The Time Is Now

Our guest today is Bérengère Ferrier, she is an expert in marketing communications and will share with us some great tips on how to establish a business and find your first clients when you just arrive in a new country.

For over 6 years, Bérengère worked in the city of Lyon for a leading French advertising agency, Saatchi and Saatchi, and successfully managed advertising campaigns for major global brands.

When her boyfriend, who later became her husband, was offered to move to California for a great job opportunity, despite the successful career path Bérengère was having, she didn’t hesitate to quit her job and join her boyfriend in this adventure.

When they arrived to LA in 2013, she started doing some freelancing and her pool of clients has rapidly grown. Today, she has her own agency in strategy and marketing advising, her company is called CREAVILIA. In addition to her agency, Bérengère also co-founded the French Cluster; which is a pool of experts that help French entrepreneurs settle their new life or business in California.

Glimpse on Bérengère insights in this episode:

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In this second part of my interview with the wonderful Marilyn Gardner, we will focus on her insights and tips that led her to become a successful blogger and writer, in addition to the portable job she created for herself. She will also share the struggles she had with repatriation and how she coped with it.

Marilyn Gardner is an American third culture kid who grew up in Pakistan. Currently she lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. As she says, her claim of fame is that she gave birth to 5 kids on 3 continents, and went on to raise them in Pakistan and Egypt before moving to the United States.

Marilyn is an author, speaker, trainer and consultant. In fact, along the years she has found a unique way to combine her experience in healthcare as a nurse with her journey navigating across cultures. She for instance began blogging in 2011 following a trip to Pakistan where she worked as a nurse with internally displaced people. The blog turned into a book called Between Worlds: Essays on Culture and Belonging

Glimpse on Marilyn’s insights in this episode:

In the first part of Marilyn's interview, she shares with us how she managed to blend her multicultural background and nursing skills to find her zone of genius and build a portable career. Click here to listen to it. 

Check out Marilyn’s:

"In the hall of an old Inn by the ocean is a sign that reads 'Home is Where Our Story Begins.' But if home is where our story begins, what happens when we can't go back?" Marilyn Gardner was raised in Pakistan and went on to raise her own five children in Pakistan and Egypt before moving to small town New England. Between Worlds will resonate with those who have lived outside of their passport country, as well as those who have not. These essays explore the rootlessness and grief as well as the unexpected moments of humor and joy that are a part of living between two worlds. Between Worlds charts a journey between the cultures of East and West, the comfort of being surrounded by loved ones and familiar places, and the loneliness of not belonging. "Every one of us has been at some point between two worlds, be they faith and loss of faith, joy and sorrow, birth and death. Between Worlds is a luminous guide for connecting---and healing---worlds." - Cathy Romeo, co-author, Ended Beginnings: Healing Childbearing Losses

Find Marilyn Gardner:

Marilyn Gardner is an American third culture kid who grew up in Pakistan. Currently she lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. As she says, her claim of fame is that she gave birth to 5 kids on 3 continents, and went on to raise them in Pakistan and Egypt before moving to the United States.

Marilyn is an author, speaker, trainer and consultant. In fact, along the years she has found a unique way to combine her experience in healthcare as a nurse with her journey navigating across cultures. She for instance began blogging in 2011 following a trip to Pakistan where she worked as a nurse with internally displaced people. The blog turned into a book called Between Worlds: Essays on Culture and Belonging

This is the first part of my interview with the wonderful Marilyn Gardner she shares with us how she managed to blend her multicultural background and nursing skills to find her zone of genius and build a portable career.

Glimpse on Marilyn’s insights in this episode:

In the next episode of this interview, we will focus on her insights and tips that led her to also become a successful blogger and writer. She will also share the struggles she had with repatriation and how she coped with it. Click here to listen to this 2nd part. 

Check out Marilyn’s:

"In the hall of an old Inn by the ocean is a sign that reads 'Home is Where Our Story Begins.' But if home is where our story begins, what happens when we can't go back?" Marilyn Gardner was raised in Pakistan and went on to raise her own five children in Pakistan and Egypt before moving to small town New England. Between Worlds will resonate with those who have lived outside of their passport country, as well as those who have not. These essays explore the rootlessness and grief as well as the unexpected moments of humor and joy that are a part of living between two worlds. Between Worlds charts a journey between the cultures of East and West, the comfort of being surrounded by loved ones and familiar places, and the loneliness of not belonging. "Every one of us has been at some point between two worlds, be they faith and loss of faith, joy and sorrow, birth and death. Between Worlds is a luminous guide for connecting---and healing---worlds." - Cathy Romeo, co-author, Ended Beginnings: Healing Childbearing Losses

Find Marilyn Gardner:

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Erin Long is an American and a certified speech therapist. She quit her job to join her husband who works for the Foreign services and went to live with her family in both Mexico and Brazil. Today she lives in Serbia. While moving from one country to another she had the brilliant idea to start online speech therapy services, World Wide Speech, to help the English native speaking community around the world; particularly expat children. She created her company Worldwide Speech and became a certified practitioner by the American Telemedicine Association in telepractice. For the last five years, she has become a leader in teletherapy within the speech-pathology community influencing teletherapy policy and training programs.

Glimpse on Erin’s insights in this episode:

 Erin’s book recommendation:

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Olga Mecking comes from Poland and she had moved the first time to Canada to join her German boyfriend at the time. They then moved together to Germany. A marriage and three kids later, she now lives with her family in the Netherlands. Olga is a blogger, writer, and translator. She has co-written four books and writes for a variety of publications about life abroad, raising children, and traveling. Olga is a regular contributor to Multicultural Kid Blogs, where she is also a board member. Her writings have been published on Scary Mommy, Mamalode, and The Huffington Post just to name a few.

Glimpse on Olga’s insights in this episode:

 Olga’s books:

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Kristin Louise Duncombe was born to American diplomats and raised in various countries. Today, she lives in Geneva and is a psychotherapist who specializes in working with international and expatriate families.

Kristin is also an author. Her first book was selected as one of the Best Indie Reads of 2013. It is called Trailing: A Memoire, which tells her experience as a “trailing spouse” who followed her Medecins Sans Frontières husband in East Africa to help the populations that were suffering from wars and disease.

Kristin also just published a new book called “Five Flights Up: Sex, Love, and Family, from Paris to Lyon”. This time she recounts her story adapting to a new lifestyle in France and reconfiguring everything she thought she knew about her "expat life”.

Glimpse on Kristin’s insights in this episode:

In the previous episode, Kristin Duncombe shares her story “trailing” with her husband in East Africa and why she insists on using this term “trailing spouse”. She explains in a very interesting way how she slowly fell into a deep identity crisis and what led her to make some drastic decisions to get her life back on track. If you haven’t heard this episode, I highly encourage you to do so!

In this episode, we focus on the second part of her journey when she decided to take a series of action to reconstruct her identity, launch her career as a therapist and then build her portable business. For instance, she shares:

Kristin Louise Duncombe was born to American diplomats and raised in various countries. Today, she lives in Geneva and is a psychotherapist who specializes in working with international and expatriate families.

Kristin is also an author. Her first book was selected as one of the Best Indie Reads of 2013. It is called Trailing: A Memoire, which tells her experience as a “trailing spouse” who followed her Medecins Sans Frontières husband in East Africa to help the populations that were suffering from wars and disease.

Kristin also just published a new book called “Five Flights Up: Sex, Love, and Family, from Paris to Lyon”. This time she recounts her story adapting to a new lifestyle in France and reconfiguring everything she thought she knew about her "expat life”.

Glimpse on Kristin’s insights in this episode:

Check out Kristin’s books:

Click for more info.

Jeremy comes from the US and is now an expat partner living in Basel, Switzerland. He used to work for the International Assignment Services group of PricewaterhouseCoopers in Boston before he joined the company AIRINC as a Tax Manager providing tax data and consulting to multinational companies. When his wife was offered an opportunity to move to Switzerland for a one to 2 years assignment, Jeremy managed to negotiate with his employer to work from Basel, which came with the added benefit of servicing their European client base from the same time zone.

Kirsten de Greling-Visman is Dutch Canadian raised as an expat child across the Netherlands, Canada, the Dutch Antilles, the US, France and Spain. Kirsten then settled and built her career in the Netherlands as a program manager and career advisor in Universities. In 2007, although she was offered three major positions by various universities, she took the decision to leave her promising career to join her French-finish fiancé who was sent to Albania for his job. Since then they had 2 boys and have been moving across Africa to Cameroon, Burkina Faso and now they live in Zambia.

While moving from a country to another, Kirsten has been able to take few job assignments but also trained to become a certified coach. Today she is a career coach, helping expat partners redefine their identity, rediscover their passion and reconnect to a life and career they love.

Glimpse on Kirsten’s insights:

Karen Wilmot was born in South Africa. When she grew up she followed the footsteps of her mom and became a Midwife. Also, her passion for traveling took her around the world. Her career has allowed her to work on a diamond mine in South Africa, in a small village in Mexico, in a military hospital in Saudi Arabia and with the Royal family of Oman. In Oman, she also established between 2009 and 2015 the first private community services supporting expat women during pregnancy and birth. It was seeing how valuable this service was, coupled with her desire to go travelling again that gave her the amazing idea to go virtual. She decided to become a Virtual Midwife and build an interactive online platform providing personalized care, information and support for women who have limited or no access to quality prenatal advice and care. She offers both online support and a VIP fly in/fly out service.

Glimpse on Karen's insights in this episode:

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