The Leap From Employee to Entrepreneur ft. Scott Trumpolt

On this week’s episode, Jana sits down with compensation strategist and independent consultant Scott Trumpolt, who spent nearly two decades climbing the corporate ladder across the U.S. and Germany before realizing that success had slowly pulled him away from the work he actually loved.

Scott takes us inside the moment that forced him to confront a difficult truth. While working for a global corporation in Germany, he found himself spending more time navigating bureaucracy, managing administration, and debating project titles than doing the compensation design work that had originally fueled his career.

What looked like career growth on paper no longer felt meaningful in practice.

At the same time, Scott was living apart from his wife, traveling back and forth between countries, and beginning to question whether the traditional corporate path was still aligned with the life he wanted to build.

What followed wasn’t an impulsive career change.

It was a complete shift in identity.

Scott made the decision to walk away from corporate security, leave behind the structure he had spent years building, and start over as an independent consultant with no guaranteed clients, no employer safety net, and no roadmap beyond trusting his own expertise.

This episode breaks down:

•  Why career success can quietly pull you away from your real passion 
•  The hidden tradeoffs of corporate growth and bureaucracy 
•  How to know when it’s time to stop chasing stability and start building freedom 
•  Why independent consulting requires selling yourself, not just your skills 
•  The difference between being good at something and truly loving it 

Scott also shares the emotional realities of going out on your own, from navigating uncertainty and dry spells, to rebuilding confidence, learning how to market himself, and redefining what security actually means in today’s world.

Because at the end of the day, fulfillment doesn’t come from climbing the highest ladder.

It comes from building a life that still feels like your own once you get there.

Where to find Scott:

• linkedin.com/in/scott-trumpolt-m-a-g-r-p-257a6b317
• Compensation Strategy Consulting | TCDS by Scott Trumpolt

Where to find Jana:

• https://janaaxline.com/ 
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/janaaxline/
• Instagram: @unstoppableleaders
• TikTok: @jana_axline 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I remember one day we were sitting around in a room talking about a new project that we were gonna try and work on together to kind of bring one aspect of compensation together for the company as a whole. And we spent so much time thinking about what the title of this project should be in this meeting, and something about that just struck me. It's like, I am just wasting too much time here. It was like in the back of my mind, I think I knew I was ready to make this leap, but I needed something to push me in that direction. Otherwise, I may never have done it. That was 14 years ago, and I'm still going strong with my own, so it was the right decision.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

Today I'm here with Scott Trump, who is the founder of Trumpult Compensation Design Solutions, who spent nearly the two decades in corporate leadership across the U.S. and Germany before making the decision to leave and build his own consulting business. Thank you for joining us today, Scott. It's so glad I'm so glad to have you here today.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Thank you, Jenna, and I really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you and to address your listeners and viewers.

SPEAKER_00 1:11

Yeah. So let's let's talk about it. You were living in living in Germany. What was going on? What was your life like at the time?

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Well, I had been working in the uh corporate world, as you mentioned, and I work for a a very large company concern, a global company. And I was working in the U.S. in compensation, which is my field of expertise, basically building pay structures, figuring out what to pay employees, jobs, sales incentives, anything really to do with how do you motivate the workforce, how do you engage the workforce through compensation. And while I was at that role, I had an opportunity to go work for the parent corporation over in Germany. So I went over there, and for about a year, they treated me as a local there. And so I got an opportunity to work in what they called a center of excellence, which since we had a lot of different divisions and a lot of different countries that were part of this large corporation, I had the opportunity to work in this center of excellence, mainly in the compensation sphere. But what I found in this stopping last point, really, in my corporate world, was that it was very difficult to get all these different divisions, which it had been acquired over time, to kind of get on the same page in terms of one compensation vision, one human resources total rewards vision, if you will. And beyond that, I found that I was spending more and more of my time in general as I grew up the corporate ladder. I was spending more and more time getting away from that which I actually love to do, which is the actual compensation design work, planning and design work. Of course, administration is part of every job, and I still do administration to this day as a consultant for my clients when it's necessary. But I got to a point where one day I just decided that I think I've learned quite a bit in my years in the corporate world. I was very fortunate that I had some wonderful mentors early in my career. And since then I had been just going up and up the ladder. And I felt like I was starting to get unhappy because, again, I was getting away from my passion slowly. It was a slow progression. And as you're making more money and having more responsibility, you don't notice these things so much. But there comes a point in time and it can vary in someone's life as to when it happens. But it just really acted as a triggering point for me that said, hey, you know what? I've had enough of this. I want to go home and I want to start my own thing. So that's a very high-level jumping off point. But I wanted to say that that was really one of the main triggers that had me decide to go back home and start my own business. And we can kind of take it from there.

SPEAKER_00 3:56

Yeah, did you was there any one moment that finally got you actually thinking about maybe it's time to make a change?

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Yeah, there was. I remember one day we were sitting around in a room talking about a new project that we were different groups of people talking about a new project that we were going to try and work on together to kind of bring one aspect of compensation together for the company as a whole. And we spent so much time thinking about what the title of this project should be in this meeting. And something about that just struck me as like, I am just wasting too much time here. These are really great people to work with and everything, but we're so restrained in terms of what we can do, and we're we're focusing on just things that are really non-essential, not important to me. And that was kind of a triggering point. There was also the factor that I had gotten this opportunity of perhaps, well, the the idea was I got this opportunity because I had the right skill set and the right background. But I was married and I still am. And uh my wife wanted to stay at home, so we kind of made an agreement that we would try this out for a while. Uh, I would come back every couple of months, that type of thing. But that got old pretty quick. I was no longer used to being a bachelor. And so what it came down to, I remember telling my wife, I said, well, after a while, I said, if you were here, I could probably last a few more years. If you weren't here in Germany with me, I could probably last longer if the job was more interesting. But since neither one of those applied, that was again kind of the the the triggering point that made me just made me decide. It was like in the back of my mind, I think I knew I was ready to make this leap, but I needed something to push me in that direction. Otherwise, I may never have done it. And that was 14 years ago, and I'm still going strong on my own. So it was the right decision for me.

SPEAKER_00 5:48

And, you know, so you mentioned that you were you saw it slowly deteriorate from doing the things that you're best at that you enjoyed doing to now sounds like maybe a lot of bureaucracy, I can imagine with the size of the organization, how that if they've got centers of excellence, there's probably pretty big and pretty bureaucratic. And then that's incredible that you were living away from your wife. It's I find it a bit ironic because my husband and I um we go back and forth between Australia and the US. And so we're apart for it's a little different, like um three weeks out of every 13.

SPEAKER_01 6:23

Still, you know what the feeling is.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Yeah, I know what the feeling is. Like you are you're like yeah, missing your other person. So so that that paints the uh context a lot. But it sounds like you, you know, you could have looked for another position. What were you evaluating going out on your own versus looking for another position?

SPEAKER_01 6:44

Well, the the big piece of that was that I felt that there was I'm in a very much a niche type of occupation. And I just felt that it goes back to the idea is where is my passion? And I could get another corporate job. As a matter of fact, I got a few phone calls while I was over there about coming back to the United States. And but I kept thinking in my mind that in order to do what I love to do, I'm gonna need to have more control over my day-to-day work life in terms of the clients and the projects, because clients bring me in for a very specific project. Whereas when you're working in the corporate world, those kind of opportunities may not come up. A lot of the time you're just working to keep the lights on and to keep everything moving and a lot of maintenance. And I wanted to spend 20% of my time in and flip and flip the weighting from an 80-20 situation where 80 was more administrative and bureaucratic and possible people leadership, which I love doing, but it wasn't enough to keep me motivated. And so this whole concept came that yes, I want to go back to the United States, but I want to go back to it on different terms. And I literally walked out. Uh, I kind of knew in the back of my head because I had built up so many contacts and clients over the years and had had good relationships. I had never gone out on my own. I didn't have anything lined up. I knew that I had money to live off of and things like that. And so I had to make some of those immediate decisions, but the long-term strategic viewpoint I couldn't really see at that point. It was just taking a leap of faith in myself.

SPEAKER_00 8:18

And so how did you work through, I mean, because you were talking about savings or and and things. Obviously, it's a big move to move back from one country to another. And you weren't gonna go back to a job. So how did you just like work through what what is at risk here?

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Well, at at risk is that I will not be able to sustain myself on my own. Because being an independent consultant, you are not simply changing a job. You are changing a way that you approach a job. Because one thing I've learned as an independent consultant, and I talked a lot about this in my book to help other people, books called the Defragmented Consultant. And part of that book is to encourage people to understand both the good and the bad if they're thinking about making this decision after, say, 20 years in the corporate world. That's who the book is really geared towards. But what happened with me was really looking at the the situation as a whole and understanding that I'm gonna have to be the individual myself and the job is gonna come much closer together. I'm gonna be responsible for my own health care, my own financial investments. I'm not gonna have a 4K match. I'm not gonna have an employer contributing to my health care plan. These are the kind of things that you you think about. But there's a whole lot of others. Am I gonna be motivated working at home? How do I keep myself in shape? Because originally the first couple of years, I'm kind of darting off the subject here a little bit. I put on a bunch of weight because I was so sedentary. Um, at least in the corporate world, I was moving around, walking from building to building. But I fixed that problem. And uh now I get all my steps every day, and I'm feeling better now, frankly, than I did 20 years ago. But there are all these decisions, but the biggest thing is you are going to now be the stopping point for everything. You are going to have to make all of the decisions. You're gonna have to spend some time, some of your time marketing yourself, time doing administrative work, getting the invoices out, paying bills associated to whatever it is that you do as an independent consultant. So all of this is on your plate. So you really need to have that passion behind what you do so that everything else is acceptable to take on those additional responsibilities. And then you also have to remember that you're a force of one if you're an independent consultant, unless you have a partner or something like that. So you're gonna have to work more efficiently, and that's where you can draw on all your prior experiences. So I didn't know all of that up front, but these are the kind of decisions you need to make about yourself. It's really interesting too. Now, that was 14 years ago, and things were a little bit different back then. Whereas, but I still I still hear people saying, Oh, I'm I'm not sure if I want to be an independent consultant. That's a lack of security. Well, to me, it's just the opposite. When you have cash flows coming in from multiple clients, you can weather the storms of COVID or a downturn in the economy. You really have control over your destiny a lot more than in a company now, per se, which now it's getting to the point where uh companies are letting people go via uh an automated message or something, and they have no control over that. So they put all their eggs into one basket. And I talk about that in the book as well to try and encourage people that if that's the one thing you're worried about, I would focus on other aspects because if you've got the tools and you've got the passion for what you do, the money will flow and you will actually be more secure because the ball's really in your court. Now that may scare some people, but in my circumstances, I like that idea. That enthused me.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Yeah. And so it sounds like a lot of that, a lot of these things you learned after you made the decision. So when you were when you were in the midst of it, what what pieces did you actually go through to decide, yes, this is what I should be doing? Um, you know, did you was it the 401k or healthcare? Did you explore those things or or how I did.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

I was at least aware of I had known a few other independent consultants and I had been around them. And when I got to know them a little bit, they they would mention these offhand things. I didn't read any books about it because I found a lot of the books out there really didn't have that personal viewpoint that we're trying to get to on this podcast, the impact on the actual individual, and talk more about the technical aspects. But what I've what I did was kind of in reverse, there's like 12 questions that I found that you really need to ask yourself. And some of it is about this this feeling of true independence, understanding that there are things that you're gonna have to do on your own to make sure that your family is provided for. As I said, investments, there are investment opportunities for individuals like a CEP IRA, uh, single employer, a pension plan. But these are things that you need to learn about. You need to understand, do I have enough financial resources? Because I I knew one thing for sure. I'm not gonna take out a loan. I am not gonna take out a loan because if I don't know what I'm doing now in my contacts, that's just gonna burn through through money and everything.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

So how much how much time did you think you had? How much runaway did you you feel like you had in order to s see if this was gonna be successful for you?

SPEAKER_01 13:37

Well, I thought that a couple of years I had enough, I had enough finances built up for a couple of years. But the thing that astonished me was that uh once I got the word out, I had a client within a a couple of weeks. So again, I didn't put a lot of thought into it because of my own personal situation. I knew that the type of work I did even 14 years ago would be applicable to people because I fit. That's the other kind of question you need to ask yourself, uh, Jana, is how many different ways do I fit into an environment? And I found that as an independent consultant, I could fit in in multiple ways because sometimes a company will have the internal expertise, but that individual is so busy with day-to-day things that they need someone from the outside. Sometimes they don't have that internal expertise. So they're looking for that from the outside. And that also provides me an opportunity to do mentoring of the people that I work with internally, which I've done now for years. And one of the things that I thought I would miss about corporate world, I still get to do. I get to mentor actual staff members that I'm working with the clients. And the other way I can fit in is if they want to be in a situation where they have an outside objective opinion. So already there were three different ways that I could fit in. It wasn't just an isolated way. So those questions went through my head. But once I had made that decision, I was like, I'm gonna make this work. Now, in hindsight, looking back, I wish I had planned it out more, but everything worked out for the best. And now what I'm able to do is share those lessons because I, in a sense, I got lucky. I did think about these things, but I didn't have everything mapped out on paper in a roadmap. But over the past first 12 years, and when I got to the fifth year of in my my business, I felt like, okay, I've lasted 55 years now, and I'm making as much, if not more, as an independent consultant. I think, except for one year, every other year in my 14 years, I've made more than my highest paying job in the corporate. And I charge very reasonable rates.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

So when you were when you were looking at this though, did you bounce? I you mentioned you had other people you knew who had been in the consulting industry. So were you did you have advisors or people who you were asking, hey, what do you think? I'm thinking about doing this.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

No, not as I said in the past I had worked with some consultants and I had asked them some questions, but that had been quite some time ago. So I didn't have anyone immediately, I just knew that there were other people out there that were doing it. And I I just everything is timing. And if I had made this decision five years earlier than I did, I wouldn't have been ready, I think. I had accumulated the knowledge and I just had to redesign how that knowledge is going to be provided to independent cons uh as in an independent consultancy format. And there's a lot of other things you need to understand. You need to understand that while what you're doing is very important to you and you're getting paid to do that job, this is all often just one of many priorities that a company has. So you have to be patient in terms of getting the information you need. But having worked in the corporate world for 20 years, I already understood that. So it provided this great grounding. But to answer your question, no, I didn't have anyone specifically that I could go to. I just kicked around the idea, my wife had total confidence in me, perhaps more in me than I did. Um, she was fine with this. And other people would be taken aback by such a thing, but I really didn't view it as that that much of a risk. But I will tell you that once I got into, and this may be interesting to focus on for a moment, once I got into it for the first couple of years, I had experienced I experienced growing pains. At times I missed the corporate office, I miss the interaction. It's a I wasn't getting interaction with my clients, but it's a different kind of interaction than you get working in the corporate environment. And even though I was doing okay in my first couple of years, I kind of felt like I don't know if this is sustainable. Now I know it is sustainable. But again, it's a little bit of taking a leap of faith and building out that roadmap. And again, now what's great is I can share my lessons with others and put in just enough biographical information, only in the sense that I can show different different triggering points that there were along the way. But the important thing now is I feel like I've laid out a roadmap in this book that can really help people get over their fears of going it alone and how actually they're gonna feel more confident because they're gonna have more control as long as they have that passion for what they do. It always circles back to that. You gotta have a passion for what you do or you will not succeed as an independent consultant. I'm convinced of that.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

You um you had mentioned that you know you're sitting in a meeting and they were trying to decide what to call the project, and that's when you kind of knew maybe this isn't the place for me anymore. Do you know, was there a moment when you finally decided, yes, I'm going back to the States and yes, I'm going on my own? Do you remember when you finally made the concrete decision that that's what was going to happen? Maybe you put in your notice or or something?

SPEAKER_01 18:56

Yeah, I would kick it around. I had a lot of time by myself over there. So that means I had a lot of time to think in the evenings and, you know, walking the streets and thinking about this. And yeah, uh, I made a decision and I said, you know, I'll give you a month here. I was astonished because one of the great benefits there is if you work in the United States and you're subject to a bonus payment, um, you usually have to be with the company until that bonus is paid out. I would be leaving before that bonus was pay out paid out. And I had no intention of, I had mentioned earlier I was being treated as a local in terms of the local. What I meant by that was being treated as a local for labor employment laws. And so even though I was leaving a few months before the end of the year, I found out to my surprise that I would be getting my full bonus because that's the way the workers' council worked over there. So that was some extra money as a cushion, and it was a considerable sum of money. That was a little bit of an extra cushion to help make that situation happen. But basically I started after about because again, I was still working, I had worked for the company for about seven and a half years, and I was almost at I was actually over a year in Bonn and in Germany, and then I made this decision. Uh and then about I gave a month and then it was back to the United States. And it wasn't as big of a transition logistically, because we had never given up our home here. My wife still was was holding down the fort here, living here, so I was coming home to I didn't have to get a new house or a new job or anything like that. So the logistical part was at a minimum.

SPEAKER_00 20:29

And so did you how quickly did you were you able to then because you mentioned how quickly you got your first client after putting the word out. So but how quickly from when you landed to when you were putting the word out?

SPEAKER_01 20:41

How quickly? Well, it was interesting because the company I was had just left asked me to do some quote consulting work for them, which I did, but I almost felt like I was back working for them again. It just didn't have the same feeling as being an independent consultant, but it was good money. And so I did that almost immediately. But as far as a new client, once I got the word out, some people reached out to me. And it couldn't have been more than a couple of weeks. I would it might be more dramatic and more interesting to say that I went through this long dry period and I persevered. But I think in my own mind I was ready. And I'm by nature a fairly conservative person in my own humanity, I just in in terms of how I think about things, not necessarily politically, but a conservative in not the world's biggest risk taker. But I took two risks. One was going over there to take this job and into a situation where, as I said, I had to kind of act like a bachelor for over a year and just coming back here and there. And then right after that, making a bigger risk to come back, but to go out on my own. But it's just a matter of timing. I would have loved to have done this kind of thing when I was single in my twenties, but I didn't have the expertise. I didn't have the education, the training. So that kind of situation wouldn't have been offered to me. So sometimes you have to take Opportunities as they arise. And that opportunity for me, the good thing about it was that it then opened up my eyes to what could be my next destination, which I'm still living. That was the best part about it. It allowed me. The experience there allowed me. It wasn't like it was horrible. I was working with really great people, you know, very nice being over in Europe and everything like that. But the idea that it allowed me to then make this transition. And again, for 14 years I've been doing this and I'd like to continue it for as long as I can.

SPEAKER_00 22:36

Did you did you feel like your age then at all was a risk? I understand what you're saying about needing the expertise and those pieces, but did you feel like, wow, this is a big step because of where I am in my life?

SPEAKER_01 22:49

Oh, in terms of my age and things like that?

SPEAKER_00 22:52

Yeah, because we talk about how sometimes we take more risks when we're in our 20s because it you've got less at stake. But I'm just so I'm curious if that w was anything for you or it it wasn't.

SPEAKER_01 23:04

No, no, it it it it it really wasn't because I it just so happened that I was at the age then where I still had years ahead of me in my workforce, but enough years to realize that I could do it on my own. I wouldn't have had that mindset five years earlier, even if I hadn't been in Germany. I wouldn't have had that same mindset five years earlier. But I had just had my fill of this situation because my passion was not weakening for for what I love to do. It was just getting stronger and stronger. And I was feeling like as I was getting older, now into my 40s, that hey, I don't have all the time in the world. I should be doing what I love to do as much as I can, and not having it just for the sake of, I hate to put it down in these terms, but just for the for the sake of a paycheck. It's just a strange kind of odyssey, a strange journey where I I would have had tremendous fears five years earlier, but it just was the right timing. The timing was not right, maybe for me to go over there based on my personal situation and everything, but it was right in order to get me to the next step. So I always think of it as this stepping off, a triggering point that made the rest possible, and I'm so grateful for it.

SPEAKER_00 24:22

And so what would you say ultimately drove your decision? What what is the first principle that, you know, propelled you to go out on your own?

SPEAKER_01 24:33

Aaron Powell The need to feel like every day I am being challenged and I'm being productive. This is very strong in me. It has always been this. There is nothing we talk about all sorts of motivational programs, but to be able to get up every day and to have a purpose and a meaning. But let's face it, our work life is incredibly important because we spend so many hours at it. I know there are a lot of people dissatisfied with their jobs. And you could say in a way that I was dissatisfied with my job. I wasn't dissatisfied with certain aspects of it, but to me, one of the principles is I actually put it on my business card, which tells the whole story. It says, founded on passion, sustained by principle. And there are different principles that I operate on that I saw, because we use consultants, independent consultants, sometimes when I was in the corporate world. And I saw some of the kind of things they did. It wasn't criminal or anything like that. But it's like I, if I was an independent consultant, I used to think I would not do that. I would not, you know, nickel and dime my clients and or I wouldn't regurgitate what we already kind of knew this should be. There was different things about what some consulting firms did, the large consultant firms. And I also thought that as an independent, I could bring not only the enthusiasm, but I could also bring uh uh a combination of of enthusiasm and personal customization to what I uh to what I do. In other words, I'm not gonna provide just the same type of solution for the specific business. I'm gonna be able to craft something that's customized that really fits the business model and it fits the work culture. So one of the things that I had to learn more of is how to be a better listener to get at those kind of things, to understand those things. So I couldn't provide a customized solution and be a one-stop. You're just dealing with me. Those were all things that benefited my independent consulting service.

SPEAKER_00 26:29

I think you said uh a drive for purposeful work and being productive. Do you think you were born that way, for lack of a better term, or was there something that in your background that kind of propelled that character trait in you?

SPEAKER_01 26:46

Uh yeah, I've I I've always kind of been very intense about this. I I want to make a contribution. And I think I've always been like that. If I'm not engaged in everything, I can just kind of fall by the wayside. And uh I found after a certain age that I really, really need to, it's it's a really strong part of my identity. Now, everybody is different. Other people, God bless them, if they can balance things, things more. It's not that I don't have a private life or a personal life. Of course I do. But I have a very strong, I I think I got it from my dad. He was in a different occupation, but he was he says, I may not be the brightest bulb in the world, but man, I'm gonna try my dandest. And he loved what he did. He was an airline pilot and he absolutely loved what I did. Can you imagine? He had his airplane license before he had his driver's license. Oh wow. Okay. He soloed at age 16. And I think he instilled in me this feeling that, you know, find something that you love to do, and then just give it your absolute complete effort. And it matters to me a lot about doing a good job and a thorough job. And again, to have that productivity in my life, it's it's very important. So I think it's been with me a long time, influenced by family.

SPEAKER_00 28:06

Do you and that was kind of why I was asking is, you know, maybe not everybody has the same drivers, but it sounds like what really helps you is having a strong understanding of who you were and what made you, what motivated you and kind of framed your, I guess, worldview. So do you think that exercise is important for people?

SPEAKER_01 28:28

Yes, absolutely. Also, it it's an opportunity for, if I can go off on a just a little bit of a tinge here, opportunity for a rebirth. Because although I had a master's degree and I had all these years of experience, I wasn't technically certified as a compensation professional. I had learned everything that I needed to learn through experience. But the first thing I did, you asked me earlier about, you know, those early weeks and months. One of the things that I did, I didn't have to do this. In fact, a couple of clients that knew me says, You don't need to do that, you know, and everything. But I went out and literally became certified in my area of expertise. There was a program, a series of exams, and I took them all, you know, looked through the books, took them all, and passed them all and got my certification as a way to help re-legit make myself feel legitimate in a in a new way because I was being an independent consultant, not just working for the corporation, but applying my expertise for a lot of different clients. So I wanted them to know that by the way, even though it's not everything, I actually am certified also in all these examinations for all the different areas that I might be helping you with. Now that's not a substitute for practical experience, but it was an opportunity. So when you asked me one of the things that I do, that's another thing that I did. I got back because I felt like some of my skills were getting a little rusty because I was spending so much time in administrative and people leadership functions. So I said, well, there are probably some new things that I can learn about. And so getting that certification was a great feeling because it kind of validated me that, hey, I do know what I'm doing and I didn't need to do this. It's not an absolute requirement. Like, you know, you have to, if you're an accounting, you have to be a CPA in some circumstances and everything. But it was a it was a way to certify myself and to also link myself to an accreditation like Better Business Bureau, I felt was very important because I'm gonna stand behind everything I do. I really it seems a little old-fashioned, Better Business Bureau, but I really it's my name on this company, and I'm gonna be behind everything I do, and I've never had an issue.

SPEAKER_00 30:32

And so obviously you made the leap. You said you've been doing this for 14 years, it's it's gone well, but did anything not go as planned at the beginning?

SPEAKER_01 30:42

It was well, as I said, I had some I had I had some growing pains. And there were also over the I had to learn a different kind of patience because there would the one thing about being an independent is there are ebbs and flows. And there were periods where the work would get very dried up and I would have some consistent clients that would stay with me for some time. That's the interesting thing about my business, is it's not just in and out, quick client, do the project, then some clients stay with me for years. So there were times where I had to rely on just those clients because I wasn't getting new clients in. And it was only in the past couple of years that I learned that I had always been relying on my business primarily through word of mouth people that knew me, and I knew so many people. But about a couple of years ago, that finally started to dry up because some of them were retiring. So I had to go out and get new clients, and I had to start doing things like podcasts and advertising and my website, making sure my website was, and so that required me to spend more time in marketing. So I think one of the big things, the challenges were that you have to reinvent yourself even within this occupation and redirect your resources in different ways to keep the business flowing, then. So there were times, and I write about this in the book too, there were, and how you know what it comes back to, uh, Janna? It comes back to this idea that if I find myself sitting there feeling sorry for myself, oh, I haven't had a new client in a while, I must be losing my touch and everything like that. I only dwell on that for a little while, and then how I get out of it, out of the doldrums, is to say, I need to be productive. So how do I do that when I don't have clients in? There's a world of things I can do to market myself. There are podcasts to appear on, there are books to write, there are, there are uh blogs to write, and all of this is on my website. And to just be productive, and when you do that, the energy starts flowing, you give off a certain kind of vibe. And with the passage of time, things start to come back. So it's a cyclical thing, and this is what this is a great example of why feeling productive, being productive every day is so important to me. Uh it keeps the blues away and it keeps you focused and with a the proper mindset to get those new clients.

SPEAKER_00 33:08

So if somebody was, and this is going to be a hard question, just gonna prepare you for this, because you're gonna want to give more than one answer. But if somebody was thinking about going, you know, making the leap and changing to be an independent consultant, what's one question they should ask themselves before deciding?

SPEAKER_01 33:26

I think the most important as you as I said earlier, and I will I will nail it down to one question, but I mentioned that there are 12 different questions. Some of them are psychological to see if you're cut out for the independent consultant life, because really you're gonna be now the personal and the business world is gonna merge together as one individual. And that may seem kind of foreign to some people. I think they need to reach out and to get resources such are that are offered out there that can help them understand this connection, that it's not like in the corporate world where you can leave everything at the end of the day, even though poor people work very hard. They have the separation. They go home and everything. And it's different when you're I mean, I touch work seven days a week, but it's okay because I love what I do. That's the biggest do you you have to have an honest conversation with yourself. The one question is do you want to become a consultant because this just happens to be what you do for a living, or do you really love it? And if you don't really love it, then you shouldn't be an independent consultant because it will come through. But you can move mountains when you're enthusiastic. You really love what you do. That's the biggest, the hardest question. You really have to think about that. Sometimes I see people in the sports world, for example, athletes, and I can I can just tell they would deny this. But I I can see the ones that really love what they're doing and the other ones that are doing it because they're very good at it. Maybe they like it, but uh by the decisions that they make and how they talk about it, I can see that they don't really love it. It's just that they happen to be gifted and they develop this talent, but they don't really love it as much as some of these other people. You can just see the difference, and I think that's the edge that you need to be successful as an independent consultant. It's a hard question to ask yourself, and you shouldn't just think about it for a moment and then toss it to the side. Because there are gonna be times we've talked about them in this podcast a little bit about the dry spells, the times when you're not the number one priority, when the times that you have to make all the decisions by yourself, all of these different things that you are going to encounter as an independent consultant. But if you love what you do, again, it's gonna make all those problems minimized. All those issues are gonna be minimized. And so that's why it is so crucial to spend the time thinking about if I want to do this because I I know how to do it and I'm good at it, or is it that I love what I do and I'm good at it.

SPEAKER_00 36:00

Yeah, it actually reminds me of the Venn diagram, and it's an exercise I went through before I exited the corporate world. It's you know, what am I good at? What do I love doing and what can I get paid for? And my answer was get shit done.

SPEAKER_01 36:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:15

I like to get shit done, I'm good at getting it done, and people will pay me to do that.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

Yeah. Yeah. And um and it just shows up in it just shows up in the work. Um I mean, the fact that you you have uh a podcast and you have different guests on it and everything, you have to be very organized, very detailed, think through what you want to get out of the people that I'm not trying to tell you your business, you know what it is that is required. But it's a skill, and not everybody can do it. And to do it well, you really need to say that there is a market for this. I really like doing this, I'm good at it, and that comes through. Because you're ultimately you're selling yourself. You're not selling a product or a service as an independent consultant. You are selling yourself.

SPEAKER_00 37:03

Yeah, yeah. It's a definitely a different mindset. Well, well, Scott, we've covered a lot of ground here, but what's one thing you'd want to keep top of mind for our listeners today?

SPEAKER_01 37:12

I would like to, as this forum has provided, I'd like to reach out to those people that have had their time in the corporate world who have thought about this idea of going out on their own, but there is something that is pushing it to the back. It's not quite as attractive. And I'd like to reach some of those people and I'd like to tell them that if you're a little bit frightened about the unknown, that there are roadmaps out there. I I have one of them that's a roadmap because it's it's the defragmented consultant, which is about when you think about defragmentation in a computer, it's to make you run more efficiently. And this book, not only part of the book is to try and get coax other people like myself who have the experience to go out on their own and experience the joy of being an independent consultant, despite all the struggles that you will encounter along the way. The joy, the true joy of being an independent consultant in a whatever expertise is yours. This book I wrote is not about being a compensation analyst. It's about being an independent consultant. So it can apply to those different areas. And then the second part of the book is really then providing that roadmap to help you make that decision that this would be the right move for me and what the benefits and the rewards could be, as well as the risks, which we've talked about a bit in this podcast. Um, to help hopefully get a little bit closer to self-actualization. And I I think that's what a lot of us are looking for. Just getting a little bit closer to self-actualization. So that's what I would I would like to leave. I I would hope that some people would find a little bit of inspiration from this podcast and to to reach out if anybody wants some advice. I'm here to give it to them. In addition to regular advice of being a comp analyst for clients, I do like to talk to people also about how how it could work for them.

SPEAKER_00 39:06

Yeah. So how can how can folks find your book or learn more about what you do?

SPEAKER_01 39:10

I have a website. It's called uh HRcompensation Consulting.com. Hopefully, you'll put that in the pages of the website. That has everything from the very basics, like what is a compensation consultant, to blogs about this area of work. It has media of different podcasts that I've been on talking about a variety of compensation topics. This podcast was great because it wasn't so much about compensation, it was more about the personal and the professional merging. But that has a lot of information that has client testimonials, talks about the things I do. It also has a link to my book, The Defragmented Consultant, which is available on Amazon in all versions, including the uh e-copy book. And if you're an Amazon, if you're a Kindle Unlimited member, you can read it for free. But it's we got paperback and hardcover, and it's been out since December. It's doing good. And um that's the way, and LinkedIn, of course, LinkedIn, I'm on LinkedIn. It's my profile page is a great way to reach me. So again, hopefully this will provide an opportunity to list those resources.

SPEAKER_00 40:14

Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you so much for taking time out to join our show today.

SPEAKER_01 40:19

Well, thank you, Jen. It's been a pleasure.

SPEAKER_00 40:20

Yeah. And to our audience, make the decision, act on it, be accountable, and until next time, stay unstoppable.