Speaker:I feel this is where I experienced you at, is like then having a very
Speaker:clear message when people find you.
Speaker:And for me, the thing that jumped out was building your career
Speaker:like an entrepreneur, something, something I could hook onto.
Speaker:You know, something that makes me, ah, I, that's Iesha.
Speaker:That's, that's, and so be curious to know how, what you, you know, how
Speaker:you work with your clients on that.
Speaker:This idea of being perceived as a person who is linked to an idea that
Speaker:then makes you more visible in a sense.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So I'm gonna bring this one back to the writing actually.
Speaker:And you know, I.
Speaker:Uh, for people put instead of writing, put whatever your thing is.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So if you talk to people instead, like, whatever it's
Speaker:you do, um, yeah, you're right.
Speaker:Laurens on a hundred year life.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:That kind of style.
Speaker:Um, I, if you spoken to me, in fact Carlos, I don't even know if I'd
Speaker:thought about build your career like an entrepreneur when we spoke.
Speaker:I don't think so.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:I, I hadn't quite got it.
Speaker:So, um, you know, all the things I'm talking to you about now, we'd
Speaker:covered, but I don't think I said that.
Speaker:And it was interesting that you picked that up.
Speaker:'cause I think that came after.
Speaker:And the way it came is because going back to your saying about writing,
Speaker:uh, one of the things I did when I was off last year was I decided to write
Speaker:publicly every single day on LinkedIn.
Speaker:Now the reason is because, um, I write every day anyway in my journal, but
Speaker:that's not the same as public writing.
Speaker:I think that when you're doing a thing, you need to have it sharpened publicly.
Speaker:Now social media can be a bit wild, so you have to choose your.
Speaker:You know, all your, your, um, platform, but LinkedIn is not,
Speaker:people aren't gonna cancel you.
Speaker:Like it's fine.
Speaker:So the point, and I was gonna do it on my blog, but um, I'm wanna annoy
Speaker:my newsletter subscribers 'cause it was supposed to be a weekly
Speaker:newsletter and I knew I needed to write, write weekly, uh, daily.
Speaker:And basically the writing helped me to think, so I was testing my ideas daily.
Speaker:I could see what people responded to, I could see what went well.
Speaker:Um, on this.
Speaker:I would caution people not to get worried about the numbers.
Speaker:It, for me, it's the type of person talking to me.
Speaker:So sometimes, like my posts that don't do very well.
Speaker:The people who talk to me in my dms are exactly the kind
Speaker:of people I've talking to.
Speaker:And then I know that's the right post.
Speaker:You, you know, I've had posts that have been many, many times my reach and it's
Speaker:kind of, they're interesting, but they haven't, A lot hasn't come out of it.
Speaker:Whereas I've had ones that maybe a hundred people have seen, but like
Speaker:one very influential person has built a relationship with me as a result.
Speaker:So it's more the kind of person you wanna be talking to.
Speaker:Don't worry about the numbers so much.
Speaker:But over time, at first, I started writing about networking because,
Speaker:um, I knew relationships were important, but I couldn't quite
Speaker:work out why and people were interested, but like nothing happened.
Speaker:And then that kind of, I spoke about social mobility because
Speaker:classes really important to me.
Speaker:And, um, you know, I had a talk, so my first bit of the business
Speaker:was what are the things I can offer, what are my products?
Speaker:Um, and I just thought I'll go with things that people have paid for.
Speaker:So one was a talk about social mobility, and the other thing was Career Pivot
Speaker:Pro, which was called Your Next Best Step at that time because I.
Speaker:I'd created that because someone had asked me to work with them.
Speaker:So they were the two things, and they're very, they're disparate, right?
Speaker:But that's what I had.
Speaker:So that's what I went with.
Speaker:And I knew that they worked for one person, so I thought
Speaker:they'd work for other people.
Speaker:So I wrote about social mobility 'cause I care about it.
Speaker:But also I had this talk and I was hoping that people would see
Speaker:it and then talk to me about it.
Speaker:Um, and then over time that, that's great actually.
Speaker:'cause I built some interesting relationships with people I
Speaker:would not have been expecting, like not in my sector, just
Speaker:to resonate with that story.
Speaker:Um, and then I thought, okay, this is interesting, but it's probably
Speaker:not gonna be the thing that's like a, an ongoing product for me.
Speaker:But it made me do a workshop.
Speaker:I tried my first paid online workshop, people came.
Speaker:So I was like, okay, this is interesting.
Speaker:That could be a new model for me and maybe I don't have to wait
Speaker:for the organizations to hire me.
Speaker:I can just do it myself.
Speaker:So that came and then back to the fear.
Speaker:I had career Pivot Pro sitting there, that's probably at the
Speaker:time my most valuable asset.
Speaker:And I'd showed it with people with before and people
Speaker:were like, this is good.
Speaker:You should do something with it.
Speaker:I didn't do anything with it.
Speaker:I was scared to offer it.
Speaker:I was like, people are gonna say it's expensive.
Speaker:People are gonna be like, who were you to offer this?
Speaker:I, I was scared.
Speaker:The thing that definitely was the thing that could help me the most.
Speaker:I was worried, worried about doing it, so I was wasting
Speaker:time with piddly little things.
Speaker:But I think I needed to build up that confidence.
Speaker:But over time I started talking about these things, you know?
Speaker:Um, and then I was trying, then I'd get people talking to me, like coming to me
Speaker:about with CVS and this and that, and I was like, ah, I don't wanna do cvs.
Speaker:Like, that's not really what I'm talking about here.
Speaker:I'm talking about creating opportunities.
Speaker:And I was like, how can I make it clear so that I don't waste people's time?
Speaker:And then I started to have questions that when people emailed me.
Speaker:Or DM me that I'd put that could help me to assess if they were the right
Speaker:kind of person for this approach.
Speaker:'cause it's not right for everyone.
Speaker:Um, if you're somebody who's used to using recruiters and CVS and
Speaker:application forms and that's your style, it's not really for you that
Speaker:you have to be someone who's willing to take chances and do various things.
Speaker:And also I realize like, you know, if someone's been made redundant
Speaker:and at the end of their redundancy period, period, they're stressed, like
Speaker:they wanna find a job straight away.
Speaker:This is not the approach for them.
Speaker:But if you're at the beginning of it and you're full of possibility or you
Speaker:are doing it alongside your work, or you've got some independent stuff,
Speaker:like yeah, you've got the space.
Speaker:So it took me a while after offering it to people and be thinking, oh
Speaker:no, that doesn't work for you.
Speaker:And they just, they just hear like, career coaching.
Speaker:And I was like, not exactly.
Speaker:It's kind of something, but I couldn't work out what to what it was.
Speaker:And then I got chatting to one of my friends and this kind of thing and I was
Speaker:like, man, like my friend said something like, you've basically written.
Speaker:A playbook for how to become an entrepreneur if
Speaker:you're somebody in a job.
Speaker:And I was like, you think?
Speaker:And they're like, oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Um, and like I, I did like a, a workshop and I was just like, I, I
Speaker:started to work entrepreneur stuff, and then I go back to career stuff
Speaker:and I was like jumping all the time.
Speaker:I was like, but it's the same skills guys.
Speaker:It's the same thing.
Speaker:Like, the reason I could, this is because of this other stuff that I did.
Speaker:And then I realized, I'm talking to people who want to build their
Speaker:own adventure basically and build their career like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:Um, and then like you, Carlos, I, I emailed it to somebody and I just put it
Speaker:at the, so to your question, um, and I think somebody mentioned about assets.
Speaker:I, I wrote a career pivot blueprint.
Speaker:It's just like a, you know, very low cost of things.
Speaker:So that in a way it's really, so people can see is this
Speaker:approach for them, that's all.
Speaker:But it's also for people who, you know, they wanna do it themselves
Speaker:and work out what it was.
Speaker:and at the bottom I put Build your career like an entrepreneur,
Speaker:like just as a throwaway thing.
Speaker:And then I sent it to someone to test and they're like, I love that.
Speaker:I love Project Career Entrepreneur, and that's how it came.
Speaker:So in essence, it was me testing things, putting it out to the market,
Speaker:writing things, play around with ideas.
Speaker:And, and the quick takeaway from that is I use social media for loads of
Speaker:different ways, like it's marketing, but I also use it to test ideas.
Speaker:Like I use it to test new products.
Speaker:I use it to see if people are interested in something.
Speaker:Um, and if people interested, I do it.
Speaker:And if they don't, I'm like, okay, that didn't work.
Speaker:So I think people are very worried about things working.
Speaker:They're looking stupid.
Speaker:Uh, I think I've gone back to my engineering roots on this and it's
Speaker:kind of, I just experiment now and it makes it so much more fun.
Speaker:And then if a thing works, I'll do more of it.
Speaker:You know, like build your career, like an entrepreneur seems to have stuck.
Speaker:and I think it's the clearest articulation of what it is that I do.
Speaker:So that was an experiment, basically
Speaker:Getting out your own way.
Speaker:That you talk about the most successful people, you know,
Speaker:that's their big thing.
Speaker:Try not to attach yourself to the success or failure of anything yourself.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:That.
Speaker:Like, it kind of just don't worry so much about the outcome.
Speaker:And if I think about approaching it more like an engineer, like in
Speaker:engineers that we iterate, um, or you try experiments and you see what's going
Speaker:on and then you just tweak it a bit.
Speaker:So back, what I was saying about your next best step is kind of you try a
Speaker:thing, you tweak it and see how it goes and get closer and, and closer
Speaker:to the desired outcome, I guess.
Speaker:for those, uh, listening who really want to build a career like an entrepreneur.
Speaker:Uh, and would love to get to know you more and hear more about what you do.
Speaker:Where would you like to point them?
Speaker:Iesha?
Speaker:Um, okay, so my website's Iesha small.com.
Speaker:There's kind of contact details on there and that's probably the easiest
Speaker:way if you wanna kind of catch up with me and ask me questions.
Speaker:and then the other thing is I'm on LinkedIn every day so you can
Speaker:follow me and connect, but obviously you don't always, I write every
Speaker:day, but of course you won't see stuff 'cause of the algorithm.
Speaker:So easiest ways, if you wanna see stuff from me, go to my website
Speaker:and sign up for the newsletter.
Speaker:But if you wanna see the random stuff I put on LinkedIn, 'cause it's
Speaker:sometimes very random, then you can
Speaker:do that
Speaker:as well.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Laurence, anything that you are, um, taking away
Speaker:loads, um, yeah, inspiring hearing Iesha's story and just kind of the
Speaker:fact you've walked the walk here.
Speaker:I think ultimately that you, you know, you're helping other people do this,
Speaker:but you've, it's been your journey all along is this kind of immersion path and
Speaker:seeing the connection points afterwards.
Speaker:I think that that's sort of like, oh, okay.
Speaker:There was a, there was a process here, there was a journey here, but maybe
Speaker:at the time it didn't feel like that.
Speaker:So I think a lot of this coming back down to, like you said,
Speaker:just helping people to navigate the fear of uncertainty really.
Speaker:'cause that's a big part of this, isn't it?
Speaker:Like trying to tie ourselves to.
Speaker:Structure, even if it is sometimes not good for us.
Speaker:Um, and faith in yourself as well.
Speaker:Faith in your ability to build relationships and some of
Speaker:those things feel intangible.
Speaker:Like you, you're necessarily, you can't see them, but it feels like
Speaker:you've got the inner belief that you will be okay and you will be
Speaker:able to work out what's next once you've got that, that inside you.
Speaker:Yeah, very much so.
Speaker:It's, it's interesting you say that because, um, the kind of people that I
Speaker:choose to work with, it's very much a partnership because they teach me stuff
Speaker:as well, and we learn from each other.
Speaker:We, we tend to co-create things.
Speaker:Obviously I have a structure, but within that they, they suggest things.
Speaker:We, we go with the flow.
Speaker:Um, but I see something in them like.
Speaker:It's, it's always people who I'm like, I can see how this can be,
Speaker:and they can do it themselves.
Speaker:It's just, I just speed it up, you know?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, that, that's all like, it, it's, it's definitely people who
Speaker:I see that they could do this, and it's more of a, okay, let's
Speaker:just like accelerate you a bit.
Speaker:I've, I've heard to describe this as a illuminator,
Speaker:that you can just illuminate what's already there, but they
Speaker:maybe can't see themselves.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's precisely that.
Speaker:And it's kind of like when they, um, you know, they, they finish or whatever.
Speaker:It's like, it's what you told me before Iesha, but I needed to go through it to
Speaker:understand, and it's just like, that's a pleasure kind of thing to, to have
Speaker:people work things out for themselves and to see what you can see in them,
Speaker:um, or the potential that you can see.
Speaker:'cause of course, you never quite know where it's gonna go.
Speaker:Thank you Iesha.
Speaker:Really, really grateful for your time and your wisdom, your stories.
Speaker:I think it's, there's many in our community are gonna benefit hearing
Speaker:from, like Lauren said, how you walk the walk as well as talk.
Speaker:The talk.
Speaker:Uh, and I'm personally, I love this.
Speaker:I see threads, the engineer, the teacher, the artist, the English lit
Speaker:person, just like woven into what?
Speaker:Where you're the unexpected author.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Unexpected author.
Speaker:My god, I love it.
Speaker:That's the next book refers like another book in the offering.
Speaker:Maybe it's the career pivot unexpected author.
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:You know what?
Speaker:Maybe there's a career pivot playbook.
Speaker:Maybe people are like, would you write another book?
Speaker:There you go.
Speaker:Something.
Speaker:Yeah.
