The 1st August, 2024 marks my sixth year entrepreneurial anniversary, when I left safety and security on the back of receiving funding from the Department of International Trade to build my business. As I look back over at the last 6 years, last year was a pivotal year for me because this was when my business direction and purpose really started to take shape and bear fruit.
I’ve been doing some talks recently about my career journey and my preparation for these encouraged me to look back and see what had happened since I left school. It made me think about how many unexpected turns I have taken as I have been in my career to bring me to where I am today. In our ‘Creative UK’ training where Tim McSweeney talked to us about what investors are looking at, he shared this image with us. He said this was a normal business journey for people. What a relief!
I could see the journey of me growing in skills, expertise and confidence along my career journey. But it’s only in the last 15 months that I have realized how I have wrestled with Imposter Syndrome whilst working in the Intellectual Property space which I’ve never really experienced before. I thought I knew what this common struggle it was, and that it didn’t affect me. I was mistaken.
Although I found myself in the IP space, had created courses and was making sales and providing things of value, I had an underlying question whispering, ‘How can you be in this legal space? How can you do it when you don’t have a legal background?’
I wasn’t sure I could do business here; I wasn’t sure I really could lead or speak in the IP space.
But a few key things happened last year that started to change that:
1) A NEW WEBSITE
My website developer told me I needed to have a specific intellectual property website. It was his view that having the IP courses on my Amanya Design Courses website made it unclear about what I did.
Putting together the IP website started to focus what I was offering, making it clearer for people to see what I could provide. He could see that and the potential of what I was doing before I could.
2) ‘THERE IS SPACE FOR YOU HERE!’
I was encouraged by one of the IP professionals who’d helped me in my bumpy trademarking journey: ‘Anna, there is space for you here. You’ve been there. You’ve done it. You can help people.’
This was a different conversation to my peers or my family, or even my other business contacts: I was hearing from somebody who was a professional in the IP space. That started to change my inner narrative and had a huge impact on my self belief, helping me to explain myself differently and approach the whole subject from a different place.
3) IP TRAINER FIRST…
I had another huge leap in my perspective when one of my business coaches said to me ‘Anna, you need to start talking about yourself being an IP trainer first, and how that has come about through your journey in protecting your own designs. It needs to come up at the beginning of the conversation, that you help to train people with understanding intellectual property and taking action with it, rather than saying you’re a designer that does IP.’
At the start it felt awkward, I still wasn’t sure I could do it, but the more I did it, the more my confidence grew as it led to meaningful conversations.
That was a game changer. Initially I had to say it before I really believed that I could do it. But the more I did it, the more I grew into it.
4) BUSINESS COACHES SEEING POTENTIAL I DIDN’T KNOW WAS THERE
My business coaches have encouraged me to step right outside my comfort zone and talk to people I’d never thought of approaching. They encouraged me to write courses for the USA market when I was approached to see if I could help a USA company with their trademarking and my initial reaction was that I coudn’t help. Whilst my courses were UK based, I already had a USA trademark so I could speak from a place of experience, so why not help others to learn from what I had done in the USA too?
Time with my business coaches stretch me way out of my comfort zone, and help me grow into what is possible with what I am doing. I love working with others with specialisms in areas that I find hard; they come alongside and get into the nitty gritty of the business and help draw out the gold. Priceless.
5) MAKING SENSE OF SPAGHETTI
And in the last 12 months, a lot of things have changed. My self belief has grown. My confidence has grown and the way people want my help has also grown. In the ‘spaghetti journey’ of me being where I am now it’s quite clear that self-belief and belief in what you do has a big part to play. I could see that it took 34 years for the spaghetti to start to make sense.
To say the last few years have been challenging would be an understatement. I have cried bucket-loads of tears. I have doubted. I have questioned what I’ve been doing. I have worked crazily hard. And I’ve wondered at times whether I made a mistake. That’s the honest journey of entrepreneurship.
For a few people the journey is a smooth ride, but for most of us, that’s not the case.
It became clear what a spaghetti ride I’d been on. It was starting to make sense now. I am recognising my place. Of course there are things I don’t know. There are things I can’t help people with. And that’s when I defer to the lawyers. But there are things I can help people with and there are things I can provide. As the solicitor said, ‘There’s room for you here.’
So often when we’re talking about our businesses, we can talk about the success stories and the way things have worked out well. But in one to one meetings, you can be a bit more honest about the struggles and about the downsides. And about the times when you want to quit and the doubts and the anxieties and the times when you think should I go back to doing something safe and secure and something that doesn’t create so much pressure!
But for those of us with an entrepreneurial and creative streak I was reminded of a conversation I had many years ago when I was offered safety and a career path on a plate but that wasn’t a career I wanted to go down. I said to them ‘I can’t do it. It’s like you’re saying to me I’ll clip your wings and you’ll never be able to fly again.’ My eyes filled up with tears and I said ‘You can’t tell me I can’t fly.’
The pull of safety and security was not great enough to stop the pull of destiny, purpose and fulfillment. I come from an entrepreneurial family. My dad left a safe and secure job with two young children to start a research project that may or may not lead to something and he and my mum discussed it and made the decision to take that leap of faith. It wasn’t an easy journey for them. It took a long time for what did become a business to become something profitable and eventually very successful. 52 years on, the business is still thriving today.
So I have entrepreneurial risk-taking in my blood and all of us in our family have started entrepreneurial things. Now, 3 out of 4 of my siblings and I are entrepreneurial. So it’s something that I was born with.
The journey of the entrepreneur and especially the creative entrepreneur is not easy. It’s a journey of at times great struggle, and at times, great doubt. And at times you wonder whether you’ve got what it takes but when I look at what I’m doing now and as the shape of my endeavours are starting to become clearer, I am finding myself come alive in doing things that I’m good at, that I love doing.
I’d never ever imagined that I would start teaching people about intellectual property – it wasn’t anywhere in my game plan. Textiles and creativity was in my game plan. But my dad gave me a love for business, alongside my Mum’s talent for drawing, painting, textiles and creating. As I think and as I tackle the tough subject of IP and try and understand it and conquer it, there’s a feeling of satisfaction, but also a sense of I’m still being creative, is just a different part of my creativity.
This last year I have put the creation of new design collections on the backburner to help build and establish the IP side of my business which has been a lot of hard work, a lot of long hours and a lot of grit and determination to not quit. At some point I’ll be able to let both parts of my business run together, but that’s not for now, my head is too full to build both sides simultaneously. But I’m still being creative. I’m freelancing: designing for somebody else and that’s using the creative design part of what I do.
So in reflection this last year has been pivotal for me in my business. Six years of spaghetti are starting to become straight now and I can see the start of that taking shape.
At the end of the six years, I want to say a big shout out to my family and friends, for their unending support and love. For walking the journey with me amidst all the ups and downs. To my business coaches who have shaped and transformed the way I do business, and to my business network who have also helped steer me into where I am today.
No one’s an island, I’ve not done this alone. I have done this with a whole load of people around me, too many to mention. I wanted to say thank you for your help, your support and for helping me get to this milestone. It’s good to be here.
They say that being an entrepreneur can be a bit like being a parent and raising a child and the disruption it has upon your life with long days as parts of your life go on pause. Sometimes your social life goes out the window and there are times when you wonder was this the right decision? I’ll be honest, there were times when I thought my business would fold. There were times when I thought it was time to go back to a safe, permanent position. But the little voice inside of me said ‘It ain’t over yet.’ There were times when others came alongside me to encourage and speak to me and pick me back up, when I was so discouraged about where things were. Times when God used people to help me know that He had planted things in me that He wanted me to fulfil. There were other times that I had to dig really deep as I said to myself, ‘This story isn’t over. I’m not gonna quit. I’m not gonna let this beat me!’
Being a creative entrepreneur is probably one of the hardest things. In the creative realm, it’s not straightforward. It’s hugely competitive and it’s very hard to separate your creativity from who you are, so knocks and setbacks can become very personal. But if we stay in the game long enough to see if we have made the right decision, we will be glad we did. I thank Jesus He didn’t let me quit.
Here’s to six years and celebrating!
