Working FT While Building Your Brand
I work with some clients who are straddling working full-time while building their brands and businesses for the future.
They come to the table with skills, tenacity, vision, and grit.
They are usually working their full-time job by day and diving into learning, building, and growth on their off hours and weekends.
I know this well because this was me.
I was recently asked how I began my coaching business. Here is how I responded:
“I started with 1:1 clients. Coaching, consulting, creative direction, and helping with positioning. I took my individual work with each client and turned it into my first program (I called it Pure Transformation Package at the time.) I went from an hourly rate to a package rate. The package then springboarded me into course work and then I had testimonials and experience which informed many other details.”
For me, my future was worth my time burning the candle at both ends working FT and building my 1:1 client work on my off hours. (Short-term sacrifices for long-term gains.)
No one was making me, I was MOTIVATED. I wanted to be the best at what I did by day (a job that I loved) and I wanted to go back to school by night.
I had to have some stability before I took the leap.
Also, HUGH asterisk here: You don’t have to ever quit your FT job. You CAN be a creative entrepreneur and keep doing what you’re doing. Write your own rules, always, friend.
In my case, praying motherhood would be in my future, I wanted to be 100% in control of my own schedule.
Can you do the and/both?
I believe that you can, you just have to be incredibly disciplined with your time and know deeply WHY you are committing in the ways that you are.
Here’s what this looked like for me:
Not doing a ton of things socially because all of my free time was being put towards growing my coaching company and learning.
Investing in my own online business education. I treated it like going back to school.
Understanding I might move a little more slowly because I was working FT and traveling for my job.
Having “dream big conversations” with my husband to open our minds to move into a place of possibility.
Attending live events to network and learn as much as I could.
“My future was worth my time burning the candle at both ends. (Short-term sacrifices for long-term gains.).”
When I looked into things from a 5-year lens, I could see where I wanted to be and that helped me to work backward from my goals.
Having spaces for community and support was vital for me to move forwards.
I recommend to any future creative to find a community and seek out mentors that can help you.
I am wishing you the very best! Would you like to keep this conversation going? I recorded a podcast episode about this. Click here to tune in.
