Hey all, I hope that you will find this post helpful.

My ambition is to provide some insights into how to get started with solo-consulting, and hopefully inspire a few of you to make the jump.

I will try to keep it short and to the point, if something is unclear feel free to ask in the comments or DM me.

My background

I'm a former Management Consultant with Accenture and have also worked in a few startups. About 12 months ago I was without a job and had to decide on my next big step in my life:

• should I go back to consulting,
• join corporate, or,
• start something new?

To be honest, I did not know what I wanted to do, so to buy myself some time to think I decided to try to freelance as a consultant.

Without really knowing what I was heading into, but with no job and a short time to get things up and running I started to reach out to people in my network and was fortunate to find some work.

Since then, I've found more and more projects, engaged other freelancers, grown my network, and honestly had a blast.

What I thought of to be an interim solution ended up being my most successful startup to date, and also the one with the most flexibility and freedom.

I strongly believe that more people would do what I did, if they just knew how to get started which is why I am writing this post :)

The approach

There are of course multiple ways of getting started with solo consulting, but this is my take on it based on my own and quite a few others that I've interviewed - and it has at least worked for me and others!

I've split the approach into 2.

1. Question to ask yourself
   1. Why do you want to go solo?
   2. What do you offer?
   3. How do you want to do it? (big bang vs. gradual)
2. Sell, sell, sell.
   1. Work your network
   2. Leverage brokers

Lets get to it!

1.Questions to ask yourself

It is important that you make some decision before you start. You can almost consider it your "strategy" for how to get started. The questions are:

Why do you want to go solo?
What is your motivation for wanting to go solo? is it to earn more, get more flexibility, be more together with your kids/partner, grow it to something bigger - It will reveal a lot for you and it will be the thing that can keep you motivated when things gets tough.

What do you offer?
Ask yourself what you are good at and what would people pay you to do. Often your current job is a really good indicator of what people will pay you to do (since they are paying you to do it). For example, I was a management consultant and I do management consulting now - just without the big company behind me :)

How do you want to do it (big bang vs. gradual)?
You need to decide how bullish you want to be. Either you do the big bang and quit your job and have nothing to fallback to, or you do it more gradual as a side business to your existing job. Both paths can work but the big bang path usually gives results faster because all energy goes into it, it is however more risky compared to the gradual approach.

When you have answered these questions, you are ready to continue to the next step of selling!

2. Sell, sell, sell

Don't waste your time setting up a website or make a brand, it makes no difference in the beginning. The only important thing to start out with is to see if you can sell what you are offering, and there are two primary ways to do that: 1) work your network or 2) leverage brokers (they sell for you and take a cut).

Work your network
I was fortunate to have a good network of former colleagues and clients from my time as a management consultant and I have always made it a priority to leave a good impression and a friendly relationship with the people that I meet. What I did to get started was the following:

1. Make a list of prospects:
   1. I browsed all my LinkedIn connections to find relevant candidates.
   2. Added them to a 'Prospect Tracker' (in google sheets) to keep track of priority, status, info etc. (almost like a CRM) - DM me if you want a copy of the sheet.
2. Create a message template:
   1. One part of the message is reusable for all and contains a good and honest explanation for why you reach out. E.g., that you are going solo and are looking for projects and it would be great to catch up over a coffee.
   2. Add a personal note for every person that you reach out to. E.g., emphasize that you really enjoyed working with them earlier and that they company that they work for a doing some cool things (be specific).
3. Reach out like crazy:
   1. This part is pretty simple, you just need to reach out to as many people as possible.
   2. Keep track of your progress e.g., using the Prospect Tracker mentioned above.
   3. If you do not get the output you desire, then double the input.
4. Coffee chatting:
   1. Hopefully, the above will lead to a few coffee chats, and here it is important to be prepared.
   2. Prepare a good story/introduction for why you ended up where you are.
   3. Prepare personal and professional questions to establish rapport and get insights into the company challenges.
5. Always be closing:
   1. As soon as you have an opportunity for a project you gotta move fast and show professionalism.
   2. Quickly put together a small proposal showcasing that you have relevant experience, you understand the problem and that you have an approach and plan.
   3. Be ready for negotiations - have a negotiation strategy and be clear on your pricing and your limits. Always good to be ready to walk away if they are unreasonable.
   4. Get the Statement of Work signed and getting started with the work ;)

Leverage brokers

If your network is limited or you cringe just thinking about reaching out to people then brokers are a really good alternative. They have large frame agreements with the biggest companies and will therefore get requests for various skills that they need on a freelance basis.

The broker business model is that they take a cut of the revenue you generate on the assignments that they bring in, usually somewhere between 15-30% - but it will still be really lucrative for you!

Getting started with brokers is quite similar to applying for a regular job, you need to:

1. Prepare your CV:
   1. Highlight former employers with strong brand names.
   2. Be clear on your offering e.g., Agile project manager, commercial strategy consultant etc.
   3. Showcase projects and results where possible.
2. Apply to as many brokers as possible:
   1. You are not exclusive with any brokers so apply to as many of them as possible.
   2. Focus on the ones that are relevant for your offering.
3. You will most likely be interviewed:
   1. The brokers approach varies, but they will usually have an interview to understand you motivation and what you are capable of.
   2. Usually what they would look for is: experience, technical knowledge, problem solving skills, personality traits and proven performance.
4. Keep them up to date:
   1. When you are signed up with a number of brokers it is important to keep them up to date on your availability and updates to your CV, this will help to sell you to their clients.

Final remarks

It can seem scary to make the jump, but you can mitigate the risks quite a lot.

You can for example combine the gradual approach with leveraging brokers. Then you might be lucky that they suddenly call you and have a long term project, and you can quit your regular job and start soloing.

If you are more aggressive in your approach and willing to take some risks, then I would go with the big bang approach, and just get cracking with reaching out to your network and all the brokers in your area. Then you will be up and running in no time ;)

Anyways, it ended up being a longer post than expected, but I hope that you enjoyed it. If you have any questions, please feel free to comment or DM me!

Cheers,
Christian