You left corporate for specific reasons.
You want autonomy.
Control over your time.
Work that feels meaningful and is lucrative.
A business that runs on your terms, not someone else's.
Here's what happens instead for a lot of independent consultants: the business gets built one micro-decision at a time.
You take the client that isn't quite right because it's in hand.
You agree to the schedule compromise because the engagement is clear.
You keep doing the execution work because that's what comes in.
And then one day you look up and realize the business you've built doesn't look much like the business you intended.
In Episode 280, Melisa Liberman addresses this directly.
She opens with three real consultant scenarios: one who always wanted a boutique firm but is currently exhausted from solo travel and project work, one who wants to flip her revenue model from mostly self-delivered to mostly team-delivered and doesn't know how to adjust the plane while it's flying, and one who is successful on paper but landing staff augmentation work when what she wanted was strategic advisory.
None of them built the wrong business on purpose. They built it through a series of invisible trade-offs that seemed small at the time.
Melisa walks through two anchor questions every independent consultant should be able to answer, then a five-step process for getting clear on the business you actually want and starting to build toward it deliberately.
If you've ever looked at your calendar and thought, "How did I get here? This business isn’t what I meant to build," this episode is where to start.
Timestamps for Key Moments:
[00:00] The question behind this episode: are you building the business you actually want?
[00:03] Agenda overview
[00:07] Companion resource: Grow Your Consulting Business book at melisabook.com
[00:09] Two anchor questions: why did you leave corporate, and why haven't you gone back?
[00:13] What actually happens: micro-decisions and invisible trade-offs
[00:18] What does success actually look like for you?
[00:20] Start from everything possible, not what feels realistic
[00:23] The five steps to build the business you actually want
[00:28] Put this episode into action
Resources Mentioned:
Companion Resource: Grow Your Consulting Business Book and Toolkit. Download free at melisabook.com
Full Show Notes: https://shownotes.melisaliberman.com/episode-280
Mentioned in this Episode: Episode 267 - https://shownotes.melisaliberman.com/episode-267
Want More?
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