You’re great at solving tough problems for your clients. Turning that expertise into clear positioning, compelling offers and a steady flow of right-fit clients? That’s a different challenge.
Build a business that gives your expertise room to pay off.
You want a business that makes the most of your expertise without demanding more and more of your time. But most of the advice for growing one points in the opposite direction. Add more.
More visibility
More content to create.
More leads
More sales calls to juggle.
More clients
More work to deliver.
More automation
More systems to manage.
When the business runs on your expertise, most of the more runs on you. And there’s less and less of you left over. Which is a really strange way to build a business that’s supposed to give you more time for the high-value work you do best—and more freedom outside of it.
The easier it is for the right people to understand what you do, see why it matters to them, and know what they can hire you for—and easily tell 10 friends why they should too—the less often you’ll find yourself trying to whip up new clients from scratch.
That’s where positioning, offers, and client attraction need to be tuned together. It’s also where most advice goes off the rails by fixating on just one piece. You can’t make good decisions by optimizing one piece in isolation because every choice has effects elsewhere.
Ideal fit clients keep finding their way to you without you having to send click-and-cringe invites on LinkedIn.
Paints a vivid picture of what working with you looks like—the value you create, what’s possible, and what your client brings to making it work.
The right people understand precisely how you can help them solve their toughest (and most expensive) problem.
Hi there, I’m Joan Gaffney, business strategy consultant and coach.
If you’ve spent time trying to grow your consulting business, you’ve probably come across plenty of smart advice. The hard part is knowing what makes sense for your business—and what’s just going to give you one more thing to manage.
I spent years in corporate helping businesses turn sophisticated expertise into something clients can understand, value, and buy. My work spanned strategy, marketing, operations, and service delivery, so I’ve seen the same strategy work beautifully in one setting and create entirely different problems in another.
As a business coach, I work across the business to help you create steady demand with premium pricing and lightweight systems. I’ll help you see through all the possible directions, evaluate what options will work most effectively for you, and pull the right pieces into a clear, actionable path forward.
Your business owes you more, and I’m here to help you get it.
The Solution Lab is private business coaching specifically for experienced independent consultants and specialists who built their expertise in corporate roles and now want a more deliberate way to structure their offers, pricing, client work, and day-to-day operations.
Just dipping your toe in the consulting water but not quite ready to dive into the deep end? The Career Detox might be for you. It’s specifically designed for senior professionals ready to shake off the corporate labels and get a fresh take on how all their experience might look in a new frame.
