Ep 4: How to Leave Corporate and Move Abroad

You want to relocate abroad, but one question keeps coming up: how will I support myself if I leave my job?

In this episode of The Bougie Expat Podcast, Sable breaks down three practical exit paths for women over 40 who want to leave corporate, relocate, and create income that supports their next chapter.

Sable shares how to use your existing skills in a new way, build a business before you move, or create a hybrid exit plan while still working full-time. She explains why your exit strategy should begin before you land in your new country, why money needs to be part of your relocation plan from the start, and how your corporate experience can become the foundation for consulting, remote work, fractional leadership, coaching, or entrepreneurship.

This episode is for Black women over 40 who are thinking about moving abroad, leaving corporate, building location-independent income, or creating a smoother path into expat life.

In This Episode

•  Why your exit plan should start before you relocate 
•  Three paths for leaving corporate and moving abroad 
•  How to use your existing skills in a new way 
•  Remote work, consulting, and fractional leadership options 
•  Why career reinvention can support relocation 
•  How entrepreneurship can become your exit path 
•  Service-based, product-based, coaching, and consulting businesses 
•  Why business structure, sales, and support matter 
•  How to build a side business while keeping your job 
•  Why a hybrid exit can reduce financial pressure 
•  How to save and reinvest business income before moving 
•  Why your next chapter should be built around work you actually enjoy

Thank you for listening to The Bougie Expat Podcast.

If this episode spoke to you, subscribe to the podcast and share it with another Black woman over 40 who has been thinking about relocating abroad, retiring overseas, or designing a new chapter with more freedom, peace, and intention.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

If you're a person who's already making very good money and you're saying, I'm not going to risk that from starting all over, then yeah, this is the path that you want to consider. Because actually, when you take your skills and you take them out like it's fractional leadership or consulting, you will see a bump 20 to 40 percent in what you are already earning just by repackaging what you already make.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

She's done waiting, she's done shrinking, and she's done building empires in rooms that were never designed for her. This is the Bougie Expat, the podcast for black women over 40 who are ready to reinvent their lives, rebuild their income, and relocate with intention. If you're done settling in corporate, tired of environments that no longer feel aligned, or quietly planning your next move, you are in the right place. Hosted by Sable, live from Panama City, Panama. Seven countries, four continents, one move she made in five months flat. Income strategies, exit plans, a life designed to actually fit you without starting over broke. Let's get into it.

SPEAKER_01 1:27

All right, so let's talk about it. You want to relocate, you've been scouting, you've been looking around, but you just don't know how to make your exit, right? And you are not alone. Most women over 40, they want to leave the corporate, they want to leave their full-time jobs, but they're wondering what's going to happen if I leave? Like, how am I going to support myself afterwards? And it's not because we don't have the skills, it's not because we don't have knowledge, but we really just can't see what would be that path. How do I make that exit? What do I do once I say I'm done? Once I hand in my resignation letter, then what? What's going to happen for me? And that's what we're going to be talking about today. I'm going to show you three exit paths, three ways that you can start getting out of your corporate job and being able to move. Because relocating is absolutely your dream. I know it's what you see for yourself in the next chapter, but it also you see yourself in the next chapter pretty much having a great time. And you can't do that without having money. And so, how are you going to keep your money going? So for me, I would say that I see women constantly talking about they want to move. I hear what they're saying. And then that question comes up: money, but how will I support myself? How am I going to take care of myself? And depending on what country you're talking about, you may not even be able to get a job there. So today we're going to talk about ways that you could move and not worry about the money, or at least have money included in your strategy. So you don't have to worry about that once you make the move. What I'm talking about today, these exit paths are not something that you're going to do after you get to your new destination, but this is something you're going to start today. Today, you are going to start figuring out how to exit. Your exit path doesn't start once you're in the country, unpacked, the boxes are all put away, but it happens while you are even considering. And it doesn't even matter if you don't know the country you want to go to. So the first one I want to talk about is reinventing yourself in your career. Most of you have amazing skills. I always say it's my HR skills that took me around the world. Having these skills, having this knowledge is how other companies have hired me across the globe because it's a transferable skill. You probably also have a transferable skill. So you can take your skills, the same skills that you have now, and offer them in a different way. You can take it by say, hey, can I find a remote job? Who is hiring remote? Because yes, remote is still in style. 22 million people are still working remote. The challenge is with this remote work, can you find a remote job that says remote anywhere? That is where you're going to find your challenge. But you can also do consulting. Sometimes for the same company that you actually work for, you can now say, hey, switch me to a contract worker and I will now consult in the same exact role that I was doing. The benefit for them is they no longer have to pay you benefits. They also can even put you on project-based work. So this means for them, they're not paying you all the time. They're only paying you per project. Or you can look at fractional leadership work, which means especially for my women who are senior leaders and mid-leaders, you can now be a fractional leader in someone's company, small businesses, or even an organization who is maybe going through a restructuring and may only need that role for a short time. This is great for women who are not quite ready to make a full-time leap into entrepreneurship. But also I want to say just because you've been doing something for the last 10, 15, 20 years does not mean in this next chapter that you are going to do the same thing. You could, but only do that if you love doing this work. Hey, I don't want you moving into your next chapter, still doing something that you don't like. This may be your total career reinvention. Totally, not just changing how you do what you do, but what you do. So before you even start thinking about remote, consulting, fractional, I want you to think about what do I really want to do? When you were in the sandbox, that little girl dreaming of a career, what were you really thinking about? Because perhaps now is the time. This may be for the time for you to look at how you can do that. So let me just say this. I know a lot of you are saying, well, I don't have an experience in that. I don't have the education or the certification. It's too late for me to start doing that. Absolutely not. I heard a woman ask Gary V the other day, hey, I'm 49. Is it too late to start over? And he said, Oh, you have 50 years in front of you. Maybe she does. But I'm saying this, you're not starting over. What you're doing is taking everything that you know, and now you're placing it in a different bucket. You're pivoting, but you're not pivoting with an empty hand. You are pivoting with like locked and loaded with all this knowledge and spill skills. So perhaps maybe sometimes your industry would change. Sometimes what you're doing is totally different, but it's in the industry that you have always been in. So you have to think about how you can continue to do what you love. Some of you have been doing it as a side hustle. Maybe it's now it's time for it to take its rightful place in your life and be front and center as the very thing that feeds you. The opportunities are there. It's about structuring those opportunities, looking for where you can actually land and how you can come in doing what you absolutely love. The other thing I want to say is doing this is definitely for women who are saying, I want to do something different. I want to now relocate in. I still want to continue to work. But I need to know that my money is going to come in every month. And if you're a person who is at a low risk of your money, your finances, you're like, I cannot have that at risk. I don't have that kind of risk talent, then you want to consider this career reinvention path. If you're a person who's already making very good money and you're saying, I'm not going to risk that from starting all over, then yeah, this is the path that you want to consider. Because actually, when you take your skills and you take them out like it's fractional leadership or consulting, you will see a bump, 20 to 40% in what you are already earning just by repackaging what you already make. And if you already have a strong corporate background, people love that because they know that you understand how corporate works. So that this is not somebody who's coming as a novice. They don't really understand the ins and outs, they don't have political savvy. So this opportunity of reinventing yourself and taking yourself into an organization with all the skills that you have, and they're like, oh, but you work for so-and-so for 20 plus years, Fortune 100, Fortune 500, Fortune 1000. Yeah, absolutely. Bring those skills. We want to see it. So for me, I told you my HR skills is what took me across the globe. I took those skills and I took them to Ethiopia. A German company identified me and I was a contractor. So I worked with them on a contract. And while I was on a contract, this contract was like over five years. And that gave me very stable income. While I didn't have any medical benefits with it, or I wasn't paid for days off or vacation, but it came with so many other parts: flights, food allowance, uh, housing allowance. It surely covered everything else. So I want you to think about that. Excuse me. How you can maintain your salary or in your salary bracket or even increase your salary by just changing around how you do your skills. Now, another way you can exit is by entrepreneurship.

unknown 9:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

Build your own thing. That is what we're doing, black women. We have been doing it consistently since 2017. We are the fastest growing demographic when it comes to entrepreneurship. And so if you have been thinking about this idea that you have, you see a gap in the market, you want to now go ahead and reach out. You can't find remote work, you're not interested in remote work, you're tired of working for someone else. You can take your same skills and take it into a business, a business of coaching. You can become a coach. And, you know, there's so many different ways of becoming coaches. You can actually get certification from the International Federal, I think it's IFC, the International Federation of Coaching. You can also just become a coach because depending on who you want to coach and what you're coaching on, you may not even need certification. If you're talking about going into corporate, yes, you're going to need some kind of certification. I went through a certification training. So I could be a certified coach. And that opens the doors for me when I want to go into corporate and I want to do executive leadership training because usually they want to see you have that training. They want to see you have that certification because there is a certain model that that actually that kind of coaching follows. But if you're saying, you know what, that's not what I want to do, I want to do a different kind of coaching. I want to have a coaching business. Then if you're going to have your own business coaching and not trying to do business B2B, then you know what? It's B2C. Most consumers are not going to ask you for certification. So go ahead and do that. Also, you can do consulting. That's also you can take your same skills and consult. Or you can have a brand new business, something that you've never done before, a service-based business. And your service-based business can be with the skills that you have or something brand new, right? You can sell something that you have never done before. You can have a product-based business. Look at all the kinds of business like on demand, on-demand t-shirts. You can, you know, there's so many people creating all kinds of cosmetics, soaps, and lotions. And there's, I mean, the market is just huge of what kind of business that you can have. But that is a great way for you to lead. So ask yourself again, sit down and think, what do I really want to do? What do I love doing? What do I do well? And how can I convert that into a business? Now, if you are thinking about being an entrepreneur, I know people love to say, oh, I don't want anybody, I don't want a boss. I just want to be flexible with my hours. I don't want anybody to tell me what to do. Entrepreneurship is not all this fancy-free, oh, I can just wake up at 10 o'clock in the morning, be finished at work by two o'clock, and hit the beach. There is a lot of groundwork you're going to have to do. Remember, it's like a baby. You are birthing, it is an embryo, and you will have to nurture it for some time. It is going to require a lot of attention. It's going to require a lot of money, and it's going to require a lot of focus. And then, yes, you can absolutely grow it. Yes, you will have autonomy to make your own decisions about how you want to build your business, what you want your mission to be for this business, what the model would be for this business. All those things absolutely belong to you. But I don't want you to think that, oh, I'm going to start this business and I'm going to make back my salary within one year. If you do, hallelujah, hallelujah, amen. I am for you, sister. But I also want you also to be realistic that it does take time to grow a business. And I do hate that word realistic. So I so hate that I just use it. But I want you to also let me just say this frame your expectations according to your effort. And so if you're like, oh, I don't want to work that hard, like me, I'm semi-retired. I want to be semi-retired, right? Then you know that you're going to make semi-retired money. But if you're a person who is saying that, no, I am going for it. I still have a lot of energy. I want to make back my, not only what I was making before, but even more than that, absolutely. But you do have to also have a certain amount of risk. Because doing this, when you're doing your own business, you are everything in the beginning. Unless you got a whole bucket of money sitting somewhere ready to fund that business, you're going to be everything. And so I would also say if you were thinking about the business, get yourself a coach. Now, I know a lot of people start a business, they never had anybody coach, but you would hear the most successful people have lots of coaches. And get yourself a coach, get yourself someone who's going to give you a framework and help you build that out. This way you could get stable a lot faster. So you don't lose money in trial and error. I can tell you, I have started, I've been starting businesses like forever. When I was working in corporate and many, many years ago, I started businesses. But I also know that I made a lot of blunders. I made a lot of mistakes when I started out. I didn't understand how to put the first thing first. And the first thing is sales, sales, sales. I was so busy like most people, tweaking my Facebook page, tweaking my photos, tweaking my website, looking for brand colors, all the things that do not equal to cash. I don't want that to be you. I want you to think about your exit strategy if it's entrepreneurship and get the support that you need so you can grow that business. Because when you do it that way, you will begin to enjoy the freedom that you're looking for as your business is scaring. You'll be able to enjoy the income you're looking for. Because as an entrepreneur, you determine your salary, you determine how big you want to grow or how small you want to grow, but you cannot grow if you don't have structure. You can't grow if you don't have focus. So I don't want you to be one of those $50,000 businesses. I want you to be a part of the 1% of women who are making seven figures. And to do that, it is not by uh putting puzzle, you know, just you know, just I don't know what to even call it, but all that DIY. You probably will need some help. I know people come online, they're like, oh my gosh, I sell three digital products and I made a million dollars in the last five minutes. I don't know. I don't know. Is that true? I don't know. Hallelujah for those ones who are able to do that. But I just want to say, if for you, if you want to do this, if this is your strategy, then start working on it. Now, you do not have to quit your job to start your business, which goes to my third one, which is hybrid exit. Start building your income now, start building that side hustle that you have now out enough that when you can leave, people already know your business. I have for so long worked in the hybrid model. When I was working for the airline, I had my little side business where I was selling uh stockings and jewelry and all kinds of accessories. And I started out just with a little bag, walking around my office, selling them. I then got a kiosk in a mall and I was selling it there. And so that was hybrid because every day I still went to my nine to five. I still had a job and I had a store in the mall. So you can do both. You can do both. Even, I mean, I think pretty much a huge part of my career when I wasn't a full-time entrepreneur, then I was a hybrid person, right? I worked hybrid, I've done consulting while I still have my full-time job. I've always had opportunities to do other things. Why? Because my skills are always needed. People are always looking for HR skills. I uh I do a lot of trainings. Till today, I still do a lot of trainings, I still do a lot of HR contracts. So that is what I'm saying. You can also do that. That's the hybrid model. And until you build your business to where you want it to be, you don't have to quit your job, which means you don't have to exit that quickly. And so you would leave your job with a lot more confidence. And so now you're saying, I'm building this business. And what I'm saying, building a business, this is a non-zip code business. It is not tied to any zip code. So when you're ready to actually make your step, most women I talk to are talking about 12 to 18 months in their move. And so now you for 12 to 18 months, you've been working on this business, you've been growing this business, you've been letting everybody know that you're in business while you're still working. You're using your income to fund this business. And I would suggest also the money you're making from this business, don't spend any of it. Just use it for savings, use it for investing, invest back more into the business. So this way you have this nest steak on the side that you're leaving with. Also, think about how you can start reducing how much you're spending in your everyday life so you can even save even more money and get accustomed to like when you're leaving. Because maybe when you're ready to leave in 12 to 18 months, your business is not matching your salary. And it doesn't have to, especially if you're moving to countries where it's more affordable, that business probably could still sustain you. I tell you all the time, I live off of one-third of what I used to make. Now, I also, you know, given a true caveat, used to only live, live off of one half of my salary even before when I was working full-time. I actually took half of my salary and putting in savings and investing. And so now, even living off of one-third of the one-third of the whatever it is, it's still a lot easier. So I know we all love to, you know, enjoy life, travel. I'm your girl, love to travel, love to shop, love to hang out, but I also love to live a life that I design for myself. And sometimes it means making adjustments in the things that we're doing. So if you're a woman who is very concerned about risk, this may be the plan for you. If you're a planner, you like to know step by step, have a structure, this may be the way for you to go. This also provides you a very smooth transition. So I want you to consider as you're considering this path, this path is probably most successful and the most successful fast in transition for people who really want to be entrepreneurs, but they haven't quite found out what their niche is, they're not really sure. So this gives you a chance to do a little trial and error. It builds your confidence also while you still have full-time salary. You're building your confidence by making money. You don't feel pressure, you're not hungry for a sale because you know that you're making money somewhere else, and the money that you're getting from your business is extra. So I want you to think about that. So, you know, I have done all three. I have worked as a contractor and uh had a position and worked in another country. I have owned my own business. I had started my own HR firm. I have also done the hybrid where I was working full-time, and I had a side business as well, and doing trainings, doing consulting. So, whichever way it is that it works for you, you've got to figure out what makes sense for you. But I do want to really say this to you. Please do not craft a business, do not craft your career invention around something you really don't enjoy, around something that feels safe. This is your moment to leap. If you are going to leap, leap big. If you're going to make this move, do it in such a way that you absolutely will enjoy when you get to the other side. Leaving corporate at a safe salary, 401k benefits is not a very easy thing to do. Expect you know, for a lot of people, it's very uncomfortable. But I'm gonna tell you this if that is what you want to do, you absolutely can do it. But in thinking about doing it and wanting to do it, do it with a plan, do it with a strategy, and don't allow fear to stop you from doing it. Go ahead and do it. You have experience and knowledge, you are powerful, you can do this. So I'm Sami Badaki. I am your bougie girlfriend. I want you to live an elevated life. Continue to walk in your dream. You can have it. You just have to start doing it. Have an amazing day.

SPEAKER_00 22:36

That's a wrap. And if this episode resonated with you, go ahead and follow the podcast and share it with another woman who's ready for her next chapter. And if you're ready to move beyond thinking and start building your exit strategy, I invite you to join me inside my live experience, the Elevated Exit Masterclass. You'll find the link in the show notes. Until next time, make your next move a bougie one.