Building a portfolio career and second life

Six months ago I quit my job to find a new #worklifebalance and start a #secondcareer. I’d been a serial #CMO and it felt the time to go #plural or try that thing called a #portfoliocareer, with in my case a blend of #NED, #BoardAdviser, #Coach and #Author. This was spurred on by having a once in a lifetime opportunity to build a new home.  I said I’d give updates on my journey, so here is my mid-year report on progress and lessons learnt:

Build score 5/5: The build has progressed very well. Demolition done, pilling done, foundations done, steels in, bricks being laid and neighbours happy. Like all aspects of life, if pays to have the right people on the job and our builder and architect have been great. The perfect blend of inspiration, practicality and communication, which I think every business needs. Inflation keeps biting us, but the project is progressing, and it is wonderful to be able to create something. 

Book score 4/5: The Marketing Leader’s Code was launched in February and reached #2 in the business best-seller lists. The book about #marketing #leadership has had some wonderful feedback and am pleased this has finally gone live. I haven’t however been able to promote widely, because supporting the book is a new website and blog called sideminds.com. This will be full of tools and assessments for marketers but has been massively delayed. More on this later. Thank you though to The Marketing Society and The Marketing Academy for promoting so far.

NED score 4/5: I thoroughly enjoy being a NED at Purplebricks and Higgidy. Both have their challenges and it’s not easy for business right now, but it is rewarding to be a critical friend and help business find shortcuts to growth. I’ve also enjoyed contributing to NED panels and advising marketers on how to become a NED (please read my early LI article). I would though like to secure another NED position and haven’t had the bandwidth to do this, so mark myself down. In a portfolio career you are juggling many things and have to solely rely upon yourself (If you need an adviser, please let me know!).

Adviser and Coach score 1/5: Over the last few months I have been supporting HomeServe globally with marketing projects, which is working really well. I haven’t been able however to advise or coach more widely. This is due to my website delays. Sideminds.com is being built by a company in Australia. Not the most obvious choice I know, but they were personally recommended to me and could build the wider tools and assessments I needed. They are good guys and I am sticking with them, but little did I know their backend developers were in Kazhakstran and they’d fall out. We may be able to communicate globally, but sometimes you need to be able to see people face to face. The site is due to go live mid-April, so please have a look.

Family score 3/5: One of the reasons for doing the career shift was to be able to find a new normal, as we became #emptynesters. Our final ‘kid’ was off to university, so we had all three away from home and we have found this re-adjustment hard. The dogs are loving it, as they become surrogate kids for my wife and I, but it isn’t easy and there are wider consequences. Like for instance when the ‘kids’ do return, their friends aren’t nearly, so we’ve had to buy another car and book AirBnBs near our old home. This area is definitely work in progress.

So, at a headline level my total score is just over a 3/5, but this excludes the #learning journey I have been on. I have had to think, learn and adapt, be self-reliant, be #entrepreneurial , be everything. It is genuinely liberating and exciting, but I won’t deny frustrating and at times lonely, especially when you are calling Australia in the middle of the night. Thanks to everyone who continues to inspire and support me on this journey. Next time hopefully I will be able to talk about walls and a website!