The long version
No degree. No formal education in anything I do today. I discovered I actually love learning around age 30, which is late, but apparently not too late.
I joined the French army at 18. Infantry. Nine years, multiple deployments. While I was serving, I studied on my own to get construction qualifications, going from no credentials to certified in a few years of evening study. That stubbornness turned out to be useful later.
After the army I ran construction teams for five years. Good work. I learned how to lead people, deliver projects, and deal with clients who change their mind every Tuesday. But I wanted something different.
So I tried building things online. A dropshipping store that took off fast, then fell apart just as fast. Two years of experiments that mostly didn't work. Then a eucalyptus bedsheet brand that I still think was a great product. Customers loved it. I still use those sheets five years later. But the economics were brutal, €30K minimum order for one color, six months to produce. Not sustainable for one person.
Through all of that, I was doing the marketing myself. The copy, the ads, the funnels, the research. An agency founder noticed what I was doing during the bedsheet pre-order campaign and invited me to help with their clients. Six months later I had six clients of my own.
That's how consulting started. Not from a plan, but from people seeing the work and asking for more of it.
