10/13/2026
Happy Monday! 👋🏽
Quick question for my fellow former corporate leaders and consultants: How much time did you spend "getting ready" before you actually sent your first client proposal?
The biggest roadblock holding newly independent executives back isn’t a lack of experience. It’s the corporate habit of asking for permission, aka waiting for external validation.
When I first started my practice, I overthought everything. I chased an elusive version of perfect and signed up for every webinar under the sun.
After round three of website revisions, my husband, who’s also my business partner, said, “Everything looks good. It’s not going to be perfect, and while you’re chasing perfection, you’re missing visibility and real feedback.”
I did what most strong women do. I quietly ignored him and started drafting my next list of revisions. 😅
But a small voice kept echoing: minimum viable product. Dawn, you won’t know if it works until you let people experience it. You keep making changes for you, but you aren’t your audience. And your audience can’t buy what they can’t see.
I see the same pattern every time a woman steps out of a VP, Director, or C-suite role to launch an advisory practice. She falls into the over-preparation trap: one more certification, a third website rebuild, another week perfecting the slide deck.
But enterprise clients don’t hire certifications. They hire outcomes.
Your decade-plus of driving corporate results is all the proof of concept you need.
Shift your focus this week:
❌ Stop tweaking background assets.
✅ Activate your warm network.
✅ Audit your client contract so it’s ready to sign.
✅ Put a real proposal in market.
You didn’t leave corporate to build a smaller ladder. You left to own the practice.
What’s one action item on your pitch list this week? 👇
