Olwen Dawe: The Pushy, Bossy Note-Takers’ View on Gender and Entrepreneurship - New NWCI Blog
Published: Sunday, July 21, 2013
I started my business three years ago. To this day, I remember the first networking event I attended 'flying solo'. In fact, I can recall the sick-to-the-stomach edginess I felt as I stood up and 'pitched' my service - it was dreadful.
Now, I am all-too familiar with this sensation - however it's a fleeting feeling when I take to a podium or chair an event - or do a live radio interview. Nerves are good, they keep you sharp. However in August 2010 it wasn't the reality of being out of the age-old, overused term, my 'comfort zone', but in fact, it was the sense that I was atypical in my surroundings. Staking a claim in the sector I work in, as a then twenty-something year-old woman, just wasn't, and to a degree now still isn't, the norm.
Big deal, I hear you say - well, actually - it is.