I left school just after I turned sixteen years of age, without School Certificate. My first job was as a florist which only lasted two months on account of my being fired for my stroppy attitude! What a wake-up call that was! However, it was a great lesson for me and ever since that dismissal I have been a diligent worker.

For the next 25 years I worked in administration roles, had my two daughters and worked myself up to being an Office Manager for the Federal Government. Not bad for someone with little education I guess, however, I have always had a yearning to have my own business.

Today, I am a Director of True Colours Group – I head up the Recruitment and Keynote Speaker Divisions of the business. True Colours Group is a Training company with a heavy focus on helping to develop women as leaders as well as linking training to Corporate Social Responsibility.

My first business was a speaking bureau called Coyote Management International, and let me tell you it nearly sent me broke, however it was the best learning curve of my life. When I started the business I was working as an Office Manager and met my then partner who is a well known Professional Speaker, Ron Lee aka the Corporate Ninja. His client invited me to join them at a conference in Fiji, which Ron was speaking at. I was in awe of the Ninja’s career...here he was getting paid thousands of dollars and spending five days in Fiji as part of his work! I asked him, “How do I become a part of this?” and he replied “Become a Speaker or start a bureau.”

Well that is exactly what I did. Within a couple of months I had a name, a website www.coyote.com.au (which I taught myself to build) and was on my way. I kept my full time job for those two months then took the plunge and left my secure employment to run my business out of our home. Big Mistake Deb!! Here I was in business having never sold in my life, knew nothing about marketing, let alone how to run a business! Six years on, I still have my bureau and I am now a Director, along with my business Partner, Tanya Harris, in a wonderful, exciting business.

My Mistakes Were:

• Starting a business with zero capital
• Didn’t have any savings to keep me going
• Left my job so stopped my income altogether
• Didn’t research the market
• Chose a stupid name! Coyote Management International? Good grief!, Do I look after Coyotes? No! I represent keynote speakers! I laugh at it now, however it does have a brand so hard to change, however I am in the process of changing it.
• I had no experience in selling
• I had no experience in marketing
• I actually had no experience in professional speaking

What I Did Right:

• I had the guts to stick to it
• I believed in my services and product
• I had passion..I lived and breathed my business
• I acquired mentors
• I learnt from my mistakes
• I learnt how to sell, market and run a business
• I attended every networking event I could
• I built a name
• I learnt how to build an internet profile
• I made contacts
• I was a sponge soaking up “How To”.....just like you are now
• I had guts
• I never ever gave up
• I compromised

So how did I get here today? Three years into Coyote I was making enough to live on, but not the type of money I dreamt of so I decided to get a sales job and run Coyote on the side. This was an excruciating decision to make as I thought of myself as a failure and I didn’t want to work for anyone else. As it turned out, I applied for a job that was advertised through a recruitment company. The Managing Director of the recruitment firm rang me himself and told me he didn’t want to put me forward for the role I applied for, he wanted me to work for him as a Recruiter. You see by now, I had learnt so much about marketing and business that I was a pretty hot candidate to enter the world of recruitment.

I accepted the role and was put in charge of heading up the business support desk with the proviso that I could still run Coyote out of hours. The company put me through vigorous training and I learnt very quickly how to build rapport with candidates and become a savvy recruiter. I utilised my strengths which is tenacity, passion and building relationships. A year on I wanted to work in the city not Chatswood, so I applied for, and was accepted, for a position in a recruitment firm for their Business Support team. Within two months I was promoted to the Executive Team heading up the Sales & Marketing Desk.

All was going well until the Global Financial Crisis hit. I was dissatisfied at work, I didn’t think there was anything unique I was offering my clients, especially in such a hard economy. It was then I mentioned to Tanya Harris, my now business partner, that I was going to put a recruitment arm into Coyote and once I placed a candidate would get a speaker/trainer to come in and conduct a team training or sales training workshop as part of our fee. I can still remember that moment because we looked at each other and exclaimed “True Colours!” – it was perfect to add Recruitment to True Colours and our point of difference is we offer an on-boarding session either by training the whole team the candidate is placed in, or a one on one coaching with the new candidate as part of our package at no cost to our client.

True Colours Recruitment became a Division of the True Colours Group and more recently we added another Division, True Colours Keynotes which is Australia’s only female speaking bureau.

This is a very abbreviated story of how I started a business and got to where I am today. You can read all about it at seemingly-sane.com. Below I have dot pointed what I learnt along the way and I hope that any woman reading this, who has a vision for herself will think “If she can do it, so can I!” Let me tell you, YOU CAN!!!

• Have a dream and write it down
• Create a plan of what you want in 3 months, 1 year and 5 years
• Have a vision of what it looks like in your business, how much do you earn, where do you work? Start of vision board and pictures of the lifestyle you want on it. In my case I have a book that I put photos of what I want to achieve i.e. the type of car, holidays etc and I am always putting a tick to these items as I achieve them!
• Read everything you can on entrepreneurs, marketing, sales, other people who have succeeded, read until you fall asleep
• Always keep a positive mindset and see your vision
• Except that you might fail and fail again
• Be prepared to pick yourself up after every knock back
• Never ever give up your dream
• Find mentors. Some of my mentors don’t even know they are my mentors. People are always flattered to be a mentor. I am happy to mentor anyone if time permits.
• Investigate if you can raise capital or get a government grant
• Use free resources i.e. zoho.com, skype.com and other great websites that you can learn to create your own logos, like logomaker.com. Check out the Government Business Websites – they want you to succeed!
• Research your competitors
• Network, even if you are shy. Just do it!
• Be creative with marketing i.e. become an expert in writing articles or learn how to write a great press release
• Be prepared to work 14 hour days or more
• My biggest mistake was trying to take on my competitors. Today however, I found a niche market in the speaking industry and started a women speaker bureau: truecolourskeynotes.com
• Learn how to build websites
• Take calculated risks
• Learn to sleep – this is hard when funds are not coming in so in my case I have a mantra if I want to sleep.
• Leverage off other people, doing it alone is tough
• Learn to Barter
• Believe in yourself
• Find someone to work with, leverage off people
• Be prepared to give
• Be confident
• Love what you do
• Tell yourself every day “I am successful”....this could even become your mantra when you can’t sleep

Go Girl! You can do it if you have the passion.

Debbie Carr is a director of the True Colours Group and Coyote Management International. You can find her at www.truecoloursrecruitment.com, www.truecolourstraining.com, www.truecolourskeynotes.com and www.coyote.com.au/debbie_carr.html and you can read her story at www.seemingly-sane.com