You don’t have to settle for ‘meh’.
Work Your Own Way is a space for professionals who want to reshape their current work role - or discover a new one - in a way that feels aligned with who they are and what matters most.
Together, we’ll explore how to find more fulfilment at work.
We’ll do this without losing sight of the things that matter most outside of it.
This isn’t about giving your all to your job, it’s about doing work that feels meaningful without losing sight of life beyond it.
Note to paid subscribers: This about page is available to anyone who visits.
Hello!
Hi, I’m Lou. I’m the guide with typing hands behind Work Your Own Way.
I’m the Change-maker in Chief at The You Can Hub and creator of Design for Work, a bespoke, one to one service that helps people bring more of themselves to work.
Work Your Own Way is an affordable community, here to help you to:
Adjust your current role - or reframe how you approach it - so you feel you’re doing it your way.
Step into a new role with mindfulness and intention, ensuring the best possible fit. (Note: There is unlikely to be a perfect fit).
Be part of a community of people doing this together.
I created Work Your Own Way as an accessible, community-driven space for people who:
Feel stuck, frustrated or undervalued in their current role.
Long to do work that’s meaningful - but for whatever reason it’s just not clicking right now.
Want to bring more of themselves to work, without giving all of themselves.
Value learning from others and being part of a supportive community.
Work Your Own Way’s approach: What is ‘work’?
For many of us, work is about more than checking off tasks - or climbing the ladder.
It’s about alignment.
For me, it’s about alignment between:
Who you are.
What you do.
The difference you want to make.
A bit about the “plan”.
Here’s what we’re focused on this year, with more detail on what we’ve been doing and what’s coming up in 2025.
This year, our paid membership is focused on:
Getting clear on who you are - getting to know yourself really well. mostly who you are at work, but I’m sure we’ll learn about ourselves outside of that too.
We’ll explore the key strands in Work Your Own Way’s alignment model.
Who you are.
What you do.
And what difference you want to make.
This is something we’ll come back to time and again over the year. You can see the alignment model in the section on what work is on the about page.
In the paid membership, we’ll do this through our Book Club and through prompts and activities I’ll set. Some of these will be based on the book, and others will be complementary - drawing on my toolkit from all the one to one work I’ve done over the years.
Getting clear on what your work is.
We’ll spend some time looking at your current job description, and updating it based on what you actually do.
Telling more accurate, inspiring stories about yourself.
By following the exercises in the Book Club in Q1, we’re going to play with different stories we can use to answer the question, “What do you do?”
We’ll write or ‘script’ one or more stories about ourselves and practice saying them out loud (or put them into practice in some written content such as your about page or LinkedIn bio).
Showing up in your CV, portfolio, and online.
Turning what we’re learning about ourselves into visible, tangible ‘objects’. Objects are helpful placemarkers, way finding tools, and signs to show other people.
Connecting with each other.
One of the main things we discovered in the listening exercise back in November is just how lonely it can feel working away on your personal and professional development (and, perhaps, your ‘career’) on your own. So a big part of community calls is going to be you talking to and supporting each other. Getting to know other people whilst getting to know yourself better.
With articles, practical tools, and rich conversations, Work Your Own Way is our space to find alignment.
Our space means:
Belonging: Finding solidarity and support as you take steps towards work that feels right. Connecting with other people who feel just like you do helps you to feel less alone.
Courage: Building resilience and taking action, even when it feels uncertain. Being vulnerable as part of that, because fear and courage are not that far from each other. Here are my thoughts on that (takes you to an instagram post).
Steady growth: Embracing slow, meaningful, deliberate progress on your own terms. This is not ‘leap and the net will appear’. Incremental change helps you test in small ways as you go. No big surprises. Small steps leading to big changes over time.
This isn’t about overnight transformations or quick fixes. It’s about creating a sustainable rhythm, informed by intentional choices and steady steps forward.
As someone with over a decade of experience managing my chronic illness, I’ve learned a thing or two about pacing myself - and I bring this understanding into everything I create.
Subscribe to get access to the publication archives and get notified about new posts. Only paying members get access to all articles, all tools, and monthly calls. A 7 day trial is also available to dip your toe in!
Join the team
Joining Work Your Own Way means joining a team. This means we’ll shape it together, learning from one another and figuring things out as we go. Here’s what that looks like:
Mutual learning: Everyone in the membership has something to bring and something to learn. We are all learning together (including me!).
Collaborative decision-making: We’ll make decisions together whenever possible. It’s unrealistic to expect that everything can be co-decided but I commit to doing it as much as we can, when we can.
Shared creation: We are making this membership together. You’ll have the opportunity to contribute ideas and co-create elements of the programme along with your peers.
Heads up. This approach isn’t always neat or simple, and depends on available resources, capabilities, and capacities. This is especially important with the fluctuating energy levels that come with my chronic health condition. But I’m committed to giving it my best, using Emma Blomkamp’s Shades of Co-design as a guiding framework.
Reference: Emma Blomkamp’s Shades of Co-design
How to join, and what you get:
Subscribe to Work Your Own Way to get access to archive posts.
Most content will be exclusive to paying members. When you upgrade you also gain access to:
All posts, with an email in your inbox as soon as a new post is published.
Monthly community calls for sharing and accountability.
Conversations, prompts for reflection, and more through threads and chat in the Substack app.
The app is where the community truly comes alive - it’s much easier to share and contribute there.
Let’s reimagine work, and find our own path to alignment, together.
About this platform: To learn more about the tech platform that powers this publication, visit Substack.com.
