Having it all….Yes, you can!

If you’re a mum (sorry, I’m from the UK!) you may have experienced the frustration of trying to balance being the mum you want to be, with the successful businesswoman you also want to be. Never far from the news are the stories of how boardrooms are dominated by men in suits.  We love men in suits by the way, but we love women who are doing what feels right for them and their families too.  Reporters ask the questions as to why less women make it, what’s to be done?  Maybe it’s that so many women balk at the long hours it takes to make it to the boardroom, coupled with the long hours it takes to be a mum. There are only so many hours in the day.  We take our hats off to the women who manage both feats at once; they are startling and remarkable and impress us every time we read about and meet them.  BUT. For us starting our own business was the best solution; we get to tick our mum boxes daily, and we fulfil our professional goals at the same time.

Working for yourself can give you everything you want, and if you think you can’t, well, yes you can! Take a look on Google at mums in business and see the thousands of women who have taken up arms (aka pens and computers) and started their own thing.  Many women start because they feel frustrated at a lack of flexibility and missed parent’s evenings, and as many start because they have a love for something that is not fulfilled within their current job.  Whatever the myriad of reasons, they started, as we started, and their businesses fulfil their needs to be great mums, provide an income for their families, and gain some satisfaction and reward in the process.

No one is right or wrong. There is only ultimately what feels right for you. There’s no problem in working full time and being a mum or being a stay at home mum, but if you do want to have it all your own way, here are our top tips to getting started with your own business.

1. Get started! Yes we really did just say get started. It would be so easy to sit and say “I don’t know enough”, “I haven’t got an idea”, “I don’t know what I want to do”, “I haven’t got any capital” – you get the picture.  But business is a journey. Where you start is not where you end up.  There are detours and diversions, some beautiful, some not so, but sure as eggs are eggs, getting started means you’ll evolve and develop and grow and end up somewhere else, which is better than not moving anywhere at all.
2. Be yourself – it’s so easy to fit in, blend in, do it like they say you should, do it like they do, be more like this and less like that, be this way, this way is best, it won’t work if you do it that way.  But it’s a lot more effective and so much more pleasurable and fun if you are being YOU!  YOU that perfect you who is just fine exactly as you are.  If you are authentic and it shows, you’ll be relaxed, flowing and in harmony with life, and in our experience happiness leads to success, not the other way around.
3. Learn! – find out what you need to know….books, courses, research, experts – use as many sources as you can to find out and learn new things.  As you grow a business so you grow yourself and the cycle continues on.
4. Ask for help – there are so many wonderful people and organisations out there who want to help, who love helping, so ask for it. No question is silly as our parents used to say, and weren’t our parents always right?   Business is a lot of opinions, there’s no one right way, and the more you ask the more you’ll learn and the more you’ll know what feels right for you.
5. Problems are opportunities – see any problem as a challenge and an opportunity.  We’ve learnt our greatest lessons and made our biggest leaps after facing problems.  Overcoming them teaches us our strengths and about what works and what doesn’t, so don’t worry about problems, just welcome them in and work on them.

If you’d like to ask us anything about starting a business or our journey so far please get in touch. We love to help and we are passionate about business and people following their dreams.