0:12

Welcome to

0:12

the fourth episode of Portfolio

0:14

Cast. Today we're speaking with

0:14

Steve Chambers. He is an

0:17

advocate of charities of all

0:17

sizes involved in the built

0:21

environment and sustainable

0:21

transport sectors. Whilst

0:25

leading policy and campaigning

0:25

roles, he has also been a

0:29

subject matter expert, which has

0:29

led to a portfolio career that

0:33

includes being a lecturer and a

0:33

media spokesperson. Welcome,

0:36

Steve.

0:37

Hello,

0:38

Hi. So in

0:38

my introduction, I've just given

0:41

a flavour of what you do, and

0:41

have done, in your working

0:44

career. And the roles have been

0:44

many and varied. I'd like to

0:48

jump in with a question on how

0:48

you have made your choices, what

0:53

has driven your portfolio career

0:53

along this path?

0:57

Okay, there's a couple of different things to kind of balance in a portfolio

0:58

career. For me personally,

1:03

although there's been a lot of

1:03

different kinds of roles, doing

1:05

different things, being a

1:05

campaigner, being an advisor,

1:08

being a lecturer, I've stuck to

1:08

two niche areas really: built

1:15

environment, urban planning, and

1:15

sustainable transport. And I've

1:18

sold myself as an expert in

1:18

those areas, I haven't spread

1:22

that part to thin. Where I've

1:22

been super flexible is with what

1:26

the doing actually is. And

1:26

that's where I've actually found

1:29

myself coming into roles that at

1:29

the beginning, I didn't

1:32

anticipate something I knew I

1:32

wanted to I wanted to become a

1:35

lecturer I wanted to do that. I

1:35

didn't know I wanted to be a

1:38

campaigner at the beginning that

1:38

that kind of evolved that

1:41

presented itself. But all, and

1:41

this is a crucial thing, I

1:43

think, based on that subject

1:43

knowledge that I held myself to.

1:48

Yeah, and

1:48

that specialism and we see it

1:50

again, again. And we actually

1:50

advise on that, during our

1:53

Catapult course, for example, is

1:53

find your specialism. Because

1:57

there are a lot of people in the

1:57

world, there are a lot of people

2:00

probably in your market unless

2:00

you are specifically very niche.

2:04

But finding that specialism is

2:04

going to be your strength,

2:07

right?

2:07

I have, as my

2:07

career's moved on, I've

2:09

identified areas that I thought

2:09

were useful for me to get into

2:14

because of where I wanted to go

2:14

and I have broadened out. But it

2:17

was a very gradual evolution, it

2:17

wasn't just spreading myself too

2:22

thin in terms of those things.

2:22

And kind of the reason I think

2:25

I've had the reason of sticking

2:25

to that niche area is partly

2:28

it's easier to explain yourself

2:28

and promote yourself that way.

2:32

But what I think is more

2:32

important in choices, and more,

2:35

something you don't really see,

2:35

if you look at someone's CV.

2:38

Yeah.

2:39

You don't see

2:39

two things, you don't see the

2:42

rate and you don't see the

2:42

reliability of that work. And

2:46

actually, a lot of the choices

2:46

that I've made have been about

2:49

the one thing I think is very

2:49

important for a portfolio career

2:52

is to have a bread and butter

2:52

job, something that's reliable,

2:55

it's maybe one or two days a

2:55

week that work's could probably

2:58

gonna be there for quite a

2:58

while, it's maybe at a lower

3:00

rate, but that's going to pay

3:00

the bills. And it might not be

3:03

the thing that you're most into,

3:03

don't do things you don't want

3:06

to do, but it might not be the

3:06

thing you're most into. And then

3:09

you can use your other days for

3:09

things that are higher rate,

3:13

because they're less secure.

3:13

They may be the more passion

3:17

projects for you. So you don't

3:17

see that when you look at a

3:21

career of a portfolio career

3:21

person, but those decisions are

3:24

actually as important as where

3:24

is this taking me? What am I

3:28

going to be doing?

3:29

Yeah, that

3:29

balance between stability and

3:32

passion is something that we

3:32

really have to strive for.

3:35

Right? Because often it's your

3:35

passion driving us. Also you

3:39

have that fear with stability,

3:39

right? You go out to lots of

3:42

different roles and you say yes,

3:42

a lot, especially in the

3:45

beginning, but that can lead you

3:45

down a path, which is harder to

3:50

maintain, perhaps.

3:51

Yeah, I mean,

3:51

well, the trouble is saying yes,

3:54

a lot and filling your time with

3:54

work is that may prevent you and

4:00

this is something I've learned,

4:00

prevent you from having time to

4:03

promote yourself to look for new

4:03

work. The way I do it now,

4:07

because I've actually had two

4:07

stints and a portfolio career -

4:09

I did it once, I went back into

4:09

full time for about two years

4:12

and came back out again - what I

4:12

do differently now is I only

4:15

programme four days of work. The

4:15

fifth day is self promotion, it

4:20

is looking for new business. You

4:20

think about it, you're your

4:23

sales person, you're selling

4:23

yourself, you need to maintain

4:26

this level of work. And if I'm

4:26

really honest, what I did before

4:29

- I didn't programme five days

4:29

of work, I just took work and

4:33

did it. And I realised now that

4:33

was a mistake. Very fortunate

4:37

that I enjoy what I do, but that

4:37

can also be a curse because you

4:40

can be ending up working seven

4:40

days a week. By having that day

4:44

that is not working for clients,

4:44

it's working for yourself -

4:49

making sure you have a good

4:49

website - it gives you the

4:51

opportunity to do... for me

4:51

personally, I will do media

4:55

appearances, not for client but

4:55

just presenting myself as an

4:57

expert that will generate

4:57

interest. Blogging just for me

5:01

not for clients that have

5:01

sparked interest as well. And

5:05

just recording things that I'm

5:05

doing and presenting that to the

5:08

world. I use Twitter a lot. But

5:08

I started moving some of that

5:12

sort of personal update stuff

5:12

away from Twitter and onto my

5:15

own website. Because social

5:15

media, the way things surface, I

5:20

started spending time to

5:20

actually update my own website,

5:24

to keep a record of that, to

5:24

keep a record of achievements,

5:26

of things I've been writing here

5:26

and there. I don't know how

5:29

common it is, for people today's

5:29

but for me personally, it really

5:32

works to have one day a week

5:32

where I am promoting myself, and

5:36

I'm needing to then get what I

5:36

need for my income for the other

5:40

four days. And that's no bad

5:40

thing. I think,

5:43

I don't think that's a bad thing at all. I think that's really great

5:45

advice. Definitely something

5:47

that I found quite difficult, I

5:47

always go back over trying to

5:51

find that balance, is that life

5:51

admin, and also that promotion

5:55

stuff is so key, but often gets

5:55

pushed down to the bottom of the

5:58

pile, it's almost too late. But

5:58

you've then you've got a rush,

6:01

then you've got to push yourself.

6:04

It's infrastructure as well. It's boring things like you know,

6:05

having a really good email

6:08

system, having your cloud

6:08

storage sorted. Yeah, these are

6:12

the sorts of things you do on

6:12

that day, spending time to make

6:15

sure you have the right

6:15

equipment that you need. All of

6:17

this kind of stuff is an

6:17

investment in yourself. And it

6:20

takes time, I don't want to be

6:20

doing it in the gaps of time I

6:23

have between other things and

6:23

not making good choices. And

6:26

going back to what are you

6:26

selecting for the work that

6:29

you're going to do? If you're

6:29

doing that without time to

6:32

really think about it, then

6:32

you're probably not going to

6:35

make the greatest choices. And

6:35

if you're fully programmed with

6:38

work, and maybe you made choices

6:38

where the rate isn't so high,

6:42

and you're unable to take on new

6:42

work and you think, "Oh, well,

6:45

I'm happy with what I've got, I

6:45

don't let this client down." If

6:47

you're creating that cushion of

6:47

time, that you have that much

6:51

more flexibility you can go for

6:51

and get better work.

6:54

Absolutely.

6:54

We've spoken about passion. And

6:57

obviously being an advocate for

6:57

charities is a real passion of

7:00

yours. And I know from

7:00

experience of giving to

7:04

charities where it may be seen

7:04

as unreciprocated. However, I

7:08

often get so much more from it

7:08

than others expect. What's the

7:13

greatest reward for you from

7:13

this kind of work?

7:16

The work I'm

7:16

doing is advocating for policy

7:19

change, trying to get government

7:19

to do things differently. The

7:22

big rewards are few and far

7:22

between that you do see that you

7:26

make change. So two years ago, I

7:26

produced a report highlighting

7:30

the lack of funding for bus

7:30

services outside of London,

7:33

great bit of timing, getting in

7:33

front of the right people. My

7:36

report was cited at Prime

7:36

Minister's question time by the

7:40

leader of the opposition,

7:40

incredible to see that

7:43

recognition. And then later down

7:43

the line, idt was a success, we

7:48

secured funding good so that bus

7:48

services could be maintained and

7:53

improve. And I enjoy the whole

7:53

process of that the whole

7:56

process of producing research,

7:56

getting coverage, do a lot of

8:00

media work, getting our story

8:00

out there. And then ultimately,

8:05

because that's the destination,

8:05

is to make change, make change

8:08

in the world. And to see that is

8:08

incredibly rewarding to me.

8:13

As you say,

8:13

you often do a lot of media

8:15

work. And as an expert in your

8:15

field, you're called upon for

8:18

this and whether that's whether

8:18

you're speaking or whether

8:20

you're on TV or whether you're

8:20

lecturing, what advice would you

8:24

give to someone who is looking

8:24

to create more of a presence

8:28

from speaking as part of their

8:28

portfolio career?

8:31

Okay, I knew I

8:31

wanted to become a lecturer,

8:35

media spokesperson, as an

8:35

opportunity came up. But for the

8:40

being a lecturer, I know what to

8:40

do it. I didn't know, however,

8:44

that I had all the skills I

8:44

needed for it. So I invested in

8:49

myself is what I'm saying. I put

8:49

myself on a PGCE course for two

8:54

years, which is a teacher

8:54

training course. You can

8:56

actually be a lecturer with no

8:56

training whatsoever. But I

8:59

wanted to be the best I could be

8:59

at doing that. And there was an

9:03

element of pragmatism, the government were paying money at the time for you to do this

9:05

course it was it made a lot of

9:08

sense. This was coming out of

9:08

the 2008 financial crisis. So

9:13

that was when my portfolio

9:13

career began. was one piece of

9:16

advice on getting a crisis is a

9:16

perfectly good time to start a

9:19

portfolio career.

9:20

Yeah, absolutely.

9:22

And it was an

9:22

opportunity that came up. I knew

9:24

I wanted to do it. I knew I

9:24

wanted to come in and do this

9:27

role, and I didn't want to be

9:27

rubbish at it. I wanted to be as

9:30

best I could be. And for me the

9:30

way to do that was to invest in

9:32

myself. And I'm always learning

9:32

in one way or another but that's

9:35

what I did at the time. I taught

9:35

sociology in sixth form college

9:39

or further education college in

9:39

West London in Ealing, and I got

9:43

my PGCE and I felt super

9:43

confident then going into

9:46

university. I'd had some offers

9:46

to do teaching work at that

9:51

point by actually turned them

9:51

down. I need to have this

9:54

investment in myself. I want to

9:54

do it right, I don't want to do

9:56

this and not you know not be so

9:56

great at it. In my head teaching

9:59

with something I thought I was going to do very much towards the end of my career.

10:02

Okay,

10:03

I'm thinking very much like a year has six months, whatever. But I'm also

10:05

think down the line, we're going

10:08

to work into what is normally

10:08

retirement. And we need to be

10:11

mindful of that, there's lots of

10:11

reasons for that not all

10:14

financial. If we're going to be

10:14

active for all this period of

10:17

time, we might want to actually,

10:17

you know, do something. So I

10:19

thought this would be something

10:19

I would do, then I had, but

10:22

obviously, I wanted to get all

10:22

the tools under my belt, I

10:25

wanted to have a have a stab at

10:25

it, opportunities came up again,

10:28

I started teaching, and I loved

10:28

it. And I loved it because I was

10:32

doing really well at it. And I

10:32

felt very confident about doing

10:36

it. My kind of advice there for

10:36

that is invest in yourself. Same

10:40

for the media stuff. As soon as

10:40

it became apparent that I would

10:44

be called on to do that. I did

10:44

media training. It's affordable,

10:49

I think for an individual to

10:49

invest in themselves. I think

10:53

that is absolutely 100% worth

10:53

doing. It was just a one day

10:57

course. But it taught me

10:57

everything that I needed to know

11:00

about that already had a little

11:00

bit of experience. And that kind

11:04

of helped. So yeah, my answer to

11:04

that is, is invest in yourself.

11:08

Yeah. And you will find that

11:08

those two roles, a lecturer and

11:12

media spokesman or anything like

11:12

that will just be so much

11:15

easier, easy on yourself.

11:18

So moving

11:18

on from lecturing, would you

11:20

recommend anybody doing

11:20

something like media training,

11:24

to advance themselves or to, as

11:24

you say, invest in themselves,

11:29

to take themselves to the next

11:29

level, I guess,

11:31

I think if there's a real chance

11:31

that you're going to be doing

11:36

media inquiries, or if you

11:36

already started to do them, I

11:39

think that's the perfect time to

11:39

do it. So when I did it, I only

11:43

just started doing it, it became

11:43

apparent I would be doing more.

11:46

And that training, it lasted a

11:46

day, I was able to connect with

11:50

experiences that I'd already

11:50

had. So I'd say that's the

11:52

moment to do it. But my thing

11:52

with training to teach and also

11:58

with the media is this was

11:58

something that I didn't feel

12:00

super confident about it. So

12:00

that for me was the time that I

12:03

knew I needed to do training,

12:03

some people just can go off and

12:07

kind of do this, and be super

12:07

confident, happy with it, that's

12:10

fine, they have an innate thing

12:10

for it. But these experiences

12:14

for me anyway, tend towards

12:14

being nerve wracking,

12:17

potentially kind of experiences.

12:17

If you've got all your tools

12:20

sorted, that's going to make

12:20

things a hell of a lot easier

12:23

and remove a lot of that

12:23

pressure. So if you're someone

12:26

who does get nervous, or in

12:26

those kind of situations, do

12:29

yourself a favour and do that

12:29

king of training set. And I'm

12:33

sure that's true for many other

12:33

high pressure, things like that.

12:36

make life easier on yourself. Yeah, yeah, I think often, we

12:38

make that assumption that we

12:42

should know and should as

12:42

terrible as we know, but we

12:46

should know how to do it. First

12:46

time off the bat. Whereas as you

12:50

say, like taking that time to

12:50

actually invest in yourself is

12:53

so key. I'd like to go back a

12:53

bit and talk about how you

12:57

started your career because you

12:57

started your career in

13:00

marketing, not yet with

13:00

specialism of town planning and

13:03

sustainable transport. How did

13:03

you get from there to here?

13:07

So I kind of went as far as I

13:07

think I was gonna go in

13:12

marketing, basically. And I knew

13:12

I wanted to do something

13:16

different. I wasn't quite sure

13:16

when I wanted to do looking

13:19

back. Now I know the structure

13:19

of nine to five wasn't right for

13:22

me. But at the time, I was more

13:22

focused on the idea that I was

13:26

in the wrong profession. So I

13:26

went back to university, I went

13:29

back to university at 29, I did

13:29

an undergraduate degree. I

13:32

learned through the undergraduate degree, which was social policy, that I was

13:33

interested in urban issues,

13:37

things about the built

13:37

environment and transport. I did

13:40

a dissertation specialising on

13:40

that areas within the social

13:43

policy degree. And that meant I

13:43

could go on to do a master's

13:47

degree in urban planning. So I

13:47

used the master's degree as a

13:50

fine tuning tool, graduated from

13:50

that out of into the financial

13:56

crisis. That meant that a lot of

13:56

options were less viable, full

14:02

time employment was less viable.

14:02

Because I been going down that

14:06

kind of specialism route.

14:06

Already at that point, you can

14:09

see the fine tuning of my

14:09

interests and my subject area. I

14:13

was blogging, I was blogging

14:13

then. I was going to events, I

14:17

was talking, invited to speak at

14:17

events because I was identified,

14:21

even at that stage as a

14:21

researcher as having a subject

14:25

specialism. And so I was self

14:25

promoting then invited to speak

14:29

at things and then opportunities

14:29

came up, but they were part

14:33

time, they were advisors, they

14:33

were consultancy. So

14:35

effectively, I started my

14:35

consultancy around 2010. And

14:39

then as I said before, I knew I

14:39

wanted to get somewhere and I

14:42

wanted to I wanted to be doing

14:42

teaching. I wanted to be a

14:45

university lecturer. And that's

14:45

how I spent some of my time, in

14:49

education. I think I was using

14:49

the portfolio career as a means

14:52

to support educating myself.

14:55

Yeah.

14:56

And then coming

14:56

out of the PGCE and kind of

15:00

moving forward why I found is

15:00

the work that I've been doing.

15:04

So I was a consultant advisor. I

15:04

saw a campaigning job advertised

15:10

in my specialism area, very

15:10

niche in my specialism in

15:14

particular transport. And I

15:14

never thought of myself as

15:16

campaigner. But I read it and was like, well, that's what I do. This are myskills, you know,

15:18

the communications, I already

15:22

have that for my marketing

15:22

career. So even that career that

15:25

I abandoned has had value. And I

15:25

refer to it when it's useful.

15:30

And subject knowledge in

15:30

particular, because this is this

15:32

world, I'm talking about policy

15:32

change, well, to change policy

15:35

needs to know policy. And I

15:35

applied for it. And it was a two

15:38

day a week job, I got it, and

15:38

then I became a campaigner, then

15:44

the teaching opportunities came

15:44

up, and I was doing more. And so

15:47

that was maybe a three way

15:47

split, lecturer, campaigner,

15:51

consultant advisor, which is

15:51

pretty much what I am now. And

15:54

that's, that's how I got there.

15:56

Yeah,

15:56

that's fantastic to hear. And

15:58

what I love about talking about

15:58

people's journeys, is the fact

16:01

that a portfolio career never

16:01

really is fixed. It can be what

16:05

you need it to be at whatever

16:05

time for example, you know,

16:08

supporting you through your

16:08

education, but that's part of

16:11

your portfolio career, and then

16:11

later, being able to get three

16:14

way split. And we've talked a

16:14

bit about it, obviously,

16:17

balancing your week, by having

16:17

the opportunity and taking that

16:20

time to reinvest in yourself.

16:20

But how do you find balance and

16:25

prioritise between your roles

16:25

between your responsibilities,

16:29

whilst also creating that

16:29

work/life balance?

16:31

Yeah, that can be difficult because clients often like your availability

16:33

every day for them, rather than

16:36

setting aside "this is Monday,

16:36

I'm going to work for you and

16:39

what I'm not gonna check emails for a week?"

16:41

Yeah.

16:42

They kind of

16:42

bleed into each other. But that

16:44

is something that's really kind

16:44

of valued. I think technology is

16:48

the answer. I use multiple email

16:48

addresses, individual email

16:54

addresses for clients. So stuff

16:54

is sorted that way, and

16:59

different cloud storage,

16:59

ensuring that they don't bleed

17:02

into each other is what I'm saying.

17:03

Yeah,

17:03

I really keep

17:03

them kind of separate. I'm not

17:07

quite sure how I juggler. I feel

17:07

like just leaving enough time

17:10

and not having too much work

17:10

really helps. Because if I was

17:13

answering this question before,

17:13

like the previous time, I was, I

17:17

was working like this. It was

17:17

chaos if I'm really honest. I

17:21

did work, deadlines were due, I

17:21

was going from one thing to

17:24

another, I was doing incredibly

17:24

long days. I was earning less as

17:28

well. That's the thing, I really

17:28

cannot stress that enough. If

17:31

you make better choices, you

17:31

will you will earn more. So you

17:34

know, working like that, having

17:34

too much work is just not a good

17:37

recipe. Finding it very

17:37

difficult to take holidays as

17:40

well, because of that kind of,

17:40

you know, organising like that.

17:43

Now I'm much more disciplined.

17:43

I'm not especially setting aside

17:48

days of individual clients. I do

17:48

work, I will work for multiple

17:51

clients across the time. Some

17:51

things have to happen at a

17:54

particular time - lecturing,

17:54

obviously, you know, you're in

17:56

the room at that time.

17:56

Interestingly, in the COVID era,

18:02

I'm travelling less. And that

18:02

helps, I feel like I have more

18:06

time. So when I was like going

18:06

between clients and going to

18:09

lecturing, wherever a lot of

18:09

time was spent travelling, not

18:12

from you know, meals grabbed,

18:12

while travelling feels like the

18:16

theme of how my life was, and

18:16

there's less of that now. I'm

18:19

travelling a bit more for work,

18:19

which is lovely, but it's not.

18:22

It's not racing between

18:22

meetings. So that's helped. I

18:25

mean, honestly, I think the

18:25

answer I'm saying is don't give

18:28

yourself too much to do. Be

18:28

organised. I use very basic, a

18:33

Trello style, sort of task

18:33

management. I think that works

18:37

works for me. But yeah, I really

18:37

do think that the number one

18:40

thing is just don't overload

18:40

yourself.

18:43

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's really great advice. And

18:44

especially for people who are

18:47

facing making that jump towards

18:47

a portfolio career. Is there any

18:51

advice that you would give, for

18:51

somebody trying to make the

18:54

decision of, should I stay my

18:54

nine to five, or should I

18:59

actually make this jump? I mean

18:59

there's a lot of people at the

19:01

moment who are facing

19:01

redundancy, or are on furlough

19:06

and not sure what's coming up or

19:06

even just not happy in what

19:09

they're doing? And I've realised

19:09

after being stuck in it, and not

19:12

having, feeling not feeling like

19:12

they have a way out? What would

19:16

that advice be?

19:17

Well, I've kind of got recent experience of that. As I said, I went back to

19:19

full time work for two years, I

19:22

had two experiences where I

19:22

thought "Actually, this isn't

19:24

the right thing for me, I'm

19:24

gonna go back to a portfolio

19:26

career." And it's really hard to

19:26

set one up from scratch or while

19:31

you're in that employment full

19:31

time. If you can, and I've seen

19:35

people do this. And this might

19:35

be a good way if you can

19:38

negotiate going down to four

19:38

days for a while and use the

19:41

fifth day, almost like I do to

19:41

start up, get your first client

19:45

and do something else. Whatever.

19:45

That's one way of doing it. But

19:50

honestly, starting a portfolio

19:50

career is like someone who says

19:53

they're gonna go on around the

19:53

world trip, and the hardest

19:55

thing for them is to just buy

19:55

the ticket. Buy yourself the

19:59

ticket. And there's a lot of

19:59

anxiety about, you know,

20:03

earnings and all that kind of

20:03

stuff. I mean, not everyone's

20:06

gonna be able to do this, I

20:06

know. But if you can try and

20:12

find a way to get your finances

20:12

sorted, so you could live with

20:15

reduced income for six months.

20:15

And maybe not up to the level

20:20

where you really want to be for

20:20

a year, but six months of like,

20:24

you know, really reduced income,

20:24

then maybe another six months of

20:27

not quite where you want to be.

20:27

Allowing for that. That will

20:31

actually help you. Because

20:31

you'll remove the anxiety and

20:34

you won't make bad decisions, so

20:34

you'll end up earning more

20:36

anyway, because you will make

20:36

better choices, you won't pick

20:39

up work, and then not be able to

20:39

do the better thing because

20:41

you've, you've picked up

20:41

something else. But really, if

20:44

you can get that six months

20:44

organised, if you're already in

20:46

that employment, maybe you need

20:46

to put some money aside, I know

20:49

everyone can't do that. I know

20:49

it's incredibly privileged thing

20:52

to be able to do that. But if

20:52

you can, it will remove that

20:56

anxiety, and you'll just enjoy

20:56

it more. It's not fun doing it

21:02

with anxious feel awkward,

21:02

because but because you look

21:06

terrible.

21:10

You

21:10

absolutely do. Absolutely.

21:13

And also one bit

21:13

of advice I had recently which

21:16

which is good for everyone in a

21:16

portfolio career, but especially

21:18

at the start. If you are not

21:18

embarrassed, asking for your

21:22

rate then it's set too low. And

21:22

you know, it's a marketing,

21:26

right, it's a starting point for

21:26

conversation. If you're not

21:29

embarrassed, embarrassed asking

21:29

for this amount of money, then

21:33

you set it too low. You really

21:33

don't sell you, I mean, let's be

21:37

honest, at the beginning of a

21:37

portfolio career, you might make

21:39

choices that are not the same as

21:39

later on, you want to get some

21:42

work, you want to be in the

21:42

world you need to be in. Going

21:46

back to that idea of things that

21:46

are more stable, but maybe not

21:49

so well paid. Also look at what

21:49

is this organisation like, who's

21:54

in it, what's their network,

21:54

networking is one of those

21:58

powerful things in a portfolio

21:58

career. You might choose a gig

22:03

that gives you access to people,

22:03

who, you know, projects that

22:09

might have an extended kind of

22:09

governance that has, you know,

22:12

influential people in a

22:12

particular area. That's good to

22:15

be part of, you know, so you

22:15

might make some decisions,

22:18

again, for a lower rate that are

22:18

around, not just stability, but

22:23

like, you know, where could I go

22:23

on to next from this role? So I

22:27

really, really advise and very

22:27

careful choices around that

22:34

juggle these different - you

22:34

need to eat! But also, you know,

22:37

kind of where, where am I going

22:37

to go? Where could this bring me

22:39

on to next?

22:41

Yeah,

22:41

absolutely. I mean, how do you

22:43

have a side hustle can work in

22:43

so many different ways. And if

22:48

you can, like reduce your hours

22:48

down to four days a week, and

22:51

then have that day to explore?

22:51

That's a brilliant option.

22:54

That's great advice. I found

22:54

doing work in the evenings and

22:58

the weekends to start my side

22:58

hustles and start my portfolio

23:02

career that way, worked for me.

23:04

Yeah.

23:06

You do work

23:06

long hours and long days. And

23:10

it's not sustainable. And that's

23:10

a great place to start. But

23:14

don't do it forever, because you

23:14

get very tired. I guess that's

23:18

that's a piece of advice that I

23:18

would give myself if I was to

23:21

restart my career at any point.

23:21

But is there anything that you

23:24

would do differently if you had

23:24

a chance to restart anywhere

23:28

along your career path really?

23:31

Yes. So the one thing as I say that I have done differently is having that day

23:32

kind of self promotion for new

23:37

business, I think, or a period

23:37

of time programming and having

23:40

that kind of in there. Again,

23:40

the second time I did go back, I

23:45

was I was more chill about

23:45

finding work. I guess I know,

23:50

because I've done it before, and

23:50

it only you know, it will work

23:52

out then. And you know what, I

23:52

thought it would take much

23:54

longer to get back where I was

23:54

before. It took six months.

23:58

Yeah,

23:59

It took six

23:59

months to get back and earning

24:02

more than I was before, better

24:02

quality gigs, more respected and

24:07

in a lot of these, really valued

24:07

for my contribution. It took me

24:12

six months.

24:12

Yeah,

24:13

I thought I gave myself a year. In my head I was thinking this could take a year,

24:15

you got to you know, prepare for

24:17

that. It didn't. So yeah, try

24:17

and be chill. You know, you've

24:22

got to be you will make bad

24:22

choices if you're kind of

24:25

anxious. So that's that's one

24:25

thing I definitely did

24:27

differently. Being hotter on the

24:27

self promotion, I was saying no

24:32

more. Some people might find

24:32

that a problem. But sometimes

24:36

you do have to say no, or, you

24:36

know, working out a way that

24:40

something is going to work for

24:40

you. And if it's not, then it's

24:42

not the right sort of opportunity.

24:44

Yeah, that mean that's really important. If you're not saying no then are

24:46

you saying how does this

24:49

actually work for me? So often,

24:49

we just say yes, and then

24:53

realise it's not the right thing

24:53

later down the line, don't we?

24:57

Finally, and this is a question

24:57

that I go back to again, again,

25:00

but it is something that a lot

25:00

of people look to and

25:03

everybody's looking for the, for

25:03

the answer on how to succeed.

25:08

Naturally, that looks different

25:08

for all of us. How do you define

25:13

success? where you are in your

25:13

career now? And does that look

25:18

any different to how it did in

25:18

the past?

25:21

How do I define

25:21

success? I'm thinking a lot

25:24

about where I'm going next now.

25:24

So one thing I've gotten into

25:28

recently is I've started

25:28

exploring directorships of like

25:32

organisations and I looked for

25:32

things that I wanted to kind of

25:36

expand into, that were useful

25:36

for me, or I could bring

25:40

something there. So success for

25:40

me now is kind of what new

25:45

opportunities are being yielded

25:45

by my work.

25:48

Yeah, I get bored quickly. So that's

25:49

something I've learned about

25:51

myself. That's why I'm in a

25:51

portfolio career. And I've

25:53

actually learned that I need to

25:53

start very early thinking about

25:56

the next thing because heaven

25:56

help me if I get to to a

25:58

position where I am - okay, I'm

25:58

really bored now - because

26:01

that's disastrous. So having

26:01

that kind of thing, a bit

26:05

earlier, thinking about that...

26:05

I'm very lucky, opportunities do

26:09

come to me, I'm actually a

26:09

quite...where I talk about self

26:12

promotion, that's marketing - I'm actually quite lazy salesman, I'm not great about

26:13

going out there. I like when

26:16

opportunities come to me. I

26:16

should do more in that area. But

26:19

you know, we are where we are.

26:19

But for me, it is about looking

26:24

at the opportunities that I have

26:24

coming in and are - and are they

26:28

where I want to be? Is it going

26:28

to be interesting for me? Is it

26:31

can be fairly remunerated? That

26:31

to me is success, because I'm

26:35

enjoying the steps on the way

26:35

and I want to be doing things in

26:38

future that are enjoyable, that

26:38

success for me, I think really,

26:43

keeping it going in that way.

26:46

Yeah, that's, that's really good advice. And this whole

26:47

conversation, thank you so much

26:50

for your time, because there's

26:50

been so many snippets of

26:53

brilliant advice that I think

26:53

it's going to help so many

26:56

people who are already in a

26:56

portfolio career but looking to

27:00

maybe restart one or get into

27:00

one now. So yeah, thank you so

27:04

much for your time. I think

27:04

we're gonna wrap up there. But I

27:07

wish you every success with all

27:07

your next ventures.

27:10

Thank you.

27:11

Thanks very much.