Interview with Secret Agent Josephine

by Carrie Pålsson

Brenda Ponnay, better known as Secret Agent Josephine amongst her flock of blog followers, spends her days doing what you and I dream of doing. She wanders along the beach, she plays with her cats, she watches Law and Order and she spends an amazing amount of time doing graphic designs, making lumpy cats and arranging wedding flowers.

Brenda gave up her job as a corporate coupon typing monkey to pursue her dreams of being her own boss. The dreams started early. She was just 12-years-old when she started her own family newspaper. As she grew up and entered the real world of office work, she didn't give up freelancing. She worked on various side projects while quickly climbing the company ladder and becoming art director of a junk mail heaven. She worked with some big names and fancy clients, but as she so bluntly puts it "it was still junk mail."

Finally Brenda had enough. Enough frustration with her job and enough courage to strike out on her own. She handed in her walking papers and started the life many of us dream of--being her own boss.

I've asked Brenda to share a little about what she does and how she does it.

What made you realize the time was right to leave the corporate world and embark on your own?

I wanted to leave my corporate job for years. The company I worked for had been bought by another company and it seemed they didn't know which end was up. It was really hard to watch friends and co-workers who I respected leave for better jobs. I'd watched more than 50 people leave this company for better work or just because they were plain fed up. It felt like I was on a sinking ship. Every person who left was a sign for me to leave too but I couldn't leave because my feet were mired in cement. That cement was money. It was a really easy job and I got paid a lot of money. The company was going bankrupt. The end was in sight. It was just a question of when I would choose to get out.

The one moment that triggered it was petty. My boss wanted me to apologize to someone who I had been curt with. It's a long drawn out stupid story... the kind you hear from anybody who works with idiots. The bottom line was I had my pride and I didn't think I should apologize for anything. So I didn't. I told my boss I didn't want to work with people like this anymore and I was quitting. So that was that. My boss was totally cool. He knew it was coming. We all wanted to quit all the time.

I had lots of freelance work on the side and my husband's business was taking off. He desperately needed help. We had agreed that it would be okay if I quit someday in order to help him in his work. That day turned out to be sooner than later.

How much planning went into the decision to quit your corporate job?

How much planning? Hmmm.... well I fantasized about quitting for years. But it wasn't like I had a life plan and was saving up money (which would have been smart). I guess the only real planning I did was during the month that I stayed at my corporate job after putting in my notice. That was when I started stocking up on manilla folders and buying myself every imaginable office product I could ever need while I still had a pay check and didn't have to ask my husband for money. I don't feel like I planned at all but I always knew that someday I would work for myself. Working away at some corporation who doesn't even know my name never felt like the right fit for me. It was amazing that I had stayed so long already.

Aside from financial insecurity, what was the scariest part of leaving your job?

The scariest part is working in the house with my husband all day. I thought for sure we'd kill each other. We'd collaborated on artistic projects before and it was awful. We never agree on anything. It's like we both want to be the main cook and don't want to take orders from the other. Being a professional stay-at-home wife has led me to experiment with all kinds of identities I never had before. Like maybe it is my job to cook and clean all day. How shocking! I came from a Christian home where it was "proper" to be submissive to your husband but I'm also very independent and I've always supported myself even if it meant working two jobs. Being dependent on someone else is really, really hard. That's why I work so hard at my freelance job in order to make my own money. I hate asking him for money.

People might think that I'm some kind of dream person who quit their job and is making fists full of money doing what I love. It's not quite that. I admit I rely heavily on my husband's successful business. I don't know that I could have taken the steps I have taken if I didn't have his financial support. I think he likes it that he can finally "provide" for me because there were many years, early on in our relationship, where I supported him. So yeah, it's tricky working with your husband all day in your house.

BUT!!!! Surprisingly we get along a lot better than I expected! We have the luxury of having two offices in our house and we both tap away quietly at our computer barely bugging each other at all. It helps that he is a photographer and is gone for hours at a time shooting but still I am surprised. That is one good thing I didn't not expect.

What's the best part of being your own boss?

Being able to pick and choose the kind of work I want to work on. If I don't like a client or their job seems like it will be a big pain I just up my price until I'm way too expensive and they go elsewhere. I don't always have the luxury of doing that, but I am getting more and more aggressive in my pricing. For a long time I took every job that ever came my way and then I found that people were coming to me just because I was cheap. I don't want to be the cheap designer that gets all the crap work. I'd rather starve and have worked on some really great projects.

How do you keep motivated on a daily basis?

Well, I don't. Lots of times I'm unmotivated and it sucks. Every once in a while I give myself a swift kick in the butt because I'm so mad that maybe we won't be able to buy a house someday and it could be all my fault. Other days it's just the clients themselves that keep me working. I really like to keep my word and if I say I'm going to do something I feel like a complete idiot jerk when they call and I'm not done. So I guess I could say the phone ringing keeps me motivated.

How can people get in touch with you to buy your services? What can you offer them?

Email is the best way to get in touch with me right now. I'm trying to put together a price list so people get an idea of how much my designs cost but it's hard because so much of the work I do is custom and has never been done before. I'm the person you come to when you can't find what you want anywhere else. Right now a client is talking with me because she's been looking all over the planet for a photo album with a kid's birthday party theme. She finally decided that she was just going to have to publish her own book and came to me for help with graphics.

Can you describe some of the challenges you've faced and how you've overcome them?

I think my biggest challenge is not riding the highs and lows to such an extreme. Some days I'm on top of the world with all the potential I have and others I just want to crawl under my bed because it is all so intimidating. I find myself procrastinating a lot because I'm afraid of failure. I'm trying to build a routine for myself that will make me feel more secure in my work but it's not done yet. I change all the time. Some days I kick ass, other days I hardly get anything done at all. Have I already said that? I guess it's a little too early to really say. I feel so new at this working for myself thing. I guess it's just like anything else you do. Every day presents a new challenge. I could go into the learning how to say "no" thing. That's been a real challenge.

Any words of advice for creative people who want to strike out on their own?

I think we all build up the "striking out on our own" idea into a fantasy. It's just as scary as any decision I've ever made. It feels just like I felt when I was picking what college to go to or whether or not to get married. I would advise people to not be so afraid of failure. Sure you're going to fail, but you fail at your regular 9-5 job too. I haven't ever met anyone who quit their job and then ended up homeless on the streets. I think if you have it in you to take a risk like that, you also have it in you to do the extra work to be a success. It's like cleaning a tub. You just have to apply elbow grease. There's no other way around it. As long as you put in the effort and you do what you really love I really believe there can be success out there for anyone. I have a lot of friends who have been out of work for months, some of them for a year and it's been really hard but it isn't the end of the world. I think working forever in a job you hate is the end of the world.