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Entrepreneurs come from all walks of life. Some come from cushy corporate jobs, while others create companies in their early twenties fresh out of college. Unfortunately, there is no clear path towards entrepreneurship. 

Our latest guest on the Inner Edison Podcast had a slightly different path into her entrepreneurial journey. 

Jocelyn Stewart’s path towards entrepreneurship was unconventional. She started her career as a lawyer in the military. Over time, she moved into the private sector before deciding to become her own boss. 

Jocelyn explained her journey into entrepreneurship and the challenges of moving from the public to the private sector. If you’re currently wondering how to leap into entrepreneurship, you won’t want to miss what she had to say.

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

After working in the public sector for the military, Jocelyn threw her hat in the ring and worked for another law firm before starting on her own.  

While she worked for another firm, she put together a site to help build up her credibility. While she admits that her site was more of a glorified resume, she credits it for helping her slowly build organic traffic while building up a client list. 

If you’re planning on starting an entrepreneurial journey, you can’t go wrong with creating a website and playing the long game. 

Moving Into the Role of Entrepreneurship

Sometimes entrepreneurs are fortunate enough to build a business while working for others, and sometimes it’s thrust upon them. The latter was definitely the case for Jocelyn. 

While working with a law firm, she began to get more and more clients specifically requesting her at the firm, which pressed the partners to make a difficult decision. Finally, they felt it was in her best interest to try and go out on her own, so she did! 

While she admits that it was a scary process, it helped her learn about building a business while growing her client list. As a former military lawyer, she received a lot of clients who were former or active duty. 

It has become her small niche within the industry. 

Learning the Importance of Marketing

Jocelyn quickly learned that if you want credibility, you must rank on sites like Google. With her earlier site, she was more invested in being online. Now, she was invested in gaining qualified leads, and that took a powerful marketing approach. 

She focused on building a site that would stand out from the competition and help drive traffic. It was a slow, organic build. But, once she started to move up in the rankings in Google, it was just a matter of time before she had more leads than she could take on her own. 

That’s when she started to hire employees. She advocates a slow building process and not trying to grow too fast. 

Helping Others

Jocelyn jokes that she’s slowly trying to work herself out of a job. Why? It’s simple. She wants to help others like her navigate the waters of going from the public military sector to entrepreneurship. 

She outlines part of the process in her first book, Shaping the Battlefield. She explains how to draft motions in military practice like a pro. Her goal is to help others move from the public to the private sector and finally into entrepreneurship status. 

With her second book starting pre-orders in the coming weeks, she is currently working on her third book, hopefully, due next year. Her second book helps lawyers how to litigate motions in military courtrooms. So if you’ve been looking for a way to turn your military law profession into a new entrepreneurial adventure, you’ve just met your new mentor. 

For more great articles and interviews about entrepreneurism and more, please check out the Inner Edison Podcast with Ed Parcaut.