Sarah Lundy x FoundHer Fire
How a solo founder reclaimed her voice, dropped perfectionism, and built a thriving business
Sarah Lundy joined FoundHer Fire eight months ago and has been a pivotal member of the ecosystem since its inception. With over 30 years of experience navigating both small and large corporations – working both agency-side and client-side – she reached a turning point, took the leap, and set up her own independent business.
Find out more about Sarah’s independent consultancy work at Sarah Lundy.
The Challenge – Out on Your Own with a Corporate Hangover
What you don’t realise when you set up on your own is that you need a tribe. Yes, you have a network – and a really good network – but it’s not necessarily a space where you can be completely open and honest. You need people you can talk to about what’s actually bothering you, get tailored help directed specifically for you, and lean on a scaffolding system to hold you when you go through the wobbles. Even though the work I am doing is not new to me, setting up on my own absolutely was.
I knew I needed support, but I didn’t know what shape that was going to take. I wasn’t looking for traditional one-to-one coaching because I thrive on collaboration. I have more than 30 years’ experience and have been part of professional networks and memberships before, but nothing ever lasted or felt like a particularly safe space. That is what FoundHer Fire is, massively – a safe space.
“Us women with 25 or 30-plus years of experience don’t automatically feel like we own that tenure. You’ve gone through menopause, redundancy, companies changing, and moments of not having a voice even when you’ve been proven right. Add in imposter syndrome, and it all adds up.”
When you’re setting a business up with that level of tenure and expertise, the hangover of those past corporate experiences absolutely plays on your mind. You carry this quiet fear of, ‘What if I can’t actually do this?’ You know you can, but your brain naturally takes you to that one isolated moment in your career where things didn’t work, undermining everything you believe in. I thought joining would feel a bit like hard work or homework – but it doesn’t. It feels joyful, connected, and entirely positive.
The Work – The Weekly Rhythm and Human Scaffolding
The weekly beat of the ecosystem means you always know what’s coming, allowing you to feed off different growth points every single month. One week you might have a guest expert talking about somatic breathing, and you suddenly realise these frameworks don’t just affect your business life – they affect your personal life, your sleep, and your overall energy mastery.
What you get as a long-term member is the cumulative buildup of knowledge. It’s the repetition. It’s learning and steadily building on the foundations.
“In week one, you might struggle to put your energy in the right space at the right time. By month three, that energy management becomes second nature, and you can layer something else in. You think about your scaffolding. You think about your posture. You think about how you portray yourself.”
One of the greatest things I’ve taken from the women in FoundHer Fire is the realisation that we all face similar challenges. Everyone in the room is an expert in their field, so we don’t need to dig into the technical mechanics of each other’s businesses. Instead, we focus on the people we are. We are amazingly similar in the challenges we face, the things we feel, and the struggles we have juggling life’s complications. It’s the laughter, the honesty, and the swearing.
The Impact – Cracking On with Absolute Confidence
Being in this space has completely shifted my outlook on my ridiculous internal perfectionism. I used to overwhelm myself with deadlines because I always wanted to do more and do better, which regularly put me into a paralysis of delivery. I couldn’t move forward because I was chasing perfection. Now, I’ve learned that getting things done is what’s actually needed for my business and my clients. Nothing is ever perfect.
Apart from that, it has given me the confidence to be the businesswoman I know I am. I’ve learned to stop over-explaining and stop apologising for things that don’t require an apology.
“I’ve also realised that delivery isn’t about sitting chained to your computer from nine to five. There is massive value in strategic thinking time. I now know I can worry about a problem, go out for a walk, and come back with a better solution – an approach that came directly from talking inside FoundHer Fire.”
Business is doing really well. It’s been brilliant and I’m loving it. I have secured some fantastic, long-term projects, and the work I’ve been able to do with my clients has been completely bolstered by how I now show up.
A lot of us running smaller businesses have to be incredibly careful where we put our investment, but the value for money here is huge. In most standard coaching programmes, you don’t get a serious, deep network alongside the education. This is different. This is deep networking – and true friendship. Sarah has built something genuinely special. People stay because they are learning, growing, and quote Sarah back to Sarah.
Outcomes Observed
- Dismantled Perfectionism: Shifted from a paralysis of delivery to highly effective, confident client execution.
- Reclaimed Authority: Eliminated habits of over-explaining and over-apologising in commercial environments.
- Energy Mastery: Integrated strategic thinking time and boundaries, directly protecting her daily cognitive baseline.
- Commercial Growth: Achieved excellent business performance, securing high-value, long-term client projects.
- Deep Peer Support: Gained an ongoing, trusted “tribe” of high-tenure peers to navigate independent business wobbles.
