I got it wrong.

Here’s what the Global Life Project is actually about.

For about a year, I was convinced this Substack was about building a life abroad.

That was true. It was also not enough.

I wrote about the move. The schools. The visas. The bank accounts. The morning a country starts to feel like home. I interviewed people who had done it. I told my own story.

From New Jersey. To London in 2015. To Copenhagen in 2016. Back to London in 2021. Now in the Middle East in Doha, Qatar, as of August 2024.

Two kids. A husband. A business that kept running while we kept moving.

What I left out is the part that made the moves actually work.

The business underneath them.

Here is what I never said out loud on this Substack.

The only reason the moves worked is because the business held up. The only reason the business held up is because of the operating system I had been building inside other people’s companies and my own for over ten years.

I split the conversation in half. Life over here. Business over there.

The people I am actually built to help do not live that way.

You do not get to leave the business at the airport.

You do not get to fantasize about a slower week without looking at who, exactly, is going to do the work that has your name on it.

The life decision and the business decision are one and the same.

So I was telling you half the truth. Here is the other half.

Who am I?

I am Sonaya Williams.

Wife of ten years. Mom to two daughters, ages seven and nine. Business owner for fifteen years.

I have lived in three different countries with my family over the past nine years.

That is the personal side.

Here is the working side.

For the last decade, I have been the CEO Partner. That is the agency I run. We come in when a founder has built something successful and is now stuck inside it. The business is making money. The founder is exhausted. Every decision still goes through them. Nothing moves without them.

We install the operating system underneath the business. The one that removes the founder as the bottleneck.

That work has a name inside our company. We call it the CEO Operating System, or CEO OS.

It is not a course.

It is the actual structure a business runs on.

Decisions. Rhythms. Roles. Money. Delivery. Team.

When the CEO OS is in place, the founder gets their brain back. I like to call it Brain Space.

When it is not, the founder keeps solving the same problems on a different week.

Why I cannot sell that to you… yet

The full CEO Partner engagement is built for businesses that already have a team and serious revenue.

If you are reading this, that is probably not you yet.

You email me. You ask. You tell me where you are.

The math does not work. Not because the work is not worth it. Because it was built for a business three or four steps ahead of where you are right now.

That is the gap I am closing here.

What am I actually doing?

I am taking the CEO OS, the same intellectual property I install inside the firms I work with, and I am right-sizing it for the solo and lean operator.

The one person shop. The founder plus a virtual assistant. The founder, plus two contractors, and a podcast editor. The person trying to get to six figures and feeling like the business is already heavier than it should be.

Same IP.

Smaller frame.

Tools you can actually use this week.

The free membership is where the thinking lives. Two articles a week. Honest writing about what it takes to run a business that does not need you in every seat.

The paid membership is where the tools live. $25 a month. $250 for the year. Every member only post includes a tool, a template, a framework, or a system you can use the same week. Every tool, template, framework, and system stays inside the Global Life Library, your member archive of everything I publish here.

How will this Substack run every week?

One life article. One business article. Every week.

Sundays are for life decisions. Where to live. When to move. How to design a footprint that fits your family. The big calls that have nothing to do with a P&L and everything to do with the shape of your year.

Wednesdays are for business decisions. What to install. What to stop doing. How to run a small operation without becoming the operation.

Two lenses. Two days. So you always know what you are getting and when.

The two frameworks I work from

There are two. They do different jobs.

The Global Citizens Framework is the lens through which Sundays are viewed.

The life lens.

It has three phases.

Desire. Should I? Direction. Where do I? Design. When do I?

It works if you are literally moving abroad. It also works as a model for any operator making a big call. Should I take this on? Where does it go? When do I commit?

The CEO Operating System is the lens through which Wednesdays are viewed.

The business lens.

How the business runs. Where the leaks are. What to install first. What to stop doing entirely.

This is the IP I have been holding back from this Substack.

It is coming forward now.

A note on location

The title of this Substack is Global Life Project.

But here is what I want you to hear:

Location is the differentiator. Not the requirement.

You do not need to leave the country to belong here.

The systems work in Cleveland. They work in Croatia. They work in Cairo. They work wherever you are.

This Substack is for the operator running a small, sharp business who wants the option. To move. To slow down. To rebuild. To step back. Without it costing them the thing they built.

What is dropping when

Week 1, this Wednesday (May 14). A private audio series called Do Less, Better.

Eight episodes. Eight to fifteen minutes each.

It is the closest thing I have ever made to sitting across from a client at the start of an engagement.

What we look at first.

What we stop tolerating.

What we put down so the actual work has room.

Members also get a one-page Listener’s Map. Eight prompts. One per episode. Designed to be answered while you listen.

Not homework. A way to make sure the series leaves you with something on paper.

Week 2 (May 21). The Decision Filter. The tool I use to run any stuck decision in your business through one filter in under ten minutes.

Week 3 (May 28). The CEO Cadence. The five anchors that hold a CEO’s week together when the business is small and the founder is the team.

Week 4 (June 4). The Contractor SOPs. Five ready-to-use SOPs for your VA, your assistant, your editor. Plus the AI script that customizes them for your business in twenty minutes.

All four go into the Global Life Library. Members keep access to every tool, every template, every framework, every system. The library grows every week.

Two questions before I close this

The first is about life.

Of the three phases. Desire. Direction. Design. Where are you?

Are you still figuring out whether you want this kind of life?

Are you trying to figure out where it goes?

Are you in the middle of building it?

The second is about the business.

Same shape. Different stakes.

Desire. You wonder if you can actually run this thing differently.

Direction. You know what you want, but not where the leverage is.

Design. You know what is broken. You are building the fix.

Tell me in the comments. The next four weeks of this Substack will bend toward what you say.

I got it wrong. I am getting it right.

Global Life Project is the operating system for operators who want a global life. Wherever that life is. Whatever scale it is running at.

Sonaya

Inside the membership this week: Do Less, Better, the full 8-episode audio series, and the Listener’s Map. Both live in the Global Life Library alongside every tool, template, framework, and system I publish here.

$25 a month. $250 a year (save $50).

[→ Become a Member]