Defining success on your terms
What success looks like in my business, how I redefined it — and prompts to help you do the same.
On Tuesdays, I share stories, advice and insights from what I’ve learned as a female founder — what’s worked, what hasn’t and what you need to know as you grow your business. Psst, only paid subscribers get access to the full article.
What I love most about working for myself is the freedom.
The freedom to work when I want, how I want, where I want, with who I want. I get to choose what clients I say yes to, what clients I kindly pass on because they’re not the right fit. I get to choose what time I start or end work every day. I get to go grab a coffee with a friend or book a doctor’s appointment without having to tell a boss. I get to go on walks during the middle of the day or peace out early to pick my kids up from school.
There’s so much freedom.
Now, there are trade-offs for that freedom. You don’t have the security of a guaranteed paycheck or benefits or health insurance. But, for me, those tradeoffs are worth it. I needed to have that freedom and flexibility for my family. And that’s exactly what my job — my own business — has given us.
There’s one other piece of freedom I didn’t initially realize I was getting when I went off on my own. It was actually something I didn’t realize I was craving.
The freedom to define what success looks like to me.
I come from big agencies. I worked in global ad agencies for over 10 years, managing world-renowned brands like Gatorade, Intel, ExxonMobil, Toyota and more. I gained insane experience and did some incredible work. I worked with celebrities and athletes. I traveled all over and had expensive meals (ones I could never afford myself). I won awards and received recognition. I lived in New York City (a total dream), and then was lucky enough to do the same type of work back home in KC.
I’m not gonna lie, working in big agencies, for big clients is a cool job. We created cool stuff, we went cool places, we met cool people. But at the end of the day, I would find myself back at the office working — grinding — to keep moving up the corporate ladder. To keep getting promotions and raises. To keep getting to that next level.
And this, maybe more than anything, is what exhausted me the most. I hated having to prove my worth in these massive companies, so that my request for a raise or promotion would go alllll the way up the chain so someone in another country (likely a man) , who had never met me, would determine whether or not I deserved one.
Umm, no thanks.
It wasn’t until I went out on maternity leave and stepped away from the office, that I could really think through what I wanted in my career, in my life.
And what I really wanted wasn’t the promotion.
Once I paused and actually looked at what other people were doing in the role that I wanted — a director level — I realized I didn’t want to do what they were doing. The higher-up you were, the more you were dealing with politics. There were politics internally, politics with clients, even politics from other agencies that shared clients with you.
One thing about me — I hate politics.
And the last thing I wanted was to deal with politics in my day-to-day work. So, then, why was I vying so hard for that promotion when I didn’t want the work that came with it? I just wanted to do great work, to be a part of cool creative. But the higher up I got at the agency, the further away I’d get from doing the actual work. Instead, I’d be stuck managing the things around the work.
But, that’s the challenge with that good ol’ corporate ladder. To get paid more, you have to keep climbing the ladder. You have to keep getting higher titles.
In the corporate world, success is determined by your title and the money that comes along with it. But in my world? That’s not what success means.
No, my definition of success is completely different.