What Happens When You Leave Corporate?

Especially after you’ve been with a place for a long time… what’s different, what’s noticeable?

Let me tell you what I noticed in myself that I’ve seen in other who have left corporate to become a self-employed business advisor…

First thing is FORMALITY… the way you communicate changes. When people quit the office, they realise there’s no need for being so measured and “on point” the whole time.

That’s a realisation that I hear a lot is that people realise how uptight they’d been and how much more relaxed their communication style can be when they’re not trying to match the behaviour that their role or their company seem to expect.

It’s like there’s a lot less processing and filtering of what they say… so that’s the 1st thing I’ve noticed. Formality, not really any need for it any more.

Second thing is people talk about the FLEXIBILITY of being in control of your own time.

And the way they talk about it is with a sense of awe and wonder and disbelief.

They’re like, “I dropped the kids at school and then I went to the hardware store to get something for the house and I didn’t even feel guilty”.

They simply can’t believe that these simple day-to-day things were completely unavailable to them for so long…

They are literally amazed at how entrenched they let themselves get to in their corporate life while this whole other life existed outside the bubble that they’d put themselves in!

Third thing I’ve noticed is CONFIDENCE… it’s like they rediscover who they are as a person.

I think what it is comes from once the status of their role falls away, they see themselves as a person again that can completely be themselves.

It doesn’t happen straight away, but we have conferences every 6 months and I literally see a happier, more energetic and brighter person when they discover that they can reinvent themselves as the person they were before their personas got machined into the corporate warriors that they’d turned themselves into.

I’ve heard it said a few times people calling it “shedding their corporate skin”.

So, my question to you is, what would shedding your corporate skin be like for you?

Who would you be without the pressure and the status of your role?

What would you be able to do more of and who would you spend more time with if you didn’t have the demands of being in an office all week.

Would you be more energetic, more relaxed, more present?

Have a think about the corporate you and the you that you’d be without the expectation of your role.

If you could earn the same or more outside of the bubble, which version of yourself would you be happier with.

Not always an obvious answer, but definitely one to think about…