What happens when corporate stress gets so bad you literally can’t swallow solid food?

That’s where Claire Sullivan found herself.

On December 1st, 2023, corporate quit on her — and she took what most people would call the riskiest step possible:

She built a business… the same day.

• Filed an LLC
• Registered everything needed to operate
• Posted on LinkedIn that she was going out on her own
• Listened to what the market actually wanted
• And replaced her former salary by the end of the week

Is that typical? No.

Is it possible? Absolutely.

And more importantly — the steps she took are repeatable for anyone stuck in a corporate job that no longer works for them.

This is one of the most real and honest conversations we’ve had on what it actually looks like to escape corporate — emotionally, financially, mentally, and practically.

Who This Episode Is For

This one is for you if:

• Corporate has stopped making sense
• Every job application feels like it goes into a black hole
• You’re burned out but can’t “just quit”
• You want control over your time, income, and health
• You don’t think you have “enough” experience to go out on your own
• You just need one real example of someone who actually did it

Connect with Claire

Maven Course: How to Layoff-Proof Your Career by Becoming a Solopreneur: https://maven.com/clair-sullivan-associates/launch-your-solopreneur-business?promoCode=ESCAPE

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-clair-sullivan/

Hi, Claire Sullivan. Welcome to the Corporate Escapee Podcast.

Thanks, Brett. Thanks for having me.

Now my pleasure, I'm super excited about this one. And if you've been listening to the podcast, this is a newer thing, but now I'm asking every single one of our guests when we get going is when did you escape corporate and what made you finally do it?

Yeah, so no, it's a great question. December 1st of 2023, a date that will live in infamy. I was working in a company in the hospitality industry, publicly traded company, and I was miserable and I'd been trying to get out for months. The stress level was higher than I've ever experienced anywhere. And I mean, I've done work with the military. I have a PhD. I've been through stress.

you

The culture there was, we'll just say not great. And it got to the point where my health was really, really suffering as a result. I could no longer swallow solid food. That's how bad it was. And corporate quit on me on December 1st of 2023. I was like, I'd been trying to find a job for months because I was absolutely miserable there.

become a solopredor. And so then that happened and I was like, okay, well, I am the sole breadwinner for my family. We cannot go without me having a paycheck. So I found out that morning, I immediately went and got the whole articles and corporation thing. I filed as an LLC within the state of Colorado where I live that day. I got an EIN number that day. I got everything registered with the state that day.

So within less than 24 hours, I'd created an LLC. went and I bought the domain, know, set up the Google workspace, all of this stuff, got the email going. And on Monday, so, you know, a couple of days later, I went on to LinkedIn and I was like, hey, everybody, this is what I'm doing. I'm starting my own company. I'm going to be working in the areas of gen AI, whether that's

you know, helping people code, so like doing freelance work or consulting work, education work, any of those things, reach out if you have a need. And by the end of the week, I'd replaced my corporate salary.

That's awesome. And just note to the listeners, that's not typical. But, but, but it does happen. And I do want to unpack this a little bit because there's some things you did that most people don't do, right? That they, they, one, they let their universe know that, I'm doing this. Hello, up there, which is super helpful. But let's go back to

That's not normal. No, it is not normal. I am very fortunate.

It can.

Did you have an actual plan? I you were unhappy and we had some parallels with our corporate quitting on us. I was unhappy. You were unhappy. I didn't have a plan when corporate quit on me. Did you actually have a vision or an idea or any plan at all when the notice came? Okay.

I did, I did, and that's not actually how it panned out. I was originally thinking that I would consult with companies on data culture. So I've seen a lot of companies do exactly the wrong things with running their data organizations. And they make some pretty common mistakes. And I thought, you know what, I've seen these mistakes a million times. I can certainly come in and help on this. So I started setting up

of course, that's okay.

Yeah.

doing some public speaking on that subject just to get the word out there, hey, I'll help consult on this stuff. But I was also thinking, okay, well, you know, obviously, Gen. AI is a thing. With my technical background, it was in those directions. And so when people were reaching out to me, they were reaching out for Gen. AI. And so I think the thing that I learned from that is you have to be fluid, you have to be adaptable, you have to go with what the clients want, and they all wanted Gen. AI.

So I was fortunately in a position where I could offer that type of service. So I went with that. I have yet to have a company want to work with me on data culture, which is unfortunate because so many companies do it so poorly.

Yes, large, small, anything. We'll get into it in a little bit because I think I'm curious about how you package some of these things. But I think the lesson there is absolutely, and again, learn from do as I say, not as I do sometimes. Because when I left, I didn't tell anybody for like two years, other than one-on-one conversations. And I had no intention of going back to corporate. So what the hell was I thinking by not just announcing it to my network that says, hey, I'm going solo. I'm doing these things. just didn't.

Yeah.

if I was in comfort. I don't know what I was thinking. Now I tell people, right?

You know, I've talked to people about this and I think that there at least used to be this perception of you go solo or you freelance when you can't do anything else. And there's actual published work out there right now that says that, I'm trying to remember the numbers correctly. I want to say it was like 2027, more than 50 % of the US workforce will be working independently.

And that can mean a lot of things. That could be freelance, could be gig economy consultants, whatever, but more than 50%, that's the first time in history that that's gonna be true. so this perception of somehow, and I mean, people, I remember when I was in corporate and I would interview candidates who were doing the freelancing thing, and they would feel really sheepish about it. And I was like, no, this is a strength. If you're able to do that and you're able to make that work for you, that demonstrates a lot of skills.

that are beyond just what I'm interviewing for. So I really think that the tide is turning on that, but I do think that there are still people who are like, geez, I'm going and working for myself. I'm starting this business. That must mean I'm a failure. No, it's quite the opposite in fact.

Yeah. And it's such a good point. want a couple of things I want to dig into there because the first one was a lot of the people I had over a thousand plus conversations now and the amount of people that are not only questioning the confidence of going solo and, but starting to question their ability within corporate, which just floors me because again, if you've been in there for four years or four decades, you've got a ton of experience and it's just.

I think it is that culture that just beats you down and starts to get you questioning what you know or you don't know. I think you're right. think there was, and sometimes people that are, they get laid off and employed and they just put either fractional on there doesn't help the name. Cause they're really not trying to be solo and building a business. And one of the names I've been pushing hard lately, at least with, with our audience is more of a, call it the escapee solopreneur, right? It's, it's.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Taking what you have in corporate right and then going applying it as a sole business You can then move in different ways kind of like we'll get into your journey a little bit But you've got the experience go figure out how to make money thousand dollars at a time start to stack it then then go Where you know you read some of these that's you know get rich quick or you reinvent yourself completely like well most of us have a financial component agreed so I so so let's let's go back and when

Yeah, no, don't do that. Yeah.

That time came, I was mad, right? Not completely surprised when I had time to reflect, but then it was like, all right, it's go time. You gotta go figure this out. What was your, I guess just because of the stress levels, you were ready to go solo? Were you nervous about doing this, excited? What were kind of the emotions you were going through? Okay.

I was terrified. I'll be honest. I was absolutely terrified. know, I'd never been laid off before or fired before or anything before. It was the very first time. I'd always quit jobs. I'd never had them quit on me. And so, you know, the idea of the loss of a paycheck was, and you know, the sole income in my family, you know, and that was the health insurance and that was the everything. And

really? Okay.

It was really, really scary. The fear is real. I did get a severance package, which was great. But I really was just terrified about the loss of income. And my husband and I, we sat down, we talked about it, and we agreed we would know after three months if this was going to work.

And one of my other worries was, well, what if after three months it's not entirely clear? And there was nothing saying I couldn't go out and apply for other jobs during that three month period. You know, you and I both know what the statistics are on that right now. Something like one in four jobs on LinkedIn is a ghost job. It's a ghost ad. They're not intending to hire. Yeah.

And I mean, it interrupted just to verify that because I just founded a stat yesterday, four tenths of 1%. If you apply for a job, four tenths of 1%, you get that job. Not not 4%, four tenths of 1%. I mean, it's insane. The the job market. So anyway, I didn't mean to interrupt you but

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah. no, it's true. And in tech, it's so bad right now. know, everybody was told for decades, you want to have a, you know, a solid career for your whole life, learn to code. I don't know that I could say that anymore, but you know, when I look at what's happening in tech and I've, you know, I've been speaking about this places, people on average who've been laid off from tech are filling out more than 750 job applications.

Yeah, that's insane. That doesn't scale. But the thing that bugs me about that, and I mean, you and I can talk to LeBrouille in the face about this, you know, just because a company lays off 10,000 people doesn't mean they have 10,000 people less work to do. They still have the work. They're just trying to alter their bottom line so the shareholders will give the C-suite these bonuses because they cut costs. That's all it is. Yeah, but it's gonna burn them.

100 %

Yep. 100 % profits over people.

And I would be surprised if we're not already seeing that. You know, we've had some pretty major internet outages over the past month. Why? You know, people, they're not going to talk about it. You know, that behooves them to not talk about it. But you know, how many of these outages are caused because they don't have enough people in there with eyes on screens looking at what's happening in the code base? Or, you know, there was the cloud flare outage this summer that brought down the whole air travel industry among other things.

And this is completely rumor. I can't prove it's true, but you know, it would just make sense that a few months prior CloudFlare had laid off their Q &A team who would have potentially caught, exactly. I mean, you can't say, and they're certainly not going to say, but they still have the work. It still has to be done. They may not have recognized it yet, but you can't, when you let go of 10,000 feet people,

Coincidence? Meh. No, heck no.

You don't just get to hire them all back instantaneously. Even if they got permission to do so, they still have to go through searches. It still takes time and they still have work that needs to be done.

And I don't care how busy or not busy you were, 10,000 people, there's a lot of stuff that was getting done to your point every single day. And the best, really good example in one of my more popular TikToks was the CEO of Spotify after going through...

Mm-hmm.

major layoffs said at the next earnings call he was surprised the impact the layoffs had on their business. I'm like no shit what did you expect? I'm like my god so yeah I mean that just tells me and you know it even more than I do but I've seen the inside of these I know how these internal companies work they're siloed by operating budgets and money

Mm-hmm. Yep.

And there is no way that they've incorporated integrated AI in these automation to make their businesses more efficient. There's just no way. There's no way. So every to your point, all these layoffs have been purely money profitability. Some point, maybe they'll figure it out, but I'm not a hundred percent sure. It's like change turning the Titanic on some of these big companies. So anyway, we.

Yeah, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Well, and then the flip side of it that I don't think, you know, people who are searching for jobs realize, you know, when I would post a job for the team that I was leading, I would post it and within a week I'd have over 3000 applicants. And it didn't matter what level I was posting for, I could be posting for a junior level or a senior level. And, you know, I'm not saying that they were all bad. There were a lot of really great applicants there, but, you know, as a human being to try and weed through 3000 applicants,

is really tough. So, you know, how are you as one person going to stand out among those 3,000? It's really, really hard.

And that's why I go back and one of my taglines, it's easier to find your first customer than your next job. And it doesn't seem like it, but that's why I kind of asked you if you were nervous, fearful, and especially if your entire career. So let's go back. All right. It's now Monday. You reached out and say, by the way, 100 % agree with you that data is the biggest issue that company, even if you want to automate, you get to get your data right. So whole different apps. But.

It is so true, so true.

Very.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

yeah. We could spend days on that one.

So what, because part of it is, all right, I want to go get clients. What did you do? What was kind of your process? Maybe what would you do differently? Maybe we can break down some of it because I've got some ideas for folks thinking through this as well. But what was your process?

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, my process was LinkedIn and people, I'm gonna say that's a double-edged sword. Some people can do really well in LinkedIn, some people don't. And I was fortunate, one of the roles that I had in corporate before going solo was in developer relations. And so part of the job in DevRel is just getting content out there in as many places as possible. And I learned a lot of different things through working in DevRel about how to

There was this, I don't want to call it a flywheel because I think that term gets overused, but like you post something one place and then you go and post it another place and then you go and post it another place and they all generate clicks and people are, know, I came across this blog post, but that took me to her LinkedIn and that took me to, you know, Twitter or X or whatever. And, you know, it just kind of organically grows your network online. And so the very first place I went on Monday morning was on to LinkedIn.

I had my webpage, I had my email. I said, hey, here's what I'm doing. I'm excited. Reach out. Okay. Yes. I said excited. I didn't say terrified, but I was terrified. Yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, I got the usual, you know, emoji responses. good luck. You're going to do great at this, blah, blah, blah. But then I had somebody that I didn't know immediately reach out.

Yeah, yeah, well, probably little both, right? Both, yeah.

And it was somebody who came across my DevRel content. It wasn't somebody I actually had a, you know, at the time, a personal relationship, but she became my first client and she had immediate needs. was a startup and I, and it sounded like fun. And I was like, yes. And she says, all right, well, let's get started after January 1st. Perfect. and then I had a second person reach out and he was somebody I had worked with in the past, another startup. And he says, Hey,

I'll check.

I really want to go down this gen AI path. I've got this idea. And I was like, great, let's do it. So, all right, let's get started after the first of the year. So that took some serious pressure off that I knew that I was going to have these two clients starting after. Right. And I think one of the things that I did as a result of that, that I think was incredibly important, I was burnt out in my gourd. I was, I mean, like I said, I couldn't swallow solid food. And so.

engagements. Yeah.

I used that time in December to just recover my body. I slept a lot. Like it was, was recovery. was, you know, when you go through something really, you know, traumatic and I would describe that job as incredibly traumatic, the most toxic environment I have ever been in. And when you go through that, you have to give yourself an opportunity to recover from it. So, you know, if you're somebody who's just been laid off,

You know, feel all the emotions, take the time to go through that. And yeah, I was very fortunate that I knew I was going to have something on the other side, but the other part, you know, the flip side to that is not burying yourself in it. You know, everybody's going to go through the different stages of grief through that process. And I did, and I'm sure you did. And what I tried to do was every day, every weekday, not doing weekends, not doing holidays,

But every working weekday, I tried to do one thing for my business. And it could have been something that took 30 seconds. It could have been something that took five hours. But just every day, the one thing so you know you're driving towards making that thing successful.

Yeah.

that and I think, yeah, I mean, but to your point, part of it is getting yourself out there, but maybe we can even take that that little step back. Cause I know a lot of people get kind of stuck or they want to pitch, right? Your idea, you're, you're going to do data cleanup or data management, that really wasn't what these people approached you. And I love the, I'm a big believer in listen, right? What, is the problem they have? And can I come up with a solution to solve it? We don't have to make it any more complicated than that, but we want to, right? You know, like, you

you

no, no, no, I'm only doing fractional. I'm only doing solo consulting. only, so I'd be curious. Let's go back to the first conversation. First person that reached out, I'm guessing you got on a call, right? And just maybe just share, obviously you don't have to give us the details. You're just kind of curious. One, did you have an idea of how this was going to work when it got started or did you truly just go in listening and say, hey, I think this is how we can do it?

Mm-hmm.

just went in with an open mind and listened to the problems that she had and what she was trying to create. And I said, yeah, I have some ideas on how you can create that. And here are the things that I can bring to the table for it. And here's the things that I can't because I think that's just as important is if you need somebody who's going to do this thing, I'm not your person. One of my personal brand things is honesty. So if I can't solve a problem for you, then I will tell you that I'm not going to just sit here and waste your time and money on it.

she legitimately had a thing that I definitely thought I could help with. And yeah, so we got started.

Okay.

Did you again something now I'm getting a little of the tactical exists this hangs people up sometimes and it's all right I think I can help you did then you just email her with a couple of options and how did you think through again? We're getting tactical Pricing because again this hangs up a lot of folks. I don't know where to get started So kind of how did you and again the other thing I tell people it's okay if you get it wrong, right? Your first client you're gonna figure it out

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, you're gonna get it wrong. You're gonna get it wrong. So the pricing thing is interesting because, you know, part of one of the things that I did during that month of December was just get some books on how to get started as solo. And, you know, they'll tell you in these books, you you want to go for people who are going to pay you like a monthly retainer. And yeah, that's great. I love that for you. Okay. But...

Like all of my clients, wanted hourly, which meant I needed to figure out what an hourly rate was. And this is something that I try to walk people through when I advise them is even if you're working as in a retainer or on a per project basis or whatever, understanding what that means for you in an hourly rate. So I go through this exercise with people where I say, okay, what was your corporate salary? Now we're going to divide that by 20 80. If you're in the United States, which is the number of working hours. If you work 40 hours a week in the U S

Okay. Yeah.

Right.

Okay, and that will tell you your hourly rate. Now, pro tip, have a drink or something ready for when you do this, because it's actually a really sad calculation. There are people who make very high, you know, what looked like on paper, very high salaries, but when you sit down and figure out what that hourly rate is, it's really not that high at all. Okay, so then I started talking in my network about, you know, how much, if I was working for some contracting shop, I was a consultant in a contract shop, how much is that company taking off the top?

From my network, was roughly about a third. Yeah. And so I said, okay, well, I know what I paid contractors to do this job when I was in my corporate role. What's two thirds of that? That's what I'll charge. like, I mean, it's really not a hard calculation. And so then I took that number and I took it to some people in my network and they were like, yeah, that's about right. Now, that number can go up and down depending on situations.

Yeah, 20 to 30 percent makes sense.

Yeah, you had a baseline.

you know, maybe there's somebody that you really, really want to work for, but they don't have the funding to afford that, you know, you can make the decision to give them a lower number or you can, you can, and this is something that I recommend. If you know that a client is going to be harder to get on board and you're going to have to do a lot more legwork for them, make that number higher. So you're eventually going to get paid for it. For sure.

Yeah.

Yeah. Can I, can I bounce an idea off you? I've been playing with this, this formula and I tell people, is not rocket science, but it's been oddly accurate compared to like what people are charging in fractional and consulting. So what I tell people is take your salary, your annual salary multiplied by 1.25, 2.25 being benefits on average. let's use a hundred thousand dollars salary. So multiply 1.25, you're at 125,000, drop the three zeros.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Your hourly rates 125. So if you're making 250,000 drop the three zeros and I think the higher you go more especially I think you can charge more than this but I guarantee you my number is gonna be higher than your number and But when it works out right because again the other thing because what I try not to do is get it too complicated So if you think back into your corporate role, you were probably

Mm-hmm.

doing what you were hired to do, what, 30 % of the time on a good week, right? Maybe if that. That's what I'm saying. So when you go work with smaller companies, they're only paying you for the highly productive time. if you scaled out all that other fluff and busy work and everything else that they made you do, then it becomes a realistic number. And doing this for long enough and talking with people long enough, it's a good starting point, right? Because everybody wants to undercharge what they.

Was I hired to sit in meetings all day? mean.

That's right.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

they can up front and part of it is the market's gonna tell you what they're gonna pay for it. But anyway, so, because I did go down the path that you were going, but I mean, I had heard this and since somebody's listening to this and knows exactly where the birth of this mini calculator came from, let me.

Mm-hmm.

I don't know, but let me add on one little tidbit onto that one. One of the best pieces of advice I was given, which was do not assume, okay, like you can come up with that hourly rate. You know, let's say it's a hundred bucks an hour, 150 bucks, 200 bucks, whatever. You can come up with that number, but you cannot assume that you will be billing for 40 hours a week. I was given a rule of 60%. Assume that you will only be able to bill 60 % of your time because you still have other things that you have to do to run the business.

Yeah.

Right.

that when you're not a solopreneur, you don't think about. You've got to do business development. You've got to do finances like taxes, content. Yeah, and you're not getting paid for that stuff. So you do need to include that in there. So when it comes right down to it, you want to take that number and see, it's not exactly correct, but 25 hours a week. Can you live on 25 hours a week out of 40 hours a week at that hourly rate? And if the answer is yes, go for it.

content.

Right.

Yeah, I mean, think that it's perfect because I think that's what, the data I'd seen from the collective, which you're a part of, but then also into like John Arms and his fractional community, what their hourly rate is and hours worked. That's what I was trying to think of. And then even just data on other solo consultants. And it is people are replacing their income and between 20 and 25 hours per week. But to your point, it's not.

Mm-hmm.

There is other stuff that you need to do, but it's realistic to be able to do that. And yeah, I just don't think people don't, they get so caught up in some of little stuff, the fear stuff before we even get to the, but yeah, keep it simple. That's for sure.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, don't overthink it. Really don't overthink it. Yeah. The hardest part is just like the first few times you have that conversation and they say, what's your hourly rate? Practice that in the mirror. Practice it with a friend or a loved one. Just, you gotta get comfortable. It's really hard the first few times you tell people my hourly rate is X. But it does come, it does get easier every time you do it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And again, think too, the other thing that I've found with folks is shifting it from sales to problem solving.

Mm-hmm.

I help you. This woman, you, your first client had a problem. You're like, yep, I can solve it. And again, the way I recommend is there's three ways, right? We can do it super simple. I can work with you a couple hours a month just to be your sounding board. We can go a little bit deeper, right? Maybe 10 hours somewhere in that, cause it does come back to hourly, even whether it's retained or not, it's still hourly. And then all the way to, bring me on full time, right? As a fractional eight to 10 hours per week. I always liked that good, better, best because it, they almost always pick

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

the middle option, right? And then if you develop the relationship, maybe they pull you in for even more that there's too many folks that are just holding out for the, you use the sports analogy, the home run, right? They want, and I was guilty of it in my early days. That's all I was looking for was the home runs. And I left a lot of money on the table doing that. So.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Absolutely. Yeah.

You know, and I think, you know, one of the things that I've learned from the corporate escapees is that I have left money on the table and you know what? It's okay. You're going to do it as you get more and more experience in, you know, working solo, you start leaving less and less on the table. And then you, you know, then you really start, and I'm not going to say that I'm to this point yet, but I've seen it with other of the escapees. You know, then they really start getting that traction and they're not leaving the money on the table. They're, they're doing real well.

But it takes some, give yourself the patience and the grace to take the time and learn how to do it.

Yeah.

And the other thing too, I found, cause I made the assumption when I left, I'm like, I just want to make more money, money, money, money, money. But then, you know, time, I'm like, God, I like having this free time. This is nice. Wait, my health's actually getting better. You talked about hell. All of a sudden this was this balance and money is still important. It is, we all have different needs and goals, but that's kind of what I found. The beauty of the escapee world is you can build it to what you need. Right. You don't have to build a Google or a Facebook or.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

a growing agency, can basically, I mean, I don't know if you ever watched Point Break, the old original Patrick, they were surfers that were bank robbers and they only robbed like three banks a year to fund their off season in Australia. So I'm like, that's what escape, we're funding our lifestyle, right? And making it predictable.

Yeah.

No.

There you go.

Okay, so it's really funny you mentioned that because like my goal was just replace my corporate salary because again, that was my fear was losing the corporate salary. Okay, so we did that. And then it was like, okay, well, I am doing that working 20 to 25 hours a week, billing 20, 25 hours a week. It doesn't mean I'm not working more, but you know, I live for those of your listeners who don't know this, I live in a resort town in the Colorado Rockies. I love to ski.

Yeah.

and I wasn't skiing. I'm like, I'm working for myself. Why am I not skiing more? You know, why am I not getting out there? And so then I just had this wild hair last spring. We've got this great regional professional theater here. And I used to love doing theater. did it when I, professional theater when I was in high school, hadn't done it in 32 years. Like it had literally been that long. And I was like, you know what?

I've been auditioned for a show and they happen to be doing Young Frankenstein, Mel Brooks musical and I'm like, I'm just gonna audition and see what happens. And I got cast as Frau Blucher. Okay, but we were rehearsing six, seven, eight hours a night, six nights a week. Okay, there is no way I could have done that working in corporate. We were rehearsing from like three till 10, Monday through Saturday, like something like that. There's absolutely no way I could have done that working in corporate.

That's so cool.

And you know, when I look back on that, it was one of the most transformative experiences of my adult life was doing that show again. So I, you know, what, did I give up by spending 32 years of, know, of course you have to work nine to five. You're not successful if you don't work nine to five. So,

Yes.

Yeah, no, I love that story and.

Can we take a pause? I'm going to close my curtain because we're getting that effect here. Give me 30 seconds.

Yeah, you got it. Yep.

All right, it's coming through a window that I don't have curtains on. I apologize. I can try to angle this a little differently.

No, no, it's fine. It's the beauty of what we do. yeah, I'll go back and chop that out.

Yeah, okay, I'm sorry, it's gonna be, let's see if I can put something over my camera to keep this from being so problematic. It's a certain je ne sais quoi.

That's fine. It adds some character to it. And it'll fade in a minute,

It will.

All right, so I'm going to pick it back up and say that that's what's so cool about the escapee. It's just you're starting to find, you know, I love another line from a movie, you know, from Shawshanker, Get Busy Dying or Get Busy Living. And the funny thing is, and I don't know if you and I have talked about this, but, know, when I started this, it was really heavily focused on Gen X, but picked up other folks that weren't. But what I've found through this journey is some Gen Xers just aren't ready to

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

go. You can lead them to water, they're not going to go. But I've found 20 somethings, 30 somethings, 40 somethings at all different ages that just knew corporate wasn't for them. It was broken.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Hmm.

and didn't see a path forward, but yet they found a path forward in doing a lot of the things that we've been talking about. So I think, you know, one of my, I don't know what you it, regrets. Regrets is a strong word, but you know, I would have figured this out 10 years earlier, but maybe we weren't in a marketplace or a world where it made that much sense. But now we're there.

I think everybody, yeah, yeah, it's, mean, if you think about what the job market was 10 years ago, it's so different. And everybody comes there on their own time. And I don't, I don't want to regret it because every job that I had and every experience that I had taught me something that I can absolutely use today in my solopreneur journey. But, you know, some people, just, you know, they, they learn those things about themselves at different times and, and, you know,

I'm happy for the people that it happens younger in life with. They get to have more of their life back. For me, losing that much time, I look at my kid who's 14 and almost 15, and I lost major portions of her childhood for work. And why? Those places, they didn't care about me. I was just another spoke in the wheel.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, one of the things that I think is a sign, and a lot of people don't realize it, of a really toxic work environment is when they say, we're all a family here. It's like, no, I actually have a family. And family treat each other in certain ways, and it ain't this.

Yeah, no, a hundred percent. again, I love the even small business owners will say, well, the small, everybody will want to work and work as hard as I'm like, no, they don't. Unless they're, they own a piece of the company. They're not going to care as much as you, nor should they write this again. I viewed it for too long, chasing promotions and just, just the way it was. I thought it was supposed to be. And when you think back about how much you built your life around that,

Yeah.

job. In my case, I was laid off a few times. So I have more little more numb than you were when it happened. But, you know, just in hindsight, there is if you have alternatives to do it, and it just the sooner the better. again, you have to be ready and the beauty of it. Like you said, you gave it you're going to give it three months, it took you a week to figure out if it's going to work. But, but even three months or four months, the risk is so low that you can you can go back or try to go back.

The thing I don't understand is the folks that have been laid off, they're afraid to try this because what do you have to lose? Right? There is no downside to testing. You're doing the same work. You're just having to do a few different things, which I understand, but that the trade off is, I don't know. That's what that's the gospel I'm trying to preach is just, just try it, try it, try it, try it.

Hahaha

Well, and the thing is, it's not all or nothing. Like, you can be trying it while you're also filling out those 750 plus job applications. There's nothing saying you can't do both. I really think if I had gotten to design it, if corporate didn't quit on me, it would have been a lot better if I could have set it up as a side hustle that I eventually grew out and then could eventually just leave of my own volition. That would have been great. Life didn't work out that way.

Right.

Yes.

Okay, fine. So, you know, I'm, but I'm not going to sit here and say, will, you know, give up my family's income and the house and the kids college fund or whatever, you know, because corporate is a toxic mess right now.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And again, if it works for you, then you're one, you're probably not listening to this podcast anyway. So, but yeah. And I think that that's the thing I would have had was a plan in place to figure out. The other thing that I learned in which I'm trying to share now is over the five years that I did start hardcore solo consulting. Then I started a hardcore fractional, then started figuring out how to monetize a bunch of different ways. And it took me down a new path. And that's what I'm finding with, you know, whatever we define successful escapees.

Mm-hmm.

is there's multiple revenue streams still tied back to their experience, either personal or professional. And sometimes I think if we just take it to that least common denominator, maybe a mini service that you can charge, maybe it's a one time thing or a monthly subscription, I still think is the path.

And I was going to say, know you've gone down this path because you launched a training program. So can you share your two year journey, how it's evolved in the time since you've been out?

Yeah.

Yeah, well, I think it's really important what you just said about monetizing a bunch of different things because we're taught in corporate life, you know, this is how the business makes money the end. You know, we have these offerings, we have this catalog, we charge these things. And there's no flexibility there. It's very rigid structure. Whereas when you're running your own business, work on what you want, charge what you want, you know, good on you if you can get somebody to pay for it. And what I...

have learned over the past two years is the things that I, you know, when I give people my elevator pitch, I say, you know, what I do is I provide consulting, freelancing, and educational services in the GEN.AI domain. Okay. But what does that really mean? I mean, it means I could do basically anything I want. And throughout the course of the past two years, one of the things that I really rediscovered was a love of teaching. And I've taught several times in several different capacities before. I was a university professor for a little while.

When I was in grad school, I taught dance for a while. So I've always enjoyed teaching. And it turned out that I had some clients who wanted to pay me to teach classes in Gen. AI. And it just really reminded me how much I loved teaching. And so what I decided to do was let's see if we can find a way to do this more. So I have started on the platform maven.com and

They do a lot of online classes for things like Gen.AI. It's kind of a saturated space there, but one of the things, they have a lot of tech people there, but they don't have a lot of, they do have a career section, but it's how to land your next promotion, how to speak with an executive presence, these kinds of things. And those are all great and useful, but nobody was teaching a solopreneur class, how to go, how to lay off proof your career as a tech worker.

by becoming a solopreneur. So I said, you know what, I'm gonna offer that. Let's see what happens. And so a couple of weeks ago, I did my first free 30 minute class and I had over a hundred people sign up. And I have another one coming up this Monday, December 1st. If you go to Maven and you just search solopreneur, you'll come up with my full-time class. So now I'm actually going to be offering a full two week, eight hour, completely live interactive course.

on how to start a solopreneur business. And we'll see if that takes off. And the great thing about this is if it does, great. And if it doesn't, that's fine too. But I have the flexibility as a solopreneur to say, I'm gonna try to monetize this or I'm going to try to monetize that. Or I'm gonna go do this thing that I'm not going to make any money at specifically because I want to. And I choose.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, I love it. And again, it's one of the things I've seen is a lot of people move into the teaching. I love the way you position that with the educational services. It's exactly what we do. And it makes sense. And you can do it on your own time. we will put the link up at the top in the show notes for that class for the folks that want to check it out. And again, think it's one, your story is inspiring. The fact is, yeah, you hit the, I don't want to say the jackpot, but you hit the jackpot early, which is awesome. But.

Mm-hmm.

was very fortunate.

it doesn't always work that way, unless you put yourself out there, you're not going to know if it's going to work that way. And so give yourself the biggest, best chance to do it. And maybe one last thing I'll talk about, because you said, as long as you're putting out, you know, applying to 750 jobs, same thing goes when you're networking, right? It's, have the conversation, I call it the dual path, right? So if you're talking to somebody, the perfect example was he's not in the community, he ended up going back full time.

Mm-hmm. That's right.

Mm-hmm.

But he landed a, he was a former CMO having conversations and he had just mentioned to somebody who was networking with that he's open to freelancer part-time. Like, I didn't realize that he ended up getting, I don't think they called their fractional CMO role, but it, he filled that gap for a couple of folks and all because in his networking call, he said, I'm open to, to part-time work. And now he ended up getting hired back full-time in a company that he loves it's small. So, but my only point is yes, just.

Hmm?

Perfect.

Be open, be flexible, listen to where the problems are. yeah, know. So Claire, thank you so much for sharing your journey. It's awesome. And I know you're just getting started with this and sharing the personal piece too, because it is getting out and doing things that you can't do when you're in corporate. awesome. Congrats on the early success. we'll keep you, I said I'm trying to bring back.

That's right.

Well, thanks for having me.

Mm-hmm.

Thank you.

folks just to keep sharing their journeys they go through. So anything exciting that happens to you, let us know and we'll bring you back on. All right. Thanks, Claire. Have a good rest of your day.

Love to, love to. Thank you, you too.