If you know corporate isn’t for you but you can’t see a clean exit, this episode is your roadmap. Brett sits down with Sam Lee (Indie Collective) to break down how experienced professionals can build a “portfolio career” — consulting, coaching, fractional work, and productized services — without quitting their full-time job first. Sam shares the simple frameworks that helped him build $1M+ in annual revenue through independent work for over a decade, and he explains why most people get stuck trading time for money. You’ll walk away with a practical way to tell your story, activate your network, and design an exit strategy with less risk.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why the “side hustle first” approach builds confidence and reduces risk

• The simple sales story that unlocks referrals: Client → Problem → Outcome

• How to activate your network without sounding awkward or salesy

• Why “fractional” isn’t always the fastest path to revenue — and what is

• The real goal: stop trading time for money and start selling outcomes

• Sam’s 3-part productization path:

1. Niche down to best-fit clients

2. Solve painkiller problems (not vitamins)

3. Build a portfolio of offers, including productized work

• The two killers of the independent path: no early wins + isolation

• Why productizing your expertise helps both client work and job searches

Key quotes / soundbites:

• “The most pernicious trade independent builders make is trading time for money.”

• “Your sales story is three things: who you serve, their problem, and the outcome.”

• “Nobody is hiring a generalist right now. They want been-there-done-that experts.”

• “Trial and error at this stage of your career is expensive.”

Resources mentioned:

• Indie Collective: IndieCollective.co

Hey Sam, welcome to the Corporate Escapee Podcast.

Thanks for having me, Brad.

Now my absolute pleasure. And again, you're one of these guests that I needed to find about five years ago when I was escaping corporate, you probably would have saved me a lot of time, money, all that, good stuff, but, better late than never. But, welcome to the podcast and you, well, why you give the audience a little bit of your background. I do want to touch on your, little bit of your escapee journey. And then we're going to talk mostly about what you're focused on now.

Amazing. Amazing. Well, it's great to be here on the podcast. And honestly, I wish we had connected a couple years ago, but here we are. We share so many great friends in common at this point. A little bit of my background. So Sam Lee, as you said, I've been in the world of work for 20 plus years now. like so many that listen to this podcast, I'd say mine has been a non-linear journey. I started my career in finance.

quickly got the heck out of that because frankly it burned me out. Moved into consumer internet, did two turnarounds, AOL, you might have heard of them, long ago. Another company that had online. And then after kind of getting bored with those big, slow moving companies, shifted into the fast moving world of startups and have spent the last dozen years largely in commercial leadership roles, sales and marketing roles, and high growth startups. Quite a few which you probably would recognize by name.

Um, so mine has been a nonlinear journey of worked with big public companies, turnarounds, high growth private companies. And about a dozen years ago, I started doing independent work, uh, a side hustle actually. Um, and as somebody who's a big advocate for building portfolio career, I'm a believer that you don't have to pick one or the other. You don't have to necessarily escape, but I do encourage any experienced professional to develop the toolkit so they can escape.

Okay.

And also so they can start to do things on the side that complement the full-time work and create optionality in the immediate and the medium and long-term because you might need to escape or frankly, you might choose to escape. So I started as a side hustle a dozen years ago. And I'll say over the last dozen years, thanks to side hustling and doing the consulting, coaching and fractional full-time, there's not been a year I haven't made a million dollars or more in revenue through a portfolio of work.

Yeah.

Right? So mine is a portfolio and the work that I started to do on myself a dozen years ago, and we can talk about what that work is, has helped me to build that portfolio and keep it interesting, keep it financially rewarding, keep it flexible, because that's one of my top priorities is not having all eggs in one basket and allowing myself personally to have the flexibility and freedom to live in different places and do different things and keep it interesting.

That's a little bit.

Yeah, that's awesome. And I think the listener's ears perked up when they heard the million dollar. I tell people, I'm like, it's more than possible, right? I mean, it absolutely is. And people just refuse to, to believe that. So the more folks I bring on that share stories, it just makes sense. if you don't mind, I'm super curious because I did not start the side hustle or even have a plan when corporate quit on me. And that's, I think it's the reality for a lot of people that's coming here sooner on later.

is I would have done that. So maybe if you wouldn't mind sharing a little bit about one, why did you think you needed to start a side hustle? Because you had some pretty high powered jobs. So it's not like you were bored at the office and needed to do it. how one, how did you start down that process? And then two, how did you do it? How did you manage your time once you when you were doing that?

Yeah, absolutely. So I'll say when I started side hustling a dozen years ago, I was at one of those public companies. I was in a general management capacity and I was pretty darn bored. So I had been in the seat for a while. I knew what I was doing. It felt like a bit of autopilot. There was some interesting aspects and but candidly I was bored and I had some time on my hands, right, to use. it was at that point that I first started to just dabble.

Okay.

in advising, investing, and also doing some lightweight consulting. And as I was starting to get out into the world and do the work, I quickly did something important, which I encourage others to do. I looked to my network and I said, who do I know that's already doing this work? Who can be the...

you know, far ahead mentors, if you will, to guide me on what those right next steps were. Because frankly, at that point, 12 years ago, this was less common, right? There wasn't a corporate escapee podcast, right? There wasn't playbooks that had been documented. you know, there weren't programs like Indie Collective to teach you how to do this, but there certainly were mentors in our networks, right? So I looked for those mentors and started to assemble a loose set of mentors for myself, people that...

for sure.

were certainly exceptional at what they did professionally, but more importantly had built an independent practice and could coach me on the things I needed to know to set myself up for success as an independent business owner, which is different than being a W2 or working in excellent companies. So it was both getting out there and just starting to do the work I knew how to do for clients that were interesting to me. And also alongside that,

seeking out the mentors who could teach me how to take the expertise that I had to offer and build a business around it. And that is super important, right? I think even for those who are early on their journey, just knowing how to do the work you know and love, yet while it is the most important ingredient to building a great business, it's not the only ingredient. And the other accelerator ingredients, the Playbooks, mentors, community tools, the things that will build the business around your expertise,

Yeah.

Yeah.

or actually the 20 % that unlocks so much more income impact and flexibility in what's possible for you. So those are the things I started doing a dozen years ago. I started dabbling and consulting and advising, and then I started seeking out the resources.

Got it. And if you don't mind me asking too, because again, I know I'm going to get the question is when you thought about that, did you reach into your network to say, Hey, does anybody need help with X, Y, and Z? Cause that's where I find people really get stuck. Cause they don't know how to have. Yeah, I do. I know I've been doing this type of work for 20 years. I know I can do this for smart companies, but how do I have that first conversation or

Is it right? If do I have to have all my duck? Cause that's the other thing I find with people when I, if they're down the path a little bit, they want the perfect website, the perfect sales pitch, the perfect offering and everything else. I'm like, man, no, just have the conversations and you can solve the problem figured out. But I'm curious, how did you, I'm sure there was some trial and error and unlocking it, but you know, how did, how did some of those early conversations go as you were starting to test the side hustle just to, give people a, ah, that makes sense.

Yeah, absolutely. I'd say one of the first, easiest, and also most important things for those who are early on their journey to do is to get clear on your sales storytelling. What is the lightweight storytelling that is authentic, that is natural, that will allow you to communicate three things to the right people in your network?

The three things you need to communicate in your sales stories are one, who is it that you serve? Who is your ideal client? Second, what are the painful problems that they experience? The ones that you are an expert and can help them solve. And then third, what are the outstanding outcomes that you help those clients to achieve?

once they solve those painful problems. Those three things, the clients, the problems and the outcomes are the three things that when married and a story will allow you to recalibrate those important people in your network. Those people that probably know those clients that will hear from those clients about their problems who can then refer you. you're experiencing that problem, said client. Like let me introduce you to Brett. He is your go-to expert, right? So when I knew that I wanted to start

Yeah.

building a bit of a pipeline. And I wasn't looking for an abundance of work. I was looking for a handful of projects because I was working full-time, right? And I was dabbling in this and it was more out of curiosity and for fun at the time to frankly round out my full-time portfolio. When I was looking to that, I got clear on who I wanted to serve, those ideal clients, what problems I felt I could solve given the toolkit I had built to that point in career and the outcomes that I...

was confident I could help them achieve. And then I started picking out of my network, the people I wanted to recalibrate. Who are the people that I want to catch up with? They might be people I haven't talked to in a year, or maybe it's 10 years since we had that last great moment together in career or in community. And, you know, have a catch up, a 30 minute zoom or, you know, in person chat at the time to just talk life and times, right? Like make it authentic, make it natural, connect on a level because that's 80 % of it. And then

Yeah.

When they ask, what are you up to these days? Boom, sales story. Here's who I'm looking to work with because I love solving this problem. I've been there, done that. And here are the great outcomes that I help people to achieve. And that plants the seeds with the right people on where you're moving so that they can be authentically enlisted to help you build that pipeline of those best fit clients, those people that you want to serve. So that's where I started. I just got clear on where I was moving.

And I started lining up conversations with the right people in my network. I call it building your list of 200. That's a bigger concept, but picking out the right people to recalibrate and then staying in touch with those people. Right. And that's where I got my early leads through direct referrals. And you know, from there, you can, there's all sorts of top of funnel and, and sales strategies that we teach, yeah, but that's a very light one, lightweight one, but it starts with your sales storytelling.

tactics. Yeah.

Yeah, that's good. And one more tactical question on this one is, did you find pushback from the early clients you're working with on the side? Because you did have full time. And I tell people most small businesses, and again, I don't know who you were working with, they can be flexible, right? If you can help them, and they're going to be okay with understanding where you're at. So just curious from your perspective, you know, how you found working with those clients while you had a full time job, because that I guarantee you that's a blocker.

artificial blocker for many, they're using it. So how do we overcome that?

Yep. Yep. I'll say having, you know, had nearly a thousand people graduate from Indie Collective's programs at this point, people who have launched and grown their own consulting, coaching and fractional practices. I'll say the number one challenge and frankly, the most pernicious trade that most independent business builders make is just trading time for money. It's just trading time for money. So, you know, I don't doubt that if you are just getting started on this independent path,

You'll get questions about how much time are you dedicating to me? And what you wanna do as you start to walk this path is move away from trading your time for money to trading results for money. And from that get go, when you do your sales storytelling, you're not talking about hours or even what you do. That's what we left out of the sales storytelling. What were the three things? It was one, who is the client? Two, what is their problem?

Three, what are the outcomes? are the results you deliver? Nowhere in the sales storytelling did I even talk about, and will you even talk about, here is my process. Here is the time we will spend, right? People actually shouldn't care about the time. They will eventually wanna know the process before they hire you, because they wanna know that you've been there and done that and have a reliable approach to get them to the outcomes they desire and deserve, but time should not be part of the calculus, right?

So that's important. And that's a big thing we teach in Indie Collective. It's what are those three things, clients, problems, and outcomes? Certainly, what is the process for getting you to those outcomes, but kind of divorcing you from this trade of time for money? Because we don't want to be capping our potential, our potential income impact and flexibility based on a 40-hour, a 50-hour, or whatever hour work week, 25-hour work week, if that's what you care to do.

Great.

So yeah, you'll get the question, but the question is how do you divorce yourself from time and instead focus on outcomes? And frankly, as you do this work more and more, build process systems and tools, things that allow you to build once and then sell and deliver again and again. Things that allow you as you productize your work to grow your income and impact while divorcing you from that time for money trade.

Yeah. And again, I was going to save this towards the end when after we talked about Indie Collective, but I think now is a good time because I think you and I have a shared passion for productizing your service and your expertise and the problem just because it creates so much more flexibility. And again, you can start to stack these smaller wins. You can go after the bigger services. So, so maybe now I would love to get your perspective on that. Cause again, I would be curious to hear from your community. A lot of my folks, I mean, they've heard about fractional. They want to do fractional.

I'm not saying don't do fractional but that may not be your fastest path to revenue because a business owner may not know what fractional is and if you can create a service or productize what you do it's gonna be a much Easier sell relatively speaking to the business owner. And so anyway, I don't lead you to to far my thoughts I really want to hear your thoughts on this because I know you've been speaking passionately about it

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So again, I try to define productization very simply, because it means different things to different people in different domains. But when it comes to independent consulting, coaching and fractional work, I say productization, simply put, is about divorcing you from this trade of time for money. Because when you live in this trade, you are just capping your potential, your potential income impact and flexibility to the hours that you can possibly spend. And that's not a trade.

that an experienced professional needs to make or should be making if they want to maximize their potential at this stage of career in life. In order to productize, you need to walk a deliberate path. And I'll say, I bet most of your listeners will say, huh, this stuff sounds pretty simple. And it's designed to be, right? It's not designed to be overly complex. Anybody that has been working out there in the world of work, in some sort of a business or even a nonprofit capacity is probably going to say, okay, this stuff makes sense. And maybe you've done this.

for the company I work for or for a client I work for. I'm already doing this independent work. But the question I ask is, have you done this for yourself? Have you productized yourself? And if you haven't, the follow-on question is, are you just trading time for money? And are you satisfied with the results you're getting from that? So these are the questions we need to honestly ask ourselves. Are we making ourselves the client? And if we haven't made ourselves the client and done this important work, are we satisfied with our results heretofore?

So how do you productize? It's a threefold path that you're gonna deliberately walk. And we happen to walk people through this in Indie Collective. And you and I know we're gonna do a workshop for you listeners on this, which I'm excited to co-host with you. But productization starts with getting super clear on who your best fit clients are. Those clients for whom you can show up as an expert, create outsize value and really enjoy doing the work.

because who needs to be doing a lot of work for people we don't care about? Right? So you first got to niche down. You got to get clear diagnostically on who those best fit clients are for you because frankly, nobody in this economic environment is hiring a generalist. Right? They want been there, done that experts. People who understand them and their organizations, people who have deeply experienced their problems, people with proven solutions.

That's why we got out of corporate.

to get them to the other side of the great outcomes they desire and deserve. So no one's trying to hire a generalist today. People are trying to hire experts. And when I started doing this work a dozen years ago, having been in finance and internet companies, public and private, I could have shown up as a generalist for sure, right? With my tapestry of experiences, but I didn't, right? I got clear early about who I wanted to serve, what problems they faced, and therefore what solutions I could offer that would...

cut through the noise, get to a sale, deliver the best outcomes. So step one is figuring out who you want to serve, right? And you want to do it thoughtfully, right? We use diagnostics to help you to think big and then focus on the right clients for you. That's step one. Step two, once you're clear on who you want to serve, you then need to diagnostically think about which are the problems, the painkiller problems that those clients need solved. And when I say painkiller problems, I sometimes get a visceral reaction from people. So I say to them,

Yep.

Listen, it's not about conjuring up negative emotion when I say painkiller, it's not, but it's about underscoring this important fact that in this economic environment, nobody is picking up the phone, answering the call, signing the contract or paying for value if you are living in a nice to solve or vitamin problem space, right? You're not gonna have a sustainable pipeline or a business if that's the type of problem you are solving. But if you are an expert who solves a painkiller problem,

right, a top one or two problem for your client, they're gonna take the call. They're gonna sign the contract. They will happily pay for the value and refer you to 10 localite clients because you rise to that occasion and you solve that level of problem for them as an expert. So that's the second step. You need to make sure once you're clear on who you wanna serve that you are hypothesizing around and validating whether or not you as an expert are solving your client's most painful problems because if you are, you will always

have a steady pipeline, they'll always be delivering valuable work, you'll be able to charge for that. So that's the second key step. And we have diagnostics again that we run on each of these things to move people through a process. And the third and final step is once you're clear on your clients and you're clear on their most acute, painful problems, you then wanna think about what is that portfolio of work that I can do that's gonna help them to get to the great outcomes that they desire and deserve? And...

I'll say, most of our indie collective members are mid and late career professionals. So they're experienced folks who don't want to become factories, right? They're not here to be widget makers or stamp out cookie cutter deliverables every single time, right? They want to build balanced portfolios, things that allow them to do some bespoke, creative, interesting projects, as well as some more cookie cutter things. So those can live inside of your portfolio, but you want to make sure everything is strategic, right? It is solving.

Yes.

a problem for a specific client and it's going to get them great outcomes. So we help people to design the right portfolio and ideally identify one, two, or even three things that they can productize. And all that means is build once so that you can sell and deliver again and again, because it's tapping into for a specific audience, a client, a painkiller problem, and has a defined approach to get the great outcomes. So that's the three full path. It's not that complicated.

Yeah.

you

Yeah.

but it's a deliberate path and you have to walk it generally with the right playbook, the right accountability, the right sounding board to make sure you're getting to your best outcomes and doing the work for yourself.

Yeah, no, 100 % on board. And again, this goes back to where if I would have met you six years ago, it would have been helpful because I did the exact opposite, right? When I left corporate, I did solo consulting at first and I was only looking for the six figure deals. Then this after I'm like, I really don't want to do the consulting that just wasn't giving me the energy. I moved into fractional leadership again, looking just for the six figure deals. Then after the course of stumbling into a couple of different opportunities, I then figured out how to monetize that corporate experience 10 different

ways, right? So I did the reverse. You're teaching it upfront, which would have made a hell of a lot more sense as I was going through the process. But yeah, no, I 100 % agree. And the other thing I would love to get your perspective on this is, well, I'm in a uni I have a unique skill set. like, I've yet to come across and like said, the folks I'm working with are not in the thousands yet, but in the hundreds. And I've yet to come across somebody that we can't find that niche down expertise and apply so but I would you've got a much larger sample set.

Can you talk a little bit about the like they get sales marketing finance you can niche and everybody needs that but Have you found anything you haven't been able to niche down yet?

Um, so we, I'll say we just graduated our fall cohort. This is now 2026. We just graduated the fall cohort, um, you know, from 2025 and we had 95 people in the cohort from 20 different disciplinary backgrounds, 20 different disciplinary backgrounds. So every discipline you just mentioned, every facet of professional services, technology, digital, um, for-profit and nonprofit. Right? Like that's the, that is the dynamism of a typical cohort and you know,

with 650 plus graduates of our intensive programs, they span 20 different discipline backgrounds. So I've yet to see a discipline where you can't do this work. And I'll say once people get past this limiting belief that by focusing, they are closing doors, once they get past this limiting belief, because psychology is 80 % of business and life, and you just lean into this threefold path, you will find the gold lying in plain sight.

Yes.

Right? And it's generally not your Rikas that are like, I never would have thought about this. It's like, wait, how didn't I already take this more focused path? Right? And it becomes a very natural thing. Because once you do this work, you are clear on the clients, clear on their problems and clear on the solutions that you can reliably deliver. You can start showing up like an expert in all aspects of your business and life. And those are the people that people want to speak to, connect with, refer to, trust and hire.

You can show up like that on your website, on your LinkedIn, in your networking conversations. You can show up like that in sales. You can show up like that in every aspect of what you do. And you create a lot of value when you do that. You attract the right people when you do that. So you're in fact not closing any doors. You're just attracting more of what you want in methodical ways. And you're creating more value for you and those people you connect with in deliberate ways. But that limiting belief of, if I close a door.

Yeah.

What if it's like, no, no, no, don't worry about that. Like you're going to open the right doors and those are the ones that will create the most value for you and the right clients you should be serving.

Yeah. And just be open-minded because again, you're so right. And that's one of the number one things I have to overcome with new escapees is I have to have this offering and do it this way. I'm like, no, trust me. There's, there's, it doesn't seem natural because corporate forces you. This is your job description. This is responsibility. This is what you do. It doesn't work like that. You can force it you may find the right companies, but yeah, you're right. It's such a psychological barrier. Then once people over, and it, don't know, I find it's like 18 months to two years is when

Yes.

people really get that it was for me. The light bulb goes off and you're like, I get this. This isn't hard. I've just been working way too hard instead of smarter. And all of a sudden it starts to unlock the path for folks. So no, think you said that really well. All right. So now I want to go, you've, started indie collective six years ago, five years ago, six years ago now.

Yeah, approaching six years. Yeah.

So what, I'm curious, like I had the origin story for the Corporate Escapee, but how did you head down that path? And kind of curious what you've learned over six years of doing this. Cause I'm guessing the way it started and the help you were providing to what you're doing today, maybe not dramatically different, but you've probably learned a lot along the way. So I just threw a lot at you there, but maybe start us back at the origin of it. And let's kind of talk through the kind of what you've learned through that process.

first.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. So I'll start with our name, Indie Collective, which is very much tied to the origin story of why Indie Collective was born and how it's evolved over time. But Indie Collective is the marriage of two words, independence and collective. I truly believe having walked this path for a dozen years that this path of independent work, whether it's your full-time, your part-time, or it's

you know, threads through your experience at different points in time is a powerful path to be walking. Because once you're clear on who you serve, what problems you solve and the value you create, you can create so much more value in the world for you and for those you serve. So I believe independence and getting clear on how you do your independence well is such a powerful path financially and also personally. Independence. Second word is collective. I know an experience from the early days of doing this work myself and over the last dozen years of doing it,

and expanded ways that independence is done better, not in isolation, but when you're in a collective, right? At what point, and I'll ask you this question, and I'm sure I'd love for your listeners to think about this question for themselves. At what point in your career to this point have you done your most exceptional, exciting, rewarding work in isolation, right? Like at what point? And the answer is never, right? Like we've always done our best work and finally found the most fulfillment in the work.

Right,

when we've been surrounded by the right people. And those people probably have included at points, far ahead mentors, people who could lend a hand, right? Whether it was deeply lending a hand or even giving you some aha that like moved you in the right direction. But also being surrounded by peers who were near peers, right? People to your left and right, people who are at a similar stage, but with complimentary skill sets, points of view, who could be in sounding board, accountability, partnership, and build business with you, right? Cause it can be a lonely path if you are truly independent in isolation. So,

Indie Collective, right, is the marriage of independence. This is a powerful path with Collective. We do our best work, not in isolation, but in a collective. And from the inception of the program, it's been about education, making sure people have the right playbooks and mentors to get on this path and get reliable, great outcomes, because our members do frequently triple, double or even triple incomes, right? Like that is not uncommon. I wasn't making...

you know, a million dollars a year in corporate all the time, right? But I do consistently make that through a portfolio of work. So that's one piece, playbooks and education and mentoring. And the other piece is community, right? We need to have the right community alongside us because doing this work, even if you have the right playbooks and mentors can be isolating. And we want to make sure you've got peers to collaborate with, be in sounding board with, find accountability alongside, and also do biz dev alongside.

So those are the things that we do. It's about playbooks, mentoring, coaching, and community to get you on your fastest, most reliable path to the outcomes that you deserve at this stage of your career in life. The first cohort we did now six years ago was a group of 30 friends. So I didn't start this as a modern MBA style program. It was eight weeks of learning, mentoring, accountability for a group of friends that I did for free.

because I wanted to bring a group of people together that I wanted to be learning and growing and building alongside. And when a second and a third cohort were in demand, and frankly, I needed to invest in a team to help me to scale this, that's when it turned into a paid program. we've now had many hundreds of people go through it as a paid program. We've got all sorts of amazing free programming that we do.

and we partner with great podcasts and organizations like yours to make sure we get the right resources in the right people's hands. So this year we hope to serve through free programs, 20,000 people. So I'll say it's evolved over time. I'll leave it there and feel free to...

Yeah, no, I mean, it makes sense. And it's funny because we, when I came up with the escapee collective, it had known you, I didn't know about the collective, but because that was one of the things when I left corporate, I went solo and didn't tell anybody. It was like the biggest in hindsight, like, God, I'm an idiot. And it just, what I did didn't make sense. Right. And I didn't want people to feel that isolation because it can be super lonely. introverts, extroverts, it doesn't matter. It's having that. And again, one of the, I totally offline with.

think that the switches we've made to the collective for this year is to move more segment based. So people are in the kind of the same either a little ahead, a little behind, but have a shared perspective of everything right now versus everybody all jumbled, which there's value in having that. But so I think having that peer group of somebody you can talk to share with and get you get to choose, right? Unlike your coworkers where sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but you don't get it to pick. And I 100 % agree with

the human aspect of this is so important and people do like the independent work, which I do, but I a hell of a lot more energy.

from working with people in the community than doing any of my project solo. So yeah, no, that's fantastic. And again, I think it shows when you started side hustle, turned that into full, then you're like, I'm gonna start a, I love that term, the modern day MBA program for folks looking to build this. And...

That's the path that's out there for folks. I think we're still so early in this. And again, depending on what your goal is, if you do want to make a million dollars, the path is absolutely there. You only want to make 50K, right? That's all you need. Even easier, right? It's not going to take you as much time to do that, but corporate has just brainwashed us so badly that we just don't think or can imagine these things are possible.

Cause when I started, I thought it was going to be all playbooks and tactics and strategies. But what I found was the psychological hurdle was the biggest first step in people had to get comfortable being uncomfortable. And then like I said, over time, I haven't found the magic pill to make take action happen sooner yet. If I do, I'll let you know. But, again, if the more friction we can take out of the process and the more folks, you know, I can bring on the program like you that have been doing this for awhile and helping.

people get to where they want to get. My mission is get as many people out of corporate as possible. Right. It's so awesome. All right. So I know we're, running a little tight on time and I want to be respectful of your time. Is there anything we didn't cover? Uh, I you did a really nice job of summarizing it, but is there anything that we think the audience and again, remember most of these folks are probably still in corporate at the moment. So any other advice, things that we didn't talk about?

Yeah, 100%.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I'd say, know, for those who are listening, who are still in corporate and who are, you know, exploring this idea of going independent, I'd make sure, you know, to the extent you can, that you make plans. And like I did, frankly, you know, start doing this work on the side and assembling, you know, your toolkit before you pull the record, if you can.

Because then you can start on this path with great confidence and frankly, you know, build on that momentum, you know, before you even go full time. You know, the number one killers I've found of people staying on this path are one, you know, not getting enough quote unquote points on the board early. So they feel psychologically defeated and they feel like, gosh, I don't know how to do this. I must go back to corporate.

you know, reason two is that even if they are putting points in the board, they think, gosh, like, this is so isolating. Like I don't, I don't want to stay on this path because I'm not finding the fulfillment in it that I found being in the context of an organization. so figuring out how you solve for those two things, right? How do you make sure that whether you're planning to go independent or you are independent, that in your first six months, you are getting the results that you deserve, right? You're.

getting the value you deserve for the work that you're doing and that you also feel supported in the process. So you are fulfilled while getting your success, super important. And Indie Collective in part was born because we need to solve for those two things, right? Like 50 % of our members are launching practices so that they're in the early days of it. And those people get a four to five X return on investment in the 10 weeks, right? And they're surrounded by peers who help them find the fulfillment as they're walking this path.

Yeah.

Right, so I encourage you to make sure you equip yourself with the resources and you find your community fast. Right, because trial and error at this stage of career is super expensive and it will be the thing that kills your independent path. Not because you couldn't do it, but because you are trialing and erring with the most valuable years of your career and that's not your fastest path to the outcomes you deserve. So get the toolkit, find your community.

Yeah, that makes sense.

and make sure you're leaning into those things early so that you get your best results and you feel good while walking this path. Because that will build momentum that will keep you going for years, decades to come.

Yeah, it's so true and so good. It's that, um, no, what was the third thing you just said? I mean, you talked about the, oh, the trial and error a hundred percent. Right. And I tell people all the time, look, I'm like, you're smart enough. If you've been, if you've been successful in corporate, you've got the skills, the expertise, everything you need to go do this. And you will eventually figure it out if you have the time, but don't lean on other people that have gone through this process to.

Yes.

Right.

to help you through it because there's things yet there's certain things you're absolutely gonna have to learn what are the type of conversations and how your personality tie 100 % but there's like 80 20 rule focus on right that 80 % that's you don't have to learn or on your own right to try so

Anyway, I just wanted to emphasize that is so true and and again, I've got a number of folks that Were on the verge like they were laid off and they were like, maybe this independent paths for me They had a right opportunity which not many are finding new jobs to go back in but what they they're going back into that new job with is a whole different mental approach to it there they know the exits coming This is gonna help them build that runway which again if you're in corporate start to build that runway build the plans

And then when they quit on you or you're ready to go, you've got the confidence to do this. And again, there's so many people that I find that are laid off out there that are still 100 % just focused on finding that next job. And man, man, I tell people all the time, it's easier to find your first client than it is your next job.

Do both if you want, right? If you're looking for a job, start to have these conversations, think about this. So yeah, I get, that's what that kind of bums me out a little bit is when people just won't open the eyes just a little bit because it may surprise you. You may really like this that they, anyway, so down a different path.

Yeah. And I'll say one last thing, on that point, because this last year of 2025 was one of the years in which we saw the most job loss ever in history. So a lot of people, no doubt, are experiencing that right now or may experience it in the year ahead. And while that is not something anybody is looking forward to, I'll say the work that we're talking about, that we specifically talked about today around productization, getting clear

as an experienced professional who you are best equipped to serve, right? Who are those best clients or frankly organizations for you? What are the problems that you as an experienced professional are best equipped to solve for those clients? What are the solutions, the things that you can do to get great outcomes for those people? Doing this work deliberately will not just win you clients and build an independent practice that is sustainable. It's gonna position you beautifully as an experienced professional to cut through the noise and

get the full-time opportunities that you deserve, frankly. And I'll say like, I still go in-house full-time off the back of fractional and consulting work, but when I go in-house, I'm in a position because I've done this work to understand my value, to negotiate offers that I was never, ever, ever able to offer with confidence prior, right? Like this work is work that I think every experienced professional should be doing for themselves because the future of work

Yeah.

Yeah.

is a portfolio career. And it doesn't mean you have to stay independent forever. I go back in and out of it, depending on what the season is and what I feel like doing. But once you've done this work for yourself, you are at such an advantage because you're no longer a generalist. You are somebody's expert. And that's who people want to hire full time and on a fractional consulting and coaching basis. So powerful work to do right now.

Yeah. And you're in control, right? Because again, I look back at my corporate career, a lot of it was reactionary. It wasn't proactive or, or if it was proactive, it was like, how do I get to the next promotion or the that type and not how do I leverage this full time job for 12 months to go? So I think it just, we need to take back control, which we, if you've been in corporate for a while, never have had. And now is the time. And maybe one last question for you, because I'm curious with your community.

and it's probably broad. How many are you looking at small businesses, midsize, large? Where do a lot of your, where a lot of your students finding work in the, is it across the board?

Great question. So our members run the gamut for profit and nonprofit from small to fortune 500 companies as clients. So they run the gamut. The work that we teach is how do you build a business around your expertise, defining the expertise and then building a business around it, the pricing, the packaging, the positioning, the sales, all that stuff. So our members run the gamut, the playbooks work for really any experienced professional. I personally happen to work with more startups because that's my passion and

where I have expertise, but what we teach in our membership is broad, for-profit, non-profit, every stage of growth. And frankly, that's good, right? I think it creates a really diverse network and so on.

Okay.

Yeah, I like the nonprofit. think that's an underappreciated area. They need help. They need the expertise and they're not going away. I also, yeah, you had under LinkedIn profile and feature work 100 % believe that corporate big corporates probably gonna have trouble getting out of their own way with everything that's going on. That small and mid sized companies really understand the power of part time and portfolio type work to leverage. mean,

I had Ron, I'm drawing a blank on his last name from lettuce, the CEO of lettuce. And he shared on the podcast that the first 41 people he brought on that team, that high growth team were all fractional or contractors. So he didn't even have some eventually transitioned into full-time because they wanted to, but he saw he's like the talent density that I could get with a portfolio approach was 10 X what I'd have if I had to hire everyone, it was full-time. I think smart businesses are starting to get it. That's why.

Yes.

Yeah. Yeah.

100%.

It's gonna be here whether you want it or not. So you might as well Plan for the worst hope for the best, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah Well, well Sam, thank you so much. This was awesome. I like I've got two pages of notes and I Appreciate it and looking forward to yeah, we're gonna do some collaborations So folks out there listeners pay to keep them a lookout for it, but Sam best way for

take advantage of it. Yeah, exactly. Take advantage of the new opportunities 100%.

folks that are curious to connect with you, what's the recommended path for them.

Yeah, check out Indie Collective, I-N-D-E Collective, C-O-L-L-E-C-T-I-V-E, IndieCollective.co. Lots of information about what we do, how we do it. You can follow along on our podcast, get on our newsletter. We've got programs that we do for free. And Brett and I will be co-hosting some of those even this quarter. So take a look at our website, but also follow Brett, because we'll be sharing out more just here.

Awesome, Sam, appreciate it. We'll have to have you back on before too long because there's a bunch of other stuff we could have got into, but I thought this was enough for people to digest. all right, thanks. All right, thanks.

Amazing. Thanks, Brett. Thanks for having me.