Most experienced professionals don’t have a marketing problem.
They don’t have a confidence problem.
They have a system problem.

They have years of experience, judgement, and results, but they’ve never translated that expertise into a clear, adoptable system the market can buy.

So selling feels heavier than it should.
Positioning stays vague.
Authority doesn’t compound.
Income plateaus.

That’s the structural issue I work on.

My goal is to future-proof your business in an AI economy.
And the only way to do that is to become a category of one.

That doesn’t happen when you sell what you do.

It happens when you build a system the market wants and package your judgement into infrastructure that buyers can adopt.

I help experienced consultants, experts, and coaches turn their expertise into systems, assets, and business infrastructure, not services, not offers and not job descriptions wrapped in consulting language.

My clients don’t hire me - they adopt my system.

What makes my work different

I merge two operating systems.

Most people try to build a $500K+ consulting business using the same internal programs that have run their entire life - the same decision patterns and default settings.

So they build the “right” strategy…
and then sabotage execution.

That’s why I design the external operating system
(system architecture, market validation, positioning, sales, distribution)

and upgrade the internal operating system - the operating code behind how you decide, implement, and follow through.

This isn’t therapy or motivation.
It’s 13 years of deprogramming distilled into a simple method that removes internal friction so the external system can actually run.

For high performers, this is not optional.

Inside my work, I help you:

-Define the real business problem you solve
-Codify judgement + decision-making into a system
-Design frameworks, methodologies, and operating models you own
-Validate demand before you sell
-Build multiple monetisable assets from one system design
-Commercialise the system end-to-end
-Build authority-led sales, marketing, and LinkedIn positioning
-Position you as a category of one

How I use AI:

I design AI instructional systems, not prompts - capturing judgement, edge cases, and decision logic so AI supports execution without replacing intelligence.

I connect everything into one system so you can validate demand, build the assets, and start monetising within 30 days.

Schedule a private conversation here:
👉 https://go.oncehub.com/15MinuteExpress

Mary Henderson

Can I pick your brain?" is the most expensive question you will ever answer.
Stop saying yes...


Every time you agree to a "quick coffee" or a "15-minute call" with someone who wants free consulting...

You're losing money.

Not theoretical money. Real revenue.

That hour you spent "picking your brain" for free? 
That's an hour you could've spent with a paying client.

That "quick coffee" that turned into 90 minutes? 
That's $500+ of billable time you just gave away.

But it's not just money. It's energy.
These people are Energy Vampires.

Read my article to find out what you can do to repel these people away from you and start attracting premium buyers. 

Share my article with your network
Leave a comment
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Business & Monetisation Specialist | Build a One-Person Consulting Business in 2026 | Replace a $200K+ Salary | Codify Expertise Into Offers That Sell | LinkedIn Strategy → Clients

Can I pick your brain?" is the most expensive question you will ever answer. Stop saying yes. Every time you agree to a "quick coffee" or a "15-minute

Open article: "Can I pick your brain?" by Mary Henderson • 3 min read

How to build a consulting business in 2026 so you can replace your $300K salary in 12 months.


There are two mistakes I’m seeing new consultants make right now and both will keep you stuck.

Mistake #1: Believing what ChatGPT tells you to sell.

Last week I spoke to a COO who said, “I’m brilliant at what I do. I got ChatGPT to figure out my value proposition, and now I know what I sell.”

ChatGPT can give you language that sounds incredible on paper.

But here’s the real question:
Does the market want what ChatGPT just told you is your solution?

If you don’t have validated demand, you don’t have an offer.

You have a theory.

That’s why so many people can’t package their expertise into an offer that actually converts.

They’re selling what sounds good, not what buyers are already buying.

Mistake #2: Thinking pipeline will magically appear.

If you don’t know how to get consulting clients on LinkedIn, you will not replace a $300K salary. Period.

Because ChatGPT can create content… but most of it is dead on arrival.

If you don’t know how to build a pipeline on LinkedIn, you can’t test messaging.

You can’t start conversations.

You can’t generate DMs.

You can’t get in front of the decision maker consistently.

You end up posting and hoping.

Save this: The 10-Second Consulting Business Test (2026):

1.  Can you articulate in 10 seconds what you sell?
2.  Can you define your avatar?
3.  What is your sales strategy: top, middle, bottom of funnel?
4.  What is your good / better / best solution and how will you deliver it?
5.  How will you price a consulting offer based on outcomes, not hours?
6.  What is your brand promise?
7.  What is your thought leadership strategy on LinkedIn?
8.  How will the decision maker find you on LinkedIn this week?

If you can’t answer those, it doesn’t mean you’re not smart.
It means you’re still guessing.

AI can write your words. It can’t validate your market.

What’s your real gap right now: DEMAND or PIPELINE?

Most consultants leaving corporate think they have time.
Time to think. Time to learn. Time to “figure it out.” 👉🏼 They don’t.


Consulting is splitting right now, and it’s not splitting around experience or intelligence.

It’s splitting around who can turn judgement into something the market can buy.

I explain why in this article 👇

Make sure you subscribe to: #OnePersonConsultingBusiness

Business & Monetisation Specialist | Build a One-Person Consulting Business in 2026 | Replace a $200K+ Salary | Codify Expertise Into Offers That Sell | Authority Positioning That Drives Invitations & Clients

View newsletter: One-Person Consulting Business

This isn’t a prediction. It’s a consequence. And it’s already happening, not on LinkedIn, but inside organisations, boardrooms, and consulting budgets

Open article: Consulting Is About to Split in Two:
Those Who Turn Experience Into Assets, and Those Who Slowly Disappear by Mary Henderson • 5 min read

Consulting Is About to Split in Two:
Those Who Turn Experience Into Assets, and Those Who Slowly Disappear

You Didn’t Run a CFO or COO Role With Post-it Notes.
So Why Are You Running Your Consulting Business Like That?


I see this pattern constantly.

People go from earning $300K+ inside a corporate system, making high-stakes decisions, managing risk, owning outcomes, to feeling strangely frozen the moment they’re on their own.

Not because they lost capability.
Because the environment changed.

Most consultants aren’t failing because they lack experience.
They’re failing because they tried to turn a job title into a business.

And those are not the same thing.

A senior operator understands:
-risk
-profit and loss
-decision-making under pressure

But none of that automatically converts into:
-a defined problem the market recognises as urgent
-a structured solution a buyer can mentally place
-a monetisable asset instead of bespoke effort
-a sales and distribution engine
-leverage in an AI-shaped economy

Six months in, the symptoms appear.

Pipeline feels thin.
Confidence is at an all-time low.

And the conclusion becomes:
“Maybe consulting isn’t for me.”

That conclusion is wrong.

This isn’t an intelligence problem.
It’s a structure problem.

In corporate, you didn’t improvise your way through complexity.
You didn’t “figure it out as you went”.

You said: “We need a specialist to architect this properly.”

The irony is that when you step out on your own, you expect yourself to magically know how to do all of it.

Here’s the part most people don’t want to face:

Your corporate performance has zero value on its own.
The market doesn’t pay for titles.
It doesn’t care what you were.

It pays for what you can extract, structure, and deploy from that experience into something it actually needs now.

Running a consulting business without structure isn’t brave. It’s inefficient.

And it quietly destroys confidence.

Save this: The Corporate-to-Consulting Reality Check

If you’re being honest, which of these are you doing right now?
-Hoping experience translates without being re-architected
-Treating clarity as a substitute for validation
-Building offers in isolation instead of against live demand
-Assuming confidence returns before structure is installed

If you wouldn’t run a company like an experiment, stop running your consulting business like one.

The people who move fastest don’t work harder.
They stop pretending they should already know how to do this.

They treat the transition seriously.
They invest like operators.
And they build something intentional.

That work happens inside The IncubAItor.
Next cohort starts January 26.
Comment GAP or DM me GAP.

If you want to replace your $250K salary, stop selling hours. Build this instead.


I spoke to an ex-CFO this week.
She took a severance package and is building her consulting business.

Her back story was impressive.
Then she told me how she plans to “help companies solve problems.”

So I asked one question:
Are you sure organisations are actively buying that problem… or are you assuming they should?

Because here’s what most executives don’t realise when they leave corporate:
A lot of organisations are not shopping for “skill gaps.”
And when they are, they’ll often pay hourly.

Save this: Let's do the salary replacement math

To replace a $250K salary at $200/hour, you need:
1,250 billable hours.
That’s a lot of hours.

That’s also why time-for-money consulting becomes an uphill battle fast.
You don’t replace a salary by billing time. 
You replace a salary by selling something deployable.

This is what my clients are doing differently:
They’re not selling advice.
They’re not selling access.
They’re not selling “I can help.”

They’re selling a solution a business can adopt inside systems it already uses.
They codify their judgement.
They validate what the market is actually buying.
They target the right people on LinkedIn.

That’s why they can charge $20K+ for an outcome.
Not hourly rates. 

If reading this makes you feel uncomfortable, good.
That discomfort is usually the moment you stop trying to “make consulting work” and start building something commercial.

And if you don’t know how to do this, it doesn’t mean you’re not smart.
It means commercial packaging isn’t your domain.

That’s what we do inside The IncubAItor: codify your intelligence, validate demand, and build a full-stack content + marketing system, fast.

Comment: SALARY and I’ll share the 3 deployable solution types that replace a salary fastest in 2026.

Posting more on LinkedIn won’t fix a quiet pipeline. And not posting doesn’t protect you either.

The real problem is simpler - the right buyers don’t know why they should think of you yet.

I hear this from serious industry experts all the time:
“I can’t be bothered posting every day. Surely there’s another way to get clients.”

There is.

But the answer isn’t frequency.
And it isn’t hacks.

The real issue is that most people are still treating LinkedIn like a broadcast channel instead of a demand system.

Posting frequently doesn’t build pipeline.
Posting without a system doesn’t.

Not posting doesn’t buy you focus.
It just ensures the right buyers never think of you.

Here’s what is important:
Organic LinkedIn doesn’t work when you “show up consistently”.
It works when your content helps the platform and the buyer place you.

Industry experts aren’t selling attention.
They’re selling codified judgement, outcomes, and results.

That requires a different operating model.
Not more posts.
More precision.

Save this: The Organic Demand Misdiagnosis Test
If organic LinkedIn “isn’t working” for you, it’s usually because one of these is true:
-You’re posting without a declared outcome
-Your buyer isn’t obvious within 5 seconds
-Your content changes topics faster than the algorithm can place you
-You’re optimising for views instead of conversations
-You’re treating content as output, not as signal

If any of those are present, frequency won’t save you.

Here’s the reframe that changes everything:
Organic content works when it’s part of a closed-loop system:
-clear problem
-clear buyer
-clear perspective
-clear conversation path

When those are in place, you don’t need daily posts.
You need recognition.

That’s why some people post twice a week and get DMs from the right buyers 
and others post every day and attract nothing but noise.

Posting more on LinkedIn won’t fix a quiet pipeline.
And not posting doesn’t protect you either.


Posting more on LinkedIn won’t fix a quiet pipeline.
And not posting doesn’t protect you either.

Posting more on LinkedIn won’t fix a quiet pipeline.
 And not posting doesn’t protect you either.

The real problem is simpler - the right buyers don’t know why they should think of you yet.

I spent six months pulling apart how distribution actually works, not from gurus, but from platform behaviour, engineering signals, and live testing and turned it into a structured system that connects:
-offer
-message
-content
-buyer placement

Once that’s installed, organic stops feeling effortful.

It becomes directional.

This isn’t about being everywhere.
It’s about being correctly placed.

And when that happens, the right people don’t need to be convinced.
They already know why they’re reaching out.

Question:
If you’re honest, what’s missing right now -OFFER clarity or PIPELINE placement?

Share below and I will give you my honest answer.

ESTEEM BUILDERS LTD

Director

WHAT I DO: I help business professionals neutralise their stress.

WHY IT MATTERS: Stress impacts productivity, focus, sleep, decision-making and wellbeing. It often drives people towards quick fixes that, in the long term, do not serve the person's best interests or the work they do.

WHAT MAKES ME UNIQUE: My coaching methodology is designed to neutralise stress issues. It comes from knowing what it is like to work in a high-octane, high-stress environment but presenting to the world someone who is calm and productive when, in truth, you are exhausted and worried.

MY STORY: My love and dedication to my previous work made me ill. I consumed vast amounts of hot chocolate and barley sugars to keep up. I was running on glucose and adrenaline, which eventually led to a crash as my body seized up, and I was left taking regular visits to the chiropractor. So, I retrained, exploring various methods and practices searching for a drug-free way of finding relief and focusing. It is these learnings that I now share in my coaching programmes.

WHAT OTHERS SAY' Mary's compassion and expertise magically brought life-enforcing energy back. She knows how to take away negative emotions and instil vitality back in complex situations that are hard to resolve.' D

HOW IT WORKS: I have a proven methodology based on an intelligent system to coach you 1:1 as you work towards becoming who you were born to be.
Reach me: 

E: enquiries@esteembuilders.co.uk

Personal Transformation Coach 

Freelance

Course creator:
* Essay Writing for Undergraduates - Udemy.com (e-learning platform)
* International Leadership in Business  - course duration 1 yr
* Soft Landings (The Ultimate Guide to successful living in the UK) - course duration 2 week  
* IT Programme (for students with English as a second language) - course duration 5 days

Co-trainer of CMI L2 (Team Leading) and L3 (First Line Management). Solo trainer on exam prep and co-presenter at Fit for Work conferences. (Until Aug 2017)

The learning outcome for the CMI training is to demonstrate an understanding and working knowledge of how to use time, resources and people in a resourceful and responsible manner. Graduates should also be able to demonstrate awareness of shareholder and stakeholder needs.

Educational Consultant

Presented across a range of educational workshops and seminars on effective learning to 300+ schools across the UK.

Freelance Education Presenter

University of Hertfordshire

Developing and delivering a range of degree courses and programmes in accordance with all University policies.

Lecturer

University of Luton (Now University of Bedfordshire)

Creator and subsequent Manager of the B.A (Hons) Media Performance. Responsible for 90 students, 4 staff and 5 subject areas. (Four years on a fractional contract).

Senior Lecturer / Degree Manager

WHAT I DO: I empower ambitious business professionals to address their self-care by neutralising triggers to stress.

THE BENEFIT TO YOU: You gain access to a confidential, safe space in which you can address what is really bothering you. From the meeting you dread to the worry that keeps you awake at night. The advantage of having someone who can help you neutralise the associated stress is that you can reconnect to a state of calm and focus.

HOW DOES IT WORK? It starts with me listening to what you have to say. We address what you need, how you feel and what you want. I then tailor my methodology to meet your needs with bespoke 1:1 coaching. You can then choose the best option for you, be it a time and cost-effective Breakthrough Day, Ongoing 1:1 coaching support or a specialist programme such as The Fearless Public Speaker.

WHAT OTHERS SAY: 'I recently had a breakthrough day with Mary and it has been life-changing. I feel like I have discovered the real me, which has been very liberating. Mary has a great approach and instantly puts you at ease' - J.

WHY IT MATTERS: In these ever-changing circumstances, it is vital that we lead by example with our own well-being. A positive emotional state is only accessible when we address how we feel, think and behave; it's about managing what we have done for so long on automatic pilot. It is easy when we are in demand to sideline our personal needs to meet the requirements of others, but when that comes at a cost to how you feel and how you function - then it's time to make a change.

MY STORY: I threw myself into a job I loved. It was incredible. I was aligned with corporate values, aims and objectives. My co-workers were lively, enthusiastic, and eager to explore opportunities, challenges and feedback. I was work, work, work and genuinely happy. However, I became ill when my body decided I had absorbed enough adrenalin and sugar. I learned that punishing your system comes at a price. 

My 1:1 work with clients supports Health and Wellness. It can also be blended into corporate programmes by contributing to conferences, retreats or off-site days.

To discover more, book a strategy call with me today - see the link on the top of the website marymcdonnell-hockley.com


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

DISCLAIMER: None of my posts, articles, videos, or guidance here on LinkedIn or on my website (marymcdonnell-hockley.com) or my company page, Esteem Builders Ltd, shall be construed as medical advice. I shall have no liability to you in any circumstances should you choose to rely on any of the materials I publish.

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Mary Henderson

Mary McDonnell-Hockley MA ILM

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The Battle

Mary Henderson

Mary McDonnell-Hockley MA ILM

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Mary Henderson's LinkedIn Performance

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