SDH 475: Freelancer to Full-Time Entrepreneur with Emily Mills

Hello everyone, welcome back to another podcast episode. This week I am joined by Emily Mills. Emily is an illustrator, designer, business owner and author. We're going to dive into how she started her business as a side hustle and decided to make her ultimate leap, leaving her corporate job in the rearview mirror and building out her business to what it is today.

Emily describes herself as an illustrator - a big umbrella term covering all of the amazing things she does. Alongside her husband in their business, Emily does animation, whiteboard explainer videos, live event illustration and is the founder of Sketchnote Academy. Inside Sketchnote Academy Emily is a coach and teacher, teaching others how to do something called ‘sketchnoting’.

Sketchnoting is basically writing and drawing at the same time. It helps with memory retention and it’s creative, fun, and overall really fun to look at.

“I never planned on niching down like that. But it turned out that it was a really good melding or marriage of all of my personal passions and skills.”

Her Story

Early on in her journey, Emily found herself working at a church as a graphic designer. It was her second job out of college and she was already feeling the internal struggle of changing jobs and relocating every few years because of the recession. At one point she joined a Facebook group with an author who wrote books about starting your own business and believing in yourself. At first, her goal was to pay off debt and she achieved this through freelancing her graphic design services, because working at a church doesn’t pay much. Through her freelance work she was able to pay off her car as well as her credit cards and realized that she could just keep going and see what happens.

Eventually Emily relocated again to Nashville for a different job, and again, was disillusioned with just how the corporate world is.

“I knew that it wasn't a great fit for me and my personality and my goals and my values.”

Emily found herself double-dipping, so to speak. Her day job offered flex time so she would work 7am-3pm (no lunch break) then head to a co-working space and work on her freelance business until roughly 9pm. In a new city this was a great opportunity to meet people and grow her side hustle at the same time.

She eventually got to the point where she was using her vacation time from her day job to go do freelance client work and when she was almost out of vacation days she decided it was time to make a big decision. After praying over it and fate stepping in, Emily was forced out of her day job and she took it as a sign to make her ultimate leap. As soon as she made that leap she landed her highest paying gig and it continued to snowball and grow from there.

Emily believes in rolling with what falls into your lap. While she loves planning, she has learned that if she simply follows the things that fall into her lap she will have a lot more success and be able to live in the moment.

“I'm just going to do it. It's going to be scary, but everything's going to be okay.”

Emily has achieved some incredible things but one of the things she is most proud of and excited about is Sketchnote Academy.

What does 2022 look like for Emily?

“My biggest goal [for 2022] is kind of shifting the balance needle on client work versus sketchnote Academy. I'm really excited about the things that are happening with sketchnote Academy, it grew a ton this year, more than any other year, and I'm just really excited about maintaining that growth and excitement and reaching more people. So I'm excited to do new courses, I'm excited to keep the community going and maybe even break into coaching and do more small groups or one on one teaching. There's just so much opportunity out in the world and when you start seeing those doors open, it's just really exciting.”

Emily’s Final Note

“I believe everybody has the potential to make the leap and create their own business and I'm excited for all the great things that the world is going to have because you're in it.”

You can connect with Emily on Instagram (@emily_a_mills) and find out more about Sketchnote Academy on her website.

Until next time, keep doing it your way!

Insights:

“I never planned on niching down like that. But it turned out that it was a really good melding or marriage of all of my personal passions and skills.”
“She eventually got to the point where she was using her vacation time from her day job to go do freelance client work and when she was almost out of vacation days she decided it was time to make a big decision.”
“I believe everybody has the potential to make the leap and create their own business and I'm excited for all the great things that the world is going to have because you're in it.”