Escape Velocity - The New Orbit!

My experience for the past 366 days in the New orbit! (Entrepreneurial life!)

"Escape Velocity" - that's what I had christened my plan. To pull me away from 18 years of bondage/association with an organization and its ethos, pathos and logos!

Like many of my friends in Wipro who feel 'stuck' in their positions, i too had the pangs of not being able to let go of a comfortable life, cash flow including (!), and plunge into an unknown life.

Here are few of the things which helped me in 'escaping' and a few lessons which I had learnt along the way after coming out.

Being in the learning domain helps sometimes in applying those learnings on yourself!
All those talk on being positive, proactive, looking at the needs than the wants, and ultimately 'What is the legacy one wants to leave in the world!' - helped in 'Staying hungry'.

As I learnt from my senior colleague & guru - Brij Sethi - The psychological contract with the organization is usually broken much before the physical contract with the organization. When I look back this was true, my psychological contract was broken atleast 1 year prior.

Reflecting back to the conversations that I had with my other colleagues, every one of them have a broken psychological contract, however, they did not have any alternative motivation that can pull them away!

So I had to create one which can pull me away - which is why I termed it - Escape Velocity!

This means identifying reasons, skills, strengths, purposes that are BIGGER and more MOTIVATING than the current ones.
I could clearly see that the only current motivator was the Cash Flow!

The obvious first step (being a logical 'C' in the DISC parlance) seems to be creating a SWOT in order to identify where my strengths lie.
Apart from the skills and variety of competence that I had listed, i was fortunate enough to identify "my Age' and the 'cognitive ability' (because of the age) as my strength.

The reason I was able to do this was because of the bucket list that I had created. Items such as 'Learning Sanskrit', Learning Tabla, etc needed the ability to learn, which (in my opinion) i may not be able to do in my 60th year.

I say 'May not' because, In my life I have seen many seniors who 'retire' and do not have any extra curricular skills and struggle to find a purpose.

Apart from this the list contains - Spend time with the children (when they still around you!) ; Grooming Youngsters; Volunteering (Service, Acupressure etc.); Gaining the foundation knowledge on spirituality; Building an old age home for close family members in a farm land;

The next step was 'Direction'
I strongly began to believe in Stephen Covey's quote
"You climb the ladder of success, only to realize - after reaching the top, that the ladder is leaning on the wrong wall!"

This quote gave me the impetus to explore my purpose in life and the direction in which I am heading.
Having certified and taught this course for many years, i had the required tools at my disposal to create a Vision (Begin with the end in mind) for myself.

I am fortunate that I had the right breaks within Wipro to play a wide variety of roles. I was a Project Manager, onsite Account manager, Pre-sales, Part of the core team that began the Clinical Process Outsourcing business, and lastly the Learning & Development.

In order for the vision to be realized, it was key to let go of the all the past 'successes' & try and rediscover. 
Fortunately (again!) I had the full support of my wife & family in deciding to let go of a comfortable life & redefine a new way!

My vision was to - 
Establish myself as a freelancer by creating the right tie-ups (so that I don't have to worry about where my next assignment is coming from) & create a discipline to focus on the big rocks!

My professional objective for the initial years was
- Get atleast half of what I used to get in the corporate ( so that the 'Bread' part of it is taken care, 'Butter & Jam' had to wait!)
- Establish a new Network that is valuable
- Have a set of repeat Customers & reliable Knowledge partners
- Spend time helping out at home (psychological / career space for spouse)

So the journey began on Jan 31st 2013!

It has been a mixed bag of success. I am close to the financial target, however many of the personal agendas are still pending :-(

Here are my learnings for the past year:
- Discipline:  Working form home has its own advantages and disadvantages. You need to discipline yourself to focus on the work at hand and not get carried away with regular home chores.

- Positive energy: You have to ensure that you motivate yourself. Think of 'Why' you have taken this step. Think of the timeline that you have given yourself to be financially independent. Thinking of the Need & not your want. 
DO NOT PANIC.
SURROUND YOURSELF WITH people who encourage you.

- Networking: This has been a BIG learning. My earlier network was mostly in the IT world and that too within Wipro!
You do not benefit greatly from it. Though I must mention that I did get business from some of the ex-Wipro folks who moved out and are in responsible positions outside!

- Asking for help - unabashedly!
This is still an area which is 'unnatural' to me! However, without 'asking' you will know the 'opportunity' or the 'money'! I am getting at it :-)

- Conserving cash
My corporate friends should be very happy that they get a pay check at the end of the month!
The payment terms is a reality and you cannot depend on spending based on the programs that you have done! and hence it becomes very important to regulate where you spend the money.
There is a very strong pressure to dip into your 'Savings'.

- Synergizing on skillset with other facilitators
Being a freelance, there is a tendency to do all the things yourself! The thought that "I brought in the business, why should i give it away?" keeps crossing you. However, when you look from the client's point of view, they would want the best and you can help in bringing in the right skills (at right cost!)
I am fortunate to have the support on multiple quarters.
Just to mention a few names - Shantanu Chakravorthy / Sudip Majumder/ Gurudutt Rao / Dr Rajendra Joshi / BKM / etc. acting as coach/guide; and Selvan Dorairaj / Shagufta Inamdar / Col. Vijay / Amit Badkas / Satyan / Kalluri Sankar helping out in getting me some business.

- Specializing in a particular area
Extension of the earlier point, there is always a dilemma on where you need to be seen as a specialist or 'know all'.
This can be very distracting to business. This i think is the offshoot of our need to be seen by the client as the one stop solution. I am still working on this (should I be called as an Experiential Learning specialist or a Leadership trainer)


- Be all end all!
This is a real bummer! Being the single person who is the organization, you are the Marketing - Sales - Content Design - Creation - Delivery - Feedback - Invoicing - Collection agent!
This can really suck out the time from your core area.
Again the dilemma whether to create a team or sign up with a team or go at it alone!
Still confused, I would say!! (trying out everything!)

- Finance - Service Tax, Income taxation, tracking expenses (filling the bills)
Knowing the regulations, Understanding how business is run, how you need to track the expenses, how/when to raise invoice, etc have all been an eye opener.

At the end of it all - It has been fun to
- take charge of what you want to do and when
- go through this whole experience of business process
- be around when you family needs the most
- take time out to smell the flowers

and as we say in our EL programs
"...and the journey begins"

PS: In case any of you want help in building you 'Escape Velocity' you are most welcome to talk to me!