After nearly four months in our new location in northern Portugal, it is time to launch the new Green Hat Coaching & Consulting services!
It’s been a long and a short journey. A life of learning, working, coaching others, leading teams, working for change, never accepting the simple or easy choice. A life of self-discovery and self-challenge. A life not quite normal. Looking for options to self-manage and break out of the corporate norms, the traditional molds.
We started looking to relocate to Europe in 2003 when I was in the Masters program at Vanderbilt University, Nashville. We toyed with business ideas in Italy, and researched visas, but after six months of research, it was clear that the idea and the location were not quite right.
We looked again when I worked for the international team of a healthcare organization, checking out options to work for their Paris, Sydney, or Sao Paulo teams. But it wasn’t meant to be.
As we started more aggressive retirement planning, we looked into Central America and South America, vising St. Maarten and Cuenca, Ecuador. But it wasn’t meant to be.
A friend suggested Portugal. On the European continent and with easy access to our favorite places to travel. Great quality of life, nice weather, low cost of living, and friendly to American expats. A tech conference in May, 2018, showed us that this was a country with great universities, high tech, friendly people, good fashion, an active tech community. This looked like it could be a great new home – a place to spark innovation and creativity.
What we didn’t quite anticipate was that the country was to decide that we should also start a business. And so we did. And the cycle which began in 2003 for Italy is finally coming full circle in Portugal.
And now, with another 15 years of life-history and work-history, we launch this time with coaching/consulting services. Our chance to now share our knowledge and passion for an unusual life with others. A chance to spark new creativity, new innovation, new levels of teamwork.
Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton
