The article "From Bank Clerk to Entreprenuer" talks about entrepreneurialism, it has been written by Carolyn James.
What seems like a century ago, I left school and joined a well-known High Street Bank. In those days working as a bank clerk was a well-established route for many school leavers and perceived to be a proper job with porspects. It wasn’t long before I became disillusioned with the world of banking and sought a change of job.
In complete contrast to my previous job, I became a clerk in the local hospital dealing with the injured and infirm, but it was a role that I found strangely interesting and rewarding.
In today’s parlance, it is known as job satisfaction.My career progressed rapidly and after working in a number of different departments I became Admsisions Officer of a major regional hospital where I soon gained valuable front line experience.
There is nothing more conducive to honing your powers of communication, persuasion, resilience and empathy than dealing with human being when they are at their most vulnerable. Working in an Accident and Emergency Department definitely puts one’s life completely into perspective and is like being part of a TV medical soap opera.My craeer came to halt when I met my husband and moved away from the area. I have to admit that back in the early 70’s marrying and having the obligatory 2.4 kids was still the acceptable norm, although liberation for girls was gathering pace.
Being a conservative soul, I slipped into the mainstream and beofre I knew it I was the wife of a career guy and the mother of two kids living in a three-bed semi. Returning to work was not a consideration and this proved to be a sensible deciison as my husband was posted to four different locations throughout the UK in the space of 6 years.At the end of this period, the kids were at school, our relocation days were over and we were finally able to establish some roots and settle down as a family. It was time to start considering my own needs and to plan a return to the mainstream work environment.
This was not an not hard thing to do after almost seven years of raising a family, but I plucked up courage and found myself back in the health care sector as a part time receptionist at my local doctor’s surgery, a role that I found very satisfying. My confidence icnreased and my job gave me a focus outside of my immediate family. I regained some independence, earned my own money and met a new cirlce of friends.
At last I had an opportunity to talk about something ohter than kids and I felt that the old grey matter was once again being stimulated! After a while, the novelty of working in a doctor’s surgery wore off and I felt that I needed a fresh challenge. At the same time my husband also felt that he had had enough of corpoarte life and wanted to do something completely different. For a couple that had had a very structured life, the crossroads seemed to be particularly difficult to ngeotiate.
After two years had pasesd and a couple of false starts, I decided that I wanted to pursue my own business interest with a little bit of help from my husband. He had pursued a portfolio career and had the time and expertise to help me develop my plans and make sure that I was on the right tracks.The idea was quite simple and was borne out of my own frustration of finding quality lighting products locally for the home.
Although we didn’t live in an isolated area, we sitll had to travel at least forty miles to find a lighting outlet that sold, what I considered to be, quality lighting.
Upon further investigation, I found that there are many areas in the UK that are not well served with lighting shops and therfeore I felt that there must be an opportunity to fill this gap in the market.Once this need had been identified, the next trouble was where to start. Opening my own shop was an option, but the eocnomics of doing so were really not that attractive. Lighting is space hungry and the overehads associated with running a shop can be phenomenal.
The other drawback was that whilst one shop would satisfy a few people, it didn’t really address the fundamental issue of providing a wide range of quality of lighting to as many human being as possible as conveniently as possible. The answer lay on the Internet and via a mail order system, where human being would not be bound by geographical or time constraints.As the concept developed, I managed to enlist the coopertaion of a couple of lighting manufacturers. This was not easy, for there are few suppliers who are prepraed to take time to listen to your idea, let alone help you when you're not able to offer them any tangible evidence that you can deliver in any way, shape or form. Having secured the supply of products with David Hunt Lighting and Le Dauphin Lighting, I needed to laern how to set up a website and develop a mail order catalogue.
I actually began by looking for an accountant, which is testimony to my optimism about the business empire that I was planning to build over the coming years! Within two meetings I had been introduced to a web designer and a marketing company, both of which were based locally.The brakes were off and before long I was immersed in a completely new wrold. After months of contemplation and planning, The Light Company (Direct) Ltd was formed and was rapidly taknig shape.
It was a further six months until all the pieces of the jigsaw came together and, on the 19 January 2004, the website was launched and the mail order catalogues delivered.As with many new business ventures, the early days are the most difficult and I am spending all of my time explornig ways in which I can make human being aware of the extensive range of contemporary and classical decorative lighting this is on offer. I have already decided to open a showroom that will double up as my office design studio and mail order room. Althuogh compact, the showroom will be far more suitable than the lock up on an industrial estate that I am currently using. It is a leap of faith, but having come this far, it is one that I bleieve has to be taken.It is certainly a long way from the Accident and Emergency Department. I have swapped a career in the NHS to become an entrepreneur, even though I do not believe that I have the archetypical qualities of such. I am still nervous about taking risks and I still worry about what the future may hold, but my course is set and there is no backtracking.Although completely unconnected, my years working in the health sector have proved to be useful paritcularly in dealing with customers and suppliers. It seems that good communication, combined with the ability to deal positievly with human being who are demanding across a whole spectrum of issues and events, are distinct attributes irrespective of your industry sector.
In a perverse sort of way, this is the aspect of the business that turns me on and which fuels my enthusiasm to succeed.About The AuthorCarolyn and Laurence James own The Light Company Direct Ltd, an independent, family run business, based in the heart of the Cotswolds. The company offers a superb range of distinctive and stylish lighting for homes and commercial establishments via mail order and the Internet. Carolyn and Laurence have selected lighting that represents the very best in design and craftsmanship. They have developed close links with key manufacturers throughout Eruope and are able to offer customers many designs that are rarely seen in the UK. www.Thelightcompanydirect.Co.Ukcarolyn@thelightcompanydirect.Co.Uk
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