From Corporate Mindset to Consulting Reality: My 3-Year Transformation

I quit my Fortune 200 job to blast Young Dolph and build a six-figure agency. Here's what happened next

I’ve almost run my agency into the red several times in three years.

Not because I’m bad at data consulting—but because I was terrible at understanding cash flow.

Having optimized inflows and outflows of cash is extremely hard to achieve in the early years. Trust me, I know this because I’ve been running my six-figure agency for 3.5 years (2+ years full time) and it’s been a roller coaster.

As a data consulting agency founder, you feel the vision. If you’re serious and have your foot on the gas, you see the movement. However, the progress towards your goals often does not feel real.

Why?

Restricted and delayed cash flow.

If you’re looking to truly start and scale a sustainable data consulting agency in 2025, thinking that this industry and growth moves fast is far from reality. The fabricated reels and glamorized lifestyles of entrepreneurs on Instagram aren’t what it actually looks and feels like.

Last week I shared something vulnerable on LinkedIn about sales cycles, and many have reached out saying they’ve felt this too (post below). The post resonated because it was real—90-day waits, procurement delays, watching bills pile up while contracts sit unsigned. Today I want to pull back the curtain even further.

I want to take you through a detailed dive into my experiences and mindset transformation after over 2 years of riding the entrepreneurship wave and living out these learnings.

Data professionals are naturally risk-averse. My former identity as a data analyst defaulted to the statistical probabilities, logical reasoning and math behind the chance of success. More often than not, I limited myself and what I thought was possible to achieve.

I’ve had to battle the inner voices inside of my head that told me I couldn’t live my true vision in data consulting. I had to overhaul how I think about finances and money, as holding onto my financial upbringing that was so hard-wired into me was slowing me down.

Hopefully my authentic story is able to ignite a spark in you, and give you a little more awareness into maneuvering the consulting battlefield. Maybe this helps you determine if you want to step foot in this wild arena.

Lastly—I’m not saying I have all of this figured out yet. I recognize I’ve only been in this game for about 4 years. My journey is truly just beginning, but I’ve also weathered some storms where most have quit. I owe it to you, my audience, to share these learnings.

The Infatuation Stage

I remember the day I submitted my two week notice to my employer vividly. I was a senior analytics engineer at a Fortune 200 commercial real estate firm. I had just been promoted. From the outside looking in, I had it made.

There were thousands who would’ve given anything to fill the position I held. Serving as the lead data architect of an $80B assets under management data pipeline was no small feat, and I just kissed it all goodbye.

As soon as I hit send, I felt a massive rush of adrenaline. I just jumped off a cliff, and had begun the journey of free falling. I exchanged some warm words with my manager. We both became emotional on a call, but parted ways on incredibly great terms.

I stormed around my apartment for 2 hours cranking the song Blind Fold by Young Dolph (yeah, I enjoy some pretty hardcore rap at the gym or after milestones in business) on repeat.

As I paced my apartment, I envisioned myself cold calling, emailing and meeting executives at events that would lead to closed deals within a few hours to a week…MAX.

My expectation of the sales side of consulting was forged through movies like The Wolf of Wallstreet and Wallstreet movies, as well as having the opportunity to sell cars at 19 years old the summer after my freshman year of college.

I figured, as long as I keep posting LinkedIn content and getting in front of the right people, my customer base would find me.

What I didn’t understand was that I had just entered the arena of Business to Business (B2B) complex sales. This was a whole different level from anything I had sold or content consumed in the past.

Average sales cycles in complex B2B average around 90 days for Steinert Analytics (in my experience and conversations). I’ve heard, speaking with other consultants and competitors, this is a fairly standard timeframe, and one I’ve directly observed as I’ve endured these cycles.

If you’re new to data consulting, know that this isn’t a get rich quick play. “Building it and they will come” mentality will blow you right into no man’s land, staring at an empty deposit bank statement month after month.

Be humble, be aware and begin your inbound and outbound lead generation funnels as soon as you can.

The Journey Into Mentorship and Coaching: A 180 Degree Mindset Shift

Ditch a Corporate Money Mindset

Once I had officially put in my two weeks, I worked closely with a business coach who runs a $10M+ annual revenue roofing company.

One of the biggest takeaways from my work with him is that money is just energy. I had been raised to count every dollar, spend little, and save as much as I could.

These are all incredibly important, but running a business requires cash. And if you’re truly going ALL IN, you need to be prepared for the financial mindset shift that comes with swinging risk using large chunks of coin.

I’ve spent multiple five figures on coaching and marketing in the last 2 years. Was this easy for me to get my head around? No. But sticking to the learnings from that mentor, I was highly motivated and inspired, and deep down knew this was the path I always wanted to walk.

Money is just energy. Money is just energy. Money is just energy. If you sit and stare at it in a bank account, you can’t create the momentum needed to achieve the growth you desire.

My mindset around money is now felt in ways I didn’t expect. I can move around thousands of dollars towards investments that don’t have a guaranteed return now. Seeing those numbers flow in and out of the business account has become like second nature to me.

I don’t say this to flex. I say this because it’s reality. You’ll gradually get more comfortable with the idea that you’re throwing energy at your growth, rather than risking a financial loss. Own it!

Business Growth is Personal Growth

The second half of my mentorship growth journey comes from a gentleman that I met at the end of 2024 and have been working with closely this year.

Yes, he’s extremely tactical when it comes to lead generation and engineering sales systems. However, he’s also unlocked a personal transformation within me. This transformation has allowed me to navigate the inevitable lows of data consulting—the ghost clients, the stalled deals, the months where revenue dips—without spiraling.

Rooted in the teachings of Dan Sullivan’s The Strategic Coach (The Gap and the Gain), this mentor has forced me into the mindset of abundance. Always focus on the Gain in every success, failure and problem that arises when running a data consulting firm.

Here’s what that looks like in practice:

Instead of thinking “I only closed two deals this quarter when I wanted four” (the Gap), I started asking “How did I close two enterprise healthcare deals at 29 when I couldn’t have landed one 18 months ago?” (the Gain).

That reframe changed everything.

The joy of entrepreneurship is not the destination. It’s the journey of who you become and the realization that you’ve gotten so far since starting, it’s incredible to be at the place you’re at right now.

This realization creates alignment and self-actualization. Which I’ve felt an incredible amount of this year. He refers to this as “flow”. Bootstrapping a six-figure consulting company at 27 to leading data modernizations and transformations as a fractional chief data strategist at 29…forever grateful to be in this position! I hope everyone gets to experience this level of satisfaction in their work.

Conclusion

If you’re reading this and you’re on the edge—considering leaving corporate or scaling your own consultancy—know this: it’s harder than you think, slower than you expect, and more transformative than you can imagine.

The gap between where you are and where you want to be? That’s not failure. That’s the game.

We’ll continue this next week. I’m going to break down the different seasons of running a data consulting agency—the feast months, the famine months, and how to survive both. It’s not what social media makes it out to be, and I want to share those realities with you in detail.

I hope this opened your eyes to the realities of cash flow and B2B sales cycles, while giving you a taste for the mental shift I’ve had to undergo in the last 2 years. I truly feel like a changed person in the best of ways. It’s just not easy going through it.

See you next week.

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Christian Steinert is the founder of Steinert Analytics, helping healthcare & roofing organizations turn data into actionable insights. Subscribe to Rooftop Insights for weekly perspectives on analytics and business intelligence in these industries.

Feel free to book a call with us here or reach out to Christian on LinkedIn. Thank you!

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