A little story about entrepreneurship

Hey moms who are into entrepreneurship — here is a story for you —

You ready? Storytime, my first entrepreneurial project. Have you heard it before? This time, let it ring different.

I hope this open and vulnerable share will make a difference for you.

I was in college. A psychology major, the biggest major there was in my school, it was very popular. Straight A student. I helped out all four years in elementary schools because I love working with kids. It was time to figure out what I was going to do with my life because I was graduating soon. The possibilities? Go to grad school (but people on average have 4 years of work experience before doing that… maybe not for me?) Become a teacher? But I was a psych major, not an education major. Go to a burnout job helping people with emotional disturbances? No thanks, it honestly didn’t look appealing at all. I became a psychology major because I wanted to help all kinds of people, not just the ones who are emotionally disturbed… let’s see what other options are there. Get a job using my computer science minor in an up and coming web development shop, with lots of people like me on the team and ping pong tables in the break room? All these companies are coming to my college to recruit for it? Sure! So, I wound up with a nice cushy job, hoping to work on the nonprofit idealistic clients that were shared on their website. It was a great way to graduate college.

Then what happened? After I started working there, the nonprofit clients dried up. It was all corporate. I saw how they went from 40 people working there to 100 people, got bought out and then laid everybody off in just one year’s time. And then… almost all the job listings for similar jobs said you needed 3 years of experience.. and I only had one! Didn’t seem fair… but I steadily did at least 3 job search actions every week, as they told me to…

And eventually, an interview! I got called in for an interview at a new tech company with ONLY nonprofit clients! Even though there were 400 resumes submitted for this position. I think I got the interview because I called the company to follow up if they received my resume and left a voice mail for a random extension. He was a VP, and he forwarded my message to HR! That got their attention. And guess what… they hired me! I was so happy.

Until… the dot com boom busted and I was laid off again. Wait a second… so this tech path is just a fad? Why is society doing this to people newly out of college?

I was bitter, but also invigorated. I was going to handle this layoff differently. While on unemployment insurance, I took 4 months to start something brand new that never existed before. I was like… hey… all these job postings in the environment to become another cog in the wheel… and it’s not even something that will necessarily last? This is what they do to straight A capable people out of college? Something’s not right. Something needs to change. And who is going to change the society if not the people in it?

So, I went to networking events. I read about entrepreneurial projects. I thought, I need to create an alternative. I wracked my brain on ideas until I realized I wanted to… yes!  Start a book drive to raise money for a nonprofit that was building schools and libraries on the other side of the world.

Where did I get that idea? I was inspired by the person who started this nonprofit. He himself had been the director of marketing in a high tech company, but really wanted to help countries build schools when he saw they needed them on a hike he went on. They were poor, they had no books, but desperately wanted to educate. So. he left the high tech world (like I was!) and started something inspirational for kids. He worked with the communities to get them fired up about new schools and libraries. He supplied donations to pay for the bricks and the mortar. He got people authoring local language books. What a great person, I thought! I was just laid off and can’t donate money but… could I serve him with my time? What could I do?

Yes, it was a far fetched project, for me to follow in this person’s footsteps. He started his nonprofit by running a book drive, and here I was wanting to run a book drive for him too. But I was successful at anything I put my mind to, and I was going to put my mind to this. If he did it, I could do it. So yes, lots of people said it couldn’t be done. But I was going to do it because a new project needed to be created and it was going to flex me as someone who was going to create something new for society.

It took a while. It took a long time. But I had time. Just a few years out of college I managed to bring on board 40 volunteers to help me, 18 organizations to partner, and in the end the people in the city of Boston mobilized to donate 3000 books! We sold them for $1-2 apiece as a donation for the nonprofit, and the rest were donated to local Boston organizations. It was a reading renaissance. It was super fun to come together and make it happen! Even though there were of course some doubters, I was thankful for my friends who did egg me on (including an amazing and encouraging roommate), for all of the helpers and partners, and for the results we got.

And why did this happen? Because I was determined to start a new project. I committed to it, I envisioned it, I showed up, I asked for advice, I asked for help, and I invited the people to donate and contribute. People donated time, bookmarks, space in their store to drop off books, driving of the books, people made signs, people agreed to print notices and send them home to parents in schools, and people even donated to put the word on the wire so that the Metro newspaper could pick up the story. It was a huge success! Here’s the article that was picked up, by the way, so you can see I’m not making this up.

Why am I sharing this? This was my first entrepreneurial project. It led to another job after that in a  nonprofit that was very entrepreneurial, much more my style than the original tech companies where I worked. I loved working there! The book drive was a pivotal moment in my life and I think you all have pivotal moments in your life. I wanted to share mine because I want you to see that any big deal that comes to fruition all starts because someone comes up with the idea. Someone decided to go for it, even if some people thought it couldn’t be done. And that someone going for something big could be you!

So if you’re not sure if a big dream of yours can come to fruition, and if you want to talk to someone who is going to cheer you on, I want you to know that I have a 3-month coaching offer for you. A one-on-one coaching offer where we get to talk, you and me, one on one for up to once a week. You can share with me the ins and outs of how it’s going in whatever initiative you are starting, and I can give it my all to support you to get the result that you are looking for, whatever it is.

I’m passionate about entrepreneurship, and I’m also passionate about supporting moms who are interested in entrepreneurship. I get that when you start a family there is SO MUCH that you want to pour into the development of your legacy, the new lives you brought into this world, and yet your legacy is also more than your family, it’s also who you impact beyond the family, such as for your career. Both matter. You can create something that is your life’s work – your voice – your inspiration – and you can share that with people. You can make a difference. You can make ripples both in the growing of your descendants  AND also with entrepreneurial work. Your why for your entrepreneurial work may in fact be to raise your kids with a good role model of a mother and with the financial support to open as many doors for them as possible. I loved kids when I was in college, and I still love kids to this day — I love the idea of supporting mompreneurs.

And while there are plenty of jobs out there who will be happy for you to jump in and take the easy ride, if you know you want to make entrepreneurship work instead, please know that I’ve got you. Society is built from entrepreneurs with big ideas that people tell them aren’t possible. If you want to make it happen, you gotta do it anyway.

If you’re interested in my 3 month coaching/mentoring package, learn more here. I would love to see you do big things while being there for your kids, and I’m happy to bend over backwards giving you the best coaching experience possible. If you are feeling the pull for working together in this way, I would absolutely love to see you in my messenger. You are invited to go ahead and write – whether you are sure now or not – you are allowed to find out. I promise you I’ll bring my A game.

Thanks for reading this rather lengthy post – whew! Kudos for getting to the end! That was a big one! Shows you have endurance – and for people with that, there is so much possible in this lifetime for you…