Unlocking Freedom, Security & Legacy for Mid-Career Women
(An excerpt from my coming book The Leveraged Leader)
As professional women mid-career, we often find ourselves at a unique crossroads in our personal and professional lives. Many of us are navigating new opportunities, juggling family responsibilities, and reflecting on what legacy we want to leave behind. One of the most powerful ways to create freedom, flow, security, and a lasting impact is by understanding and climbing the "Ladder of Leverage." This ladder represents different levels of income and wealth generation, each offering progressively more freedom and influence, and empowering us to create the life we desire.
Let's dive into each level of the ladder and explore how women can leverage their skills and expertise to reach new heights.
Level 1: Unskilled Labour - The Starting Point
At the base of the ladder is unskilled labour. Many of us start here—working in jobs that require physical effort, basic tasks, or routine roles. Maybe this was your first job while at school or college, perhaps it was babysitting for your neighbours. My first jobs were exactly this - gift wrapping at David Jones and working in a fried chicken shop to afford my first stereo and first car.
While this can be a great stepping stone, the reality is that unskilled labour offers limited freedom, growth, and income potential. The wages are typically fixed, and the work is often demanding and repetitive, leaving little room for personal growth, creativity, or financial independence. What was your first job at this level?
Level 2: Skilled Labour - Wages, Consulting, and Expertise
The next step up is skilled labour, where we trade our time for expertise and higher wages. This level includes salaried positions, skilled trades, and consulting work. Here, your skills and expertise are valued, and the income potential is higher than in unskilled labour. This level gives more freedom and control over our work, as we can leverage our experience to build a reputation and client base.
My 20’s and start of my 30’s were in this zone, going back to university to further my skills with a Masters, doing good work to become more employable and indispensable, while starting to invest in property slowly on the side. Oh and buying shoes, did I mention the shoes at that time!
Consulting is also a particularly powerful option and can be more leveraged that working for a wage as you begin to experience more freedom of choice over the work you do and the hours you work as well as no longer having your income capped, and even transitioning into entrepreneurship. Sadly for many women the downside is that time is still a critical factor. Your income is often tied to the hours you work, and that can be in conflict with the time you are raising a young family, caring for ageing parents, paying off a mortgage so it can bring a lot of stress and overwhelm, plus working for yourself can also have limited scalability and freedom.
Level 3: Intellectual Property (IP) and Media - Books, Courses, Training and Other People’s Time
The third level of leverage is where things really start to get exciting: Intellectual Property (IP) and media. This level includes creating products such as books, online courses, workshops, and training programs that can be sold repeatedly without requiring your constant involvement. It’s about taking your accumulated knowledge, experiences, and expertise and packaging it in a way that can help others while generating income on autopilot.
Developing your own intellectual property allows you to reach more people and create a scalable income stream. You’re no longer confined to trading time for money in one-on-one interactions. Instead, you can sell your materials to an unlimited number of people—whether that’s through an online course, a book, or a series of training workshops. The freedom here is undeniable, as your expertise is leveraged to create a system that works for you 24/7.
But here’s where leveraging other people’s time becomes critical. To truly scale your business and your impact, you must move beyond doing everything yourself. This means hiring others to help manage your intellectual property. For example, you could:
Hire virtual assistants to manage customer support, handle administrative tasks, or maintain your website.
Outsource content creation to writers or video producers to help develop additional courses, blogs, or multimedia content.
Work with experts or coaches to guide your students, further expanding your reach and impact.
By leveraging the time and skills of others, you can focus on what you do best—creating, innovating, and expanding your IP—while your team handles the day-to-day operations. This allows you to operate at a much higher level, freeing up more of your time to create more products or dive deeper into your own personal and professional development.
At this stage, you’re not just building a business; you’re building a system that runs on the collective effort of others, significantly multiplying your capacity to grow. This is a game-changer for women over 40, as it means more freedom to pursue other passions, balance family life, and create a legacy without being bogged down in micromanagement.
Leveraging other people’s time allows you to move from being the person at the center of every task to becoming the visionary leader of a growing business empire. It also opens up opportunities for collaboration, joint ventures, and partnerships that can propel your work to even greater heights.
Level 4: Data and Software - Scorecards, Surveys, Unique Information, and AI
At the fourth level, you’re moving into the realm of data and software—where you can leverage technology to scale and create something with far-reaching impact. This includes creating proprietary systems, like scorecards, surveys, or tools that deliver results to your audience. It could also mean building apps, software platforms, or AI applications that address specific pain points for your target audience.
Data-driven assets are incredibly powerful because they can run independently, gathering information, generating insights, and automating tasks that would otherwise require significant manual effort. This level takes your knowledge and creativity and merges it with technology to create systems that operate 24/7, without being reliant on your direct involvement.
For mid-career women, this level offers incredible scalability and the ability to create exponential growth. You can reach global markets, refine your offerings, and even position yourself as an innovator in your industry. The possibilities for passive income and long-term security are endless.
Level 5: Financial Assets - Business, Real Estate, and Investments
Level 5 Financial Assets is all about building and acquiring wealth in the form of businesses, real estate, or investments. This level is about creating and securing assets that generate ongoing income and can be sold for significant profit, providing long-term financial security and the freedom to live on your own terms.
For women over 40, this is where the potential for legacy truly materializes. Building or acquiring a business that has the potential to be sold or scaled, investing in real estate that provides a reliable cash flow, or managing financial investments like stocks or precious metals (I particularly like buying silver bars) are powerful ways to create long-term wealth. When done strategically, these financial assets can provide a consistent stream of passive income, whether through rent, dividends, or business profits.
My investment vehicle of choice is real estate, as it offers an opportunity for both appreciation in value and rental income. Properties—whether residential or commercial—can be income-generating assets that provide stability and financial freedom. This is a fantastic avenue for creating wealth that doesn’t require daily involvement once the properties are managed effectively. Don’t get my wrong, it’s not all set and forget and I’ve had my share of challenges with tennants in arrears, unexpected maintenance and plumbing issues and over priced tradesman, but all those challenges aside it’s been the greatest component of my portfolio as it has provided me security, peace of mind and the opportunity to provide affordable, decent accommodation for many other women and their families a legacy that helps people today and that can be passed down to future generations.
For many mid-career women this is the point where they are beginning to consider transitioning from simply earning an income to building generational wealth. It’s a time when you begin to have the capacity to own and control assets, and build a stronger sense of security so you are no longer at the mercy of market fluctuations, an employer or an unpredictable job market.
This stage of the ladder is also about exit strategies. When you’ve built a valuable business or accumulated significant investments, you have the option to sell or liquidate, allowing you to cash out and enjoy the fruits of your hard work or alternatively going all in and finally starting your own business. It’s about creating long-term wealth and securing your financial future in a way that offers the ultimate freedom. By investing in assets that generate ongoing income, you pave the way for more control over your time and the ability to leave a powerful legacy for your family.
Level 6: Spiritual Surrender and Consciousness - Aligning with Purpose
The final level of the ladder transcends the material and enters the realm of spiritual and personal growth—spiritual surrender and consciousness. At this stage, women are typically over 40 and beginning to want to focus on aligning their work and life with their deepest purpose. A desire to cultivate a sense of inner peace, fulfillment, and connection and realising that true freedom comes from within.
Spiritual surrender involves letting go of the constant need for control, embracing trust, and allowing things to unfold naturally. For me it began with reading some of Michael Singer’s work The Surrender Experiment and The Untethered Soul. Initially a curiosity then later a full blown desire to build a tiny house, downsize and eventually move to the country where I could cultivate a sense of abundance, knowing that everything I needed to create the life I desired was already within me. When you tap into your inner consciousness, your work no longer feels like a grind but a purposeful journey. You create with intention, clarity, and love—focusing on serving others, contributing to the greater good, and building a legacy that transcends financial gain.
This level is not about renouncing material success but about integrating it with a higher sense of meaning. I call it the meeting of two - the material and the spiritual, the boardroom and the bush. It’s about developing a deep sense of self-awareness, cultivating gratitude, and recognizing that you are part of something much larger than yourself. As you become more aligned with your inner truth and purpose, your ability to leverage all the previous levels of the ladder magnifies exponentially. Your work flows effortlessly, and the impact you have on others is far-reaching and transformative.
Embracing spiritual surrender and expanding your consciousness is a powerful way to create a lasting legacy. It’s about creating a life and business that feels aligned with your values, passions, and authentic self, which ultimately leads to lasting fulfillment and the deepest sense of freedom.
For anyone finding themselves at a crossroads, a new phase of life, the Ladder of Leverage offers a roadmap to review the current reality and dream of the next chapter in order to create more freedom, flow, security, and a lasting legacy.
At each stage, you gain more autonomy, influence, and wealth—allowing you to build the life you’ve always dreamed of while leaving a profound legacy for your family and community. It’s not a race to the top; it’s a journey of growth, self-discovery, and empowerment that can transform not only your life but the lives of those around you.
As you climb, remember that each level is an invitation to step into your power, claim your worth, and lead with confidence. Whether you’re just starting or are already well on your way, the Ladder of Leverage offers a framework to help you create the freedom, flow, security, and legacy that you and your family deserve.