On women, family & doing business our own way!
What a heady combination; motherhood, family & business. No wonder it’s such a daunting move for most women, but according to Myriam Borg, founder of Cre8 Australia, the alternatives, are far scarier. “I look at my girlfriends who climbed the corporate ladder and none of them are coping. Their day starts at 6:00am so that they get the kids to day care and be at work by 8:30am. Because they have good position, they rarely get home before 7.30 pm… A lot of women can relate to that and it’s not pretty, these women are exhausted!”
“Unless you are really not very Ambitious, combining a brilliant career & a family is sheer madness”, she says. She should know. As a young mum, she had to ask herself some really tough questions. Questions like “do I want to pay the heavy price of leaving my babies from 7:00 in the morning till 7:00 at night 5 days a week for my glorious career?” I started to feel like the career woman “thing” was just a big lie.
“Like many of my friends, we were young women and ambitious as hell, and we really thought we could have it all!” Myriam speaks about climbing the career ladder to top management, which was enjoyable and challenging, but left her missing her child and totally guilt ridden. “As THE boss, my staff needed me & so did the board. That meant morning starts at 7:00am and at night it was not odd to get home after 9:00pm. I had a 4 year old at home that didn’t see me until the weekends. He was more attached to his day carer than he was to me. It simply was not a sacrifice I was was willing to make. Period! So I climbed all the way down the ladder back to a training job and even then, with a second child on the way, it was not viable, but other women keep on this madness for years, even decades because they can’t see a viable alternative.”
In 2000 with a second baby in tow, Myriam went on a search for a home business alternative and found none to meet her requirements.
“I was so frustrated by the garbage that was being offered, I wanted a REAL business that I can run around my family from home that had tiny overhead, so that if I take a week or two off with the kids sick or for breaks it would cost me nothing in overhead to stay in business. I wanted total control being a control freak, any franchise, MLM or multi structure would just not work for me… Oh, and I wanted goodwill, so that my work brings me income but also develops me an asset,” she laughs. “You’d think there would be tons of opportunities that fit my bill – there was a big fat NOTHING! So, true to form, I went about creating it….”
Myriam thinks there is no better time in history for women to get entrepreneurial than right now. Why? “With new technological connectivity and access to tidal waves of information, a shift in society is occurring and it’s affecting how business is done. And by the looks of things, it’s all good news for women wanting to stay home,” she says.
Rapid changes in technology are causing disruption in the way corporations do business. Communication is now digital. Products are now digital. Marketing and delivery of product and services must be done in a different way to meet the digital age.
And she’s packaged a number of great opportunities to suit, in a number of industries, and has set up her own consultancy service to help women get into business for themselves via tailored solutions. “I have some really fabulous opportunities, but it may not be for everyone, so I set up the consultancy to cater to individual requirements. Because we should have the right to get career satisfaction & be good mothers & partners. Today, I do life on my terms and that’s a real viable option for every woman out there sitting in that same spot I was in; we don’t need to sell out. I am living proof of that.” With that, she smiles and leaves her office room to run upstairs. “The kids are on school holidays”, she explains, “and they need lunch made”. That’s what it’s about for her seamless work/family life balance – it’s a beautiful thing.
