Don Blohowiak Executive Director, Lead Well Institute Do you secretly think of yourself as a professional speaker even though you're drawing a paycheck from an employer? Here's a more probing question: Should you quit your day job to pursue your fantasy of becoming a speaker for hire? The worst thing you can do in dreaming about a career as a full-time speaker is to deny yourself the opportunity to pursue it. The second worst thing is to jump into the pursuit prematurely. So, what are the realities of moving from employee (comfortable albeit repressed with steady paychecks and benefits), to speaker (creatively fulfilled though eternally in search of cash flow?) For the last ten years of my career as an executive on a corporate payroll, I thought of myself as a professional speaker-in-the-making. I wrote books, got quoted in some impressive publications and began giving paid speeches. I joined NSA, picked up bureau representation and grew increasingly restless in my "real" job. Two years ago, I resigned my former position to earn my living where I found my passion-standing in front of audiences, sharing insights, stimulating thinking and teaching important skills. If you aspire to take a similar path, the following thoughts may save you some time, money and wrenching heartache when you finally leave your day job to pursue your new career.
Perfect Your Skills - While you're gainfully employed, develop your speaking, marketing and business skills. Recognize the escalating expectations of those who hire speakers. They demand engaging and entertaining presentations jam-packed with fresh insights and take-home value. With the proliferation of videotapes and conferences featuring top professional speakers, meeting planners have been thoroughly exposed to the best in our industry. Their expectations are high; to compete, you need to fulfill them. You must be so good that people who hear you will enthusiastically want to tell others about you.
Study Where You Are - If you speak on a topic related to your current professional life, your employer becomes your laboratory. Take notes, clip articles, attend industry conferences-all on your employer's nickel. Participate in every NSA event that you possibly can. Be active in Toastmasters. Hire a coach to develop the best platform and business skills you are capable of. Once you're on your own, if you want to eat, you will have to produce income and run a business. Your time for learning the business then is greatly reduced. A great way to learn more about the speaking business is to hire speakers for the company you work for right now. Volunteer to serve on a program committee. I learned a great deal about this business by hiring speakers for sales, management and incentive meetings for my former employer.Moonlight - Speaking while you hold a regular job is a great way to build both the credibility and the relationships that will fuel your future success. Use your vacation days as an investment in your future. You'll return to your regular job energized from the speaking experience.
Stash Away a Fortune - No matter how well you prepare in advance, you'll need savings to cover living expenses while waiting for the world to discover you, additional monies while you wait for the conferences of those who discovered you and even more while you wait to get paid for the dates you were fortunate enough to secure. Accumulate a year's worth of living expenses (or more if possible) in addition to what you'll invest in your video demo, brochure and office equipment. You cannot force a fast success in this business, even if you're an outstanding and well-connected talent. This business can be brutal. Anyone who has belonged to NSA for more than three years has seen promising colleagues come into the business only to leave a year or two later. Staying power requires more than talent and commitment. It requires business acumen backed by financial resources to keep you intact during the inevitable lean times. You can do everything right in this business and still have to wait longer than you want for your bookings to build to a level that approaches your former salary and benefits. Three or more years is not unrealistic. Even when you begin to build momentum and receive those golden referrals and recommendations, the nature of the meeting business can mean torturously long lead times between the initial interest in your services to being paid for delivering them.
Other Financial Considerations - Planning to buy a house or finance a car? Get those big purchases behind you before you open your business. Credit-the kind requiring approval of an application-is tough to come by when you own a new business. Financial institutions look at someone self-employed as essentially unemployed until a prosperous track record has been established. Get a software program such as QuickBooks to track your business expenses and income. Set up a separate business checking account. It may not seem important when speaking is a sideline, but getting into the practice and habit of treating business funds separately will help immensely when you go full-time.
Set Up an Office - Acquire and become proficient with the tools you'll need when you're full-time (i.e., computer, software, fax machine.) Get a business phone line with voicemail now. You don't want your speaking-related calls coming to your current employer or your regular home line. Your spouse isn't your secretary and your children certainly aren't either. Create a Business Plan. Can you live by speaking alone? Chances are that you'll need to mix in some consulting, teaching, writing or other business activities to augment revenues (especially in the beginning, even if you've been moonlighting.) Understand the agonizingly long time it takes to build a reputation-that magic mix of name recognition and enthusiastic endorsements from important people. Think of a speaker you admire. How long have they been delivering paid speeches? Most likely, the answer is measured in years and decades.
Prepare to Say No - Early in the self-employed game, every opportunity looks exciting and inviting. However, you'll soon discover that you must be strategically disciplined about how you spend your time. If you're fulfilling a teaching fantasy and find yourself correcting exams, you're not networking with prospects, writing articles or developing new promotional materials. Time is the most precious commodity you have; it's finite and non-renewable and must be used selfishly and wisely. When you have excess cash in the bank from your wildly successful speaking career, you can better afford to indulge your varied interests than when you're starting to pursue a business plan. In the meantime, get a clear picture of the ultimate-realistic-expression of your business and define your time and activities by whether or not they support the attainment of your vision.
Think Through Your Business Processes - Will you have staff? Who's going to send out your promotional kits? Will you sell products? How will you bill and ship them? How will you track conflicting holds on your calendar? How are you going to capture and return phone messages? Who's going to make your travel arrangements? While traveling, is someone going to check your fax machine? The more you think through these questions before Day One of your business, the easier and faster the start. Time management is crucial for two very different challenges in this crazy business: 1) Operating effectively under multiple, tight deadlines when you have a lot of current business; and 2) Operating effectively when you don't have any. The second kind is the most challenging for me; it is in such sharp contrast to the deadline-driven mode we must so often work in. When those deadlines no longer frame the week (or month,) I start to feel a bit adrift. Here's what I suggest to be productive when no client deadline looms: Keep a list of projects you want to develop and get right to work on them when you see unscheduled time on the calendar. Projects might include writing a newsletter for your clients (or an article for a newsletter published by someone else,) introducing yourself to (or rekindling a relationship with) speakers bureaus or speaking prospects; call old clients to renew your interest in their business; research a new topic or refresh your data on an existing one; schedule an appointment with your accountant to review your current business plan and forthcoming tax matters; or, begin or continue work on a book, tape or other product. The key is to be productive with an eye toward the long-term success of your business when you are not frantic with short-term obligations. To do so takes both discipline and focus, but it can be some of the most productive work you will ever-and must-do.
Speak Freely - No brochure or video can boost your business or create demand quite like having people see your unique contribution from the platform for themselves.
Don Blohowiak