Email to a FriendTo celebrate International Women's Day 2022 we are shining a light on our fabulous members and their stories.
Each and every single one of them has an inspiring story about starting their own business. So read on to find out more.
Katie Earl, owner of Katie Earl Editing
What first drew you to starting your business?
I was inspired by a friend of mine who ran her own freelance graphic design business. At the time, I was struggling to keep going in a role that was pulling me away from my passion (writing and editing content) and pushing me into a management role that was making me miserable.
At first, I thought it was too risky to start my own business - after all, I had a mortgage to pay! But over time I realised that the bigger risk was staying in a job that was making me miserable.
One day, I jotted down some ideas about how I could start the business and still make enough money to cover my essential bills, and I knew that I'd never look back.
A few weeks later I handed in my notice, and a few weeks after that, the UK went into its first lockdown of 2020. I panicked, but it actually turned out to be the best decision I could have made. All of a sudden, a lot more business owners were thinking about their online presence and how they could connect with their clients through blogging and other forms of content, which was exactly what I wanted to help them with!
What is the best thing about being your own boss?
Running my own business has allowed me to become who I always wanted to be. It challenges me on a daily basis to problem solve, learn new skills, develop resilience, and prove to myself just what I'm capable of. I can't quite believe I get to do this as a job!
What's your advice to other women going into business?
Seek out a support network to keep you going through thick and thin, and who understand what you're going through.
Whether it's a Facebook group, a networking group, some friends who also run their own business - I am absolutely certain that this is the reason I've been able to weather the storms and keep going.
What is your top tip for success?
My top tip for success is to not take failure personally. It was a tough lesson to learn, but being able to separate a failure in my business from my own self worth has meant I can assess what went wrong and come up with a plan to fix it.
Each time I've stumbled, I've taken a step back, reviewed the processes I was following, and narrowed down the bit that has probably caused the problem. Then I work on it until I'm really good at it, so that I don't make the same mistake twice.
Tell us something about yourself we might not expect?
As well as starting my business during lockdown, I also taught myself how to crochet using YouTube tutorials.
It was actually quite helpful, because I've had a lot of my best business ideas while sitting and doing crochet! Something to do with the repetition and being able to switch off my brain so that ideas can whirr away in the background. I'd highly recommend it!