This journey is best described as a ladder.

We all earn money someway.  For me, I started a part-time job at Crazy Clarks when I was 14 years and 2 months old.  A friend got me the job and I was so excited to get my first little yellow pay packet (how we got paid in the good old days – real cash!).  Such a sense of freedom and independence.  The whole goal of this phase is to add as many 0′s as you can to your hourly rate.  I have worked in England for as little as 2 pounds per hour and grew to a whopping 45 pounds per hour as a 21 year old.  But staying on this rung was short term.

My mentor, Mr Zollinger, taught me to get into my own business as fast as I could.  So I took the leap at age 23 when I joined Flight Centre Ltd and shared my goal with my trainer who said the fastest person to management had been 8 months.  I did it in 7 months after banking $100,000 in my sixth month of sales.

I’ve got to tell you, management sucked.  I cried . . . a lot.  I was insulted, blamed, cursed, accused, abused and lied to.  That was my first month managing others whilst maintaining sales.

Deciding to jump out of a stable corporate career into franchising was such a leap of faith for me.  The rules of the game had changed and I knew that to achieve my hopes and dreams, I would have to switch industries and start again.

Energy is such an enemy if we get focused on things we can’t control.  How was I to know that the travel industry would suffer such a severe run of events such as September 11, Ansett collapsing and then SARS within a 90 day period.

My team of once committed team members were no longer so easily motivated to do hours of rework with no commissions and a chage from head office meant I could no longer retain my share in my shops unless I was a full-time manager.  The writing was ont eh wall, but what could I do?

It was then that I was approached by a credible client who offered me an opportunity in franchising.  I was so unsure, yet he was so confident and agreed to allow me to put together my own agreement to make the transition easier.

It was 10 years ago that I was trained as a business coach.  In a 10 day intensive training course and induction, I left with a brain full of systems and processes, legals and practices and a new community of franchisees to travel the path with.

I can not recommedn it highly enough!  They told us on our first day that of the 23 trainees, just 3 of us would be successful – I wondered who the other 2 would be.  I embraced the process of a 12 week fast track.  I was accountable to my coach Tracey Voyce (now successful owner of Bloomtools) and embraced fear when challanged to jump out of a plane from 13,000 feet.

The community of franchisees seperated into four distinct packs:

The High Achievers (top 10%) – these are the students of growth, committed to unlearn and relearn constantly to reach for better and better results.

The Professors – who were trained and like to retrain the same stuff to others and seem to enjoy feeling that they know it all.

The Prisoners – who feel trapped and just want to be elsewhere.

The Passangers – the bulk being here, happy to take the ride and enjoy the journey that is franchising.

I enjoyed flirting with all four mindsets and found that most bumped around from phases of prisoner – passenger – student – professor and back again.

My passion is to help people fast track each phase and embrace the learning that comes from experiencing success.

I have coached franchise groups at national conferences like Harvey World Travel, Subway, Brumby’s, Jim’s Pool Care and enjoyed meeting like minded couples who own their life.  I have coached owners of franchise groups such as Glen Hickman (Mr Rental), Peter Velzen (Jim’s Pool Care and Snags), Jade and Tanya Winter (Studio Pilates) and Julia Cormie (RealScope) and many franchisees from varied franchise groups such as Cold Rock Ice-creamery, Harvey world Travel and Discover travel.

As we commit to our quest of serving 100 healthy, enlightened millionaires by 2015, we are excited about our growing community who give back time and money to charity and pay it forward by helping others every day.  Living an unltimate existance to us is committing to the journey to become part of our cycle of success.

Allow us to contribute to your journey in whatever capacity you choose and keep us updated to your thoughts and feelings on your journey.