Meet The Entrepreneur: Martha Urquhart

Meet The Entrepreneur: Martha Urquhart

Published on Monday, 26 September 2011 14:41

	By RachaelO Follow @_AsktheExperts_

Martha Urquhart constantly strives to push beyond her comfort zone.

  In so doing, she has increased her areas of expertise to include online learning, curriculum development, writing, training, mentoring, facilitating, consulting, and even translating. She just recently acquired a health food business and is looking forward to expanding her skills in that field.

Following contributing to Lessons Learned from the Recession, Martha spoke to RachaelO about being an entrepreneur and her passion for business:

What was the first job that you did that developed or instigated your entrepreneurial spirit?

My first recollections of entrepreneurial activity were long before I was old enough to work. I think this is often the case with many people who are part of families that need to be creative in making ends meet. As a young child, I would pull a wagon filled with fresh vegetables from our garden around the neighbourhood to sell. This is reminiscent of by-gone days when merchants would travel through the streets calling out their wares. I can assure you that I am not that old. Circumstances simply dictated using a more traditional method of selling our produce.

Fast forward many years. As a young adult, I was not attracted to the security of regular paychecks. Instead, I sought out the jobs that gave me the flexibility I craved. For a number of years, while I traveled from place to place, I would hire myself out as an “office temp.” This allowed me to work at a variety of offices, performing a wide range of activities, without committing myself to one employer. I was able to live a less structured lifestyle than many of my friends had adopted. More importantly, it taught me that security does not lie in a regular paycheck. Rather, it lies within ourselves.

What is the most powerful lesson in business that you have learned?

Don’t wait for encouragement, support, or confidence. Trust your instincts and go for it. You will always have “nay-sayers” in your life. Many times, these “nay-sayers” are your closest friends or family members. Don’t let their fear of your success or failure hold you back.

Have any of your business ventures ever failed? What went wrong?

I started a daycare business for a brief period in my life. My sister had a successful daycare and I thought it would be a good idea. I hated it. I did not like someone telling me what they thought I should be doing. That just does not work for me. Neither do keeping notes and justifying the work I do. I need to have autonomy.

There have been many ventures that have failed. But I don’t dwell on them so I don’t remember their details. I simply take the lesson that I learn and move on. And one of the greatest lessons I have learned over the years is that I work best directing my own self. I can work within a group, but not under a group. There is an important distinction that has taken me many years and many different types of employment to discover.

As an entrepreneur, have you found any habits that are hard to break?

Limiting myself to a few entrepreneur ventures at one time. I find that I have a lot of ideas and I want to implement them ALL at the same time. That is not possible. I need to take a step back, decide on which would be best for me to focus on, and stick to that decision.

Another habit I have is related. I tend to jump at opportunities as they arise. Sometimes, this means that I’ve got more opportunities than I can handle. I pull it off but not without a lot of stress emotionally and physically. I’m trying to initiate a time management method that will not allow myself to continue doing this. It’s hard to remember and I have to catch myself before I overload again.

What is the biggest goal that you have set yourself recently and achieved?

I made the decision to write a daily blog and I have done exactly that. Although some days I don’t have access to the internet. I have to post my blog the following day. Even so, I write one blog every day. And most of the time, the blogs are posted on the day they are written, or else the very next morning.

I even started writing my blogs before I actually set up my blog site. By the time I had my blog site set up, I had two weeks worth of blogs to post!

This is a major breakthrough for me. I love writing. I’m very good at it. But often I allow other activities to interfere. By setting this goal, even though it is a small one, I have forced myself to sit down every day and write something worth reading.

Another incredible writing goal that I accomplished this past year is writing 50,000 words in 30 days. NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is an event sponsored by the Office of Letters and Light. Its purpose is to inspire everyone to write 50,000 words during the month of November. I did exactly that: within one 30-day period, I wrote more than 50,000 words.

I ended up with five different short stories that I intend to publish as one book. As I’m completing the editorial process, one of these stories may emerge as a novel on its own right. As an entrepreneur, I’m always open to changing direction if circumstances indicate a better approach.

What was your favourite purchase in the last 12 months?

A beautiful yellow cocktail dress. Over the past five years, I had been looking for a dress to wear on special occasions. I’m quite picky with the type of dress I wanted to wear. I don’t go for fashion, I go for what flatters me. A lot of the fashion over the past five years is not flattering, at least not for my body type. I was having a lot of trouble finding something I liked and that looked good on me. This yellow dress jumped out at me. Not only do I love the colour yellow but the style itself looks fantastic on me!

From your recent contribution to the book Lessons Learned From The Recession, what was your advice to aspiring business leaders?

Remember the bottom line. And it’s not what we’ve been told or what businesses in the past have practiced. The bottom line is people. The driving force behind your business is people. People buy your products or services. People sell your products or services. Your entire success is dependent upon how people relate to you and what you are offering. Your business doesn’t grow because of money, or products, or services, or the economy. Your business grows because of the people who are attracted to you and what you have to offer them. If you put people first – whether employees or customers – they will put your business first.

Do you have any favourite motivational quotes that you can share?

"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, totally worn out and proclaiming, ‘Wow, what a ride!’” (anon)

Why do we sometimes live our lives being so careful?

“And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance / I hope you dance.”

Part of the chorus to I Hope You Dance by Lee Ann Womack.

This is my hope for all young adults just beginning their future. We all end up in the same place in the end. So we might as well choose to dance, rather than sit on the sidelines watching.

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.”
The last lines in the poem, The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost.

Life is all about choices. And where we end up will depend upon the choices we make today.

Relevant Links

Martha's Blog

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