65. Part 5: On Building a Work Life after Corporate Life with Kathy Oneto & Philip VanDusen

Overview

In this episode, I’m excited to be joined by my good friend and mentor, Philip VanDusen, whose been on the podcast with me two times before. Philip comes back to join me for this 5-part series on Building a Work Life after Corporate Life. How do you leave corporate and move into self-employment or starting a business? Our intent with this series is to create a guide to going out on your own.

This became a topic for The Sustainable Ambition Podcast based on a listener request, and I thought who better to discuss this with than Philip. Both of us have had 25+ year careers in Corporate and then went out on our own and even have a shared journey on our post-Corporate path that will share along the way.

The series will be aired here on The Sustainable Ambition Podcast, as well as on Philip’s podcast, Brand Design Masters.

In Part 5 of the series, the final episode, we talk about getting your brand and new business going: the launch and beyond.

We cover some similar ground yet go deeper exploring how to build your visibility, activating your connections, other approaches for sales and marketing, being prepared to demonstrate your credibility, and the importance of doing great work. Throughout, we offer power tips and set expectations to embrace the journey of work life after corporate life.

And that’s a wrap! Thanks for the fun and informative series, Philip! Always great to be in conversation with you.

More About Our Guest

Philip VanDusen is a creative entrepreneur and owner of Verhaal Brand Design a branding agency based in New Jersey, USA. As a thought leader, Philip shares his expertise in marketing, design and entrepreneurship on YouTube to his 250k subscribers, in his Brand•Muse newsletter, on the Brand Design Masters podcast, and in his Brand Design Masters Facebook community.

In his career, Philip has led creative teams on both the client and agency-sides— serving as VP of Design for PepsiCo and Old Navy and Executive Creative Director at the iconic branding firm Landor Associates. Past clients include a host of Fortune 100 companies.

Topics Covered

  • Where do you start with visibility? How do you let people know you are open for business? Yes, we again cover website and social! But more importantly, you need to start communicating to people in your network that you’re out on your own and available to provide services. Get into their awareness, and have the tools that make it easy for them to learn and share about what you do.

  • Philip offers power tips - utilize the banner on your LinkedIn Profile to tell your story and be proactive in providing swipe copy so people can easily refer you.

  • Kathy offers a power tip - gather testimonials and samples of your work to be ready to demonstrate your credibility.

  • Have fun and embrace the freedom in establishing your own voice outside of the corporate sphere. Have a point-of-view. Philip shares - don’t be so fearful. You can also leverage content creation as a reason to connect with others in your area of expertise, broadening your network.

  • Philip and Kathy each share why they chose to lean into content creation as a marketing and business development lever, and later in the episode cover what to consider if you don’t want to follow this approach. For example, partnerships are a valuable method to build your brand.

  • Kathy talks about the marketing funnel at a high-level to introduce you to this concept and have you start to think about how you will market yourself or your business.

  • We again touch upon the importance of communities and masterminds as a resource in building your network and building your business.

  • Tip from Philip - at the start keep it simple, don’t overcomplicate, and build over time.

  • Importantly, we finally get to getting the income coming in!

  • Could your Corporate employer be your first client? Set up a first client before you jump.

  • A few more power tips: Do great work! Document your process, so you can speak to it, share it with clients, and leverage it to share with others you bring on to work with you. Develop case studies.

  • Be prepared that building a business is iterative.

  • Pay attention to what feels good.

Resources Mentioned

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65. Part 5: On Building a Work Life after Corporate Life with Kathy Oneto & Philip VanDusen

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