Lessons from a Quitter Ep. 08: How Maria Granovsky made the jump from Ph.D. to J.D. to Entrepreneur
Maria Granovsky knows exactly what it takes to quit and start something new because she quit her profession not once but twice! Maria got her Ph.D. in medical and molecular genetics from the University of Toronto. During her post-doc training, she decided not to go down the path as a scientist but rather pursue her lifelong interest in the law. She received her law degree from Georgetown University and went on to work as a patent litigator for over 10 years.
During that time, Maria took some time away from the law to write and sell a novel. Ultimately, though, she decided to return to law for a couple more years. Maria delved into marketing courses in order to help with business development of her own law practice. She quickly began helping other lawyer friends with business development for their law practices as well. She realized that she had a knack for marketing and really enjoyed this aspect of the business. About a year and half ago, Maria quit her legal practice in order to start her own business helping other lawyers with marketing and business development.
Today we talk to Maria about how she navigated these various career pivots and what she has learned from them.
Here is what we chat about in this episode:
- How graduate school can be the path of least resistance
- Why Maria took time away from law to write a novel and ultimately decided to go back to law
- How her experience with business development in her own legal practice led her to start her marketing and coaching business.
- How she moved past having her identity tied up with being a lawyer
- Why it makes sense to start a new business that is tangentially related to your career
- Why everyone has to learn marketing and business development regardless of their field
- Why networking is like a negotiation and how you can make it work for you
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Pivot, by Jenny Blake
Where to find Maria:
- www.mariagranovsky.com
- Linkedin: @mariagranovsky
- Twitter: @mgranovsky
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