Riding the Waves of Business
When I started my business, I was very lucky. Having been in the recruitment industry for 20+ years, my career was full of contacts in our region who knew how I worked and what I could deliver. Yet even with all that support, the emotions of dropping the security blanket of a permanent position could not be hidden or not felt. In telling my husband that I am a small business owner now and if I don’t work, I don’t get paid, there was the realisation that holidays would wait until business was quiet. My business started in October 2019 and had my first week off in November 2022.
As a Branch Manager in the recruitment industry, I used to say that my job was to rock in a foetal position. If the branch was quiet, I would rock in a foetal position about how we would build the business. If we got a large project in, I would rock in a foetal position about how we would deliver the project with the resources we had. I have had the same experiences in my own business, however along the way I have learnt some lessons:
1. People genuinely want to support you. I have been blessed to have the unwavering support from some amazing people. My business growth is word of mouth and some of my clients have followed me since 2007.
2. It’s a remarkable journey being a small business, but you won’t get through without some scrapes along the way. They are called mistakes and we all make them – that is what makes us human! Turn those mistakes into a learning opportunity and they will always be a positive.
3. Be true to your business values. Our Values are Safety, Customer Focused, Integrity, and Community. We support community not for profits with our time and advice. We make a genuine difference by listening to our clients’ needs. We are fair and equitable in our practices with open and honest communication, allowing us to whole heartedly support our clients to succeed; and we believe in a holistic approach to safety by supporting our clients’ vision to keep their people safe. In essence, we walk the walk. Do not have values for your business that are not firmly entrenched in everything you deliver and the business decisions you make. We have written enough on the importance of values, for you to understand that they are fundamental to our business.
4. Sometimes the most amazing things happen in the worst-case scenario. As most of you would be aware, Kelly Boyle was the leader of the HR Services side of Nic Willis Consulting. When Kelly told me she had to move overseas for six months, I absolutely rocked in a foetal position. She is one of the best HR practitioners I have ever had the pleasure of working with and one half of my business. Needless to say, I am not one to sit on my hands, so I started to reach out to close HR contacts asking if they knew anyone who could lead the HR Services side of Nic Willis Consulting. Hard ask because as you would be aware, it has been very difficult to find good HR people in our region for the last few years. I also needed that person to have a key driver of making a positive difference.
And it happened! Again, sometimes the most amazing things happen when you least expect it – Rod Francisco reached out to me. Now this is an HR practitioner I have respected for years. His HR experience is vast, and he also wants to make a difference. Winning!
I not only have Rod leading half of the business, but I am in the position to have the opportunity to learn so much from working with him. Who knew that from such a tough situation, new opportunities would sprout.
Ride the waves. Small business is not always unicorns and rainbows. Don’t let that stop you – go the distance and back yourself. Ride the waves and expect the most remarkable things will happen and perhaps they just will.