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Overview
From a very serious corporate career in marketing to creating a business based on fun RedBalloon, this is my journey. In this blog I share what it takes to be an entrepreneur and what I have learned - warts and all. I am also the author of 'I want what she is having' which chronicles the first five years of building of a fast growing business.
Very proud to be awarded National Telstra Business Womens Award for 2008 in the Nokia Innovation Catogory
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Where I’m Speaking
My presentations to company events are not listed because those engagements are not open to the public. Contact Kate on +61 2 8755 0034 for more details on speaking.
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- on my way to Keri Keri, via Auckland Auckland, from Sydney Sydney about 1 day ago from web
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- It is not the storms you meet in life, but the way you set your sails... about 1 day ago from web
- Saw this at the gym this morning 'To make your dreams come true, first thing to do is wake up' about 1 day ago from web
- Doh - got the first call on my new iphone 4 - could not hear a thing... had forgotten to take of the plastic wrap. about 1 day ago from web
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Tag Archives: Business Leadership
Coming up this week.
I had a great time at the Business Chicks lunch this week. The photo is of Janine Allis, myself, Kristina Karlson (Congratulations on her EY Entrepreneur of the Year Southern Region win) and Natalie Bloom – who popped in to support the conversation. One of the questions from the audience was on mentoring - and [...]
Posted in This Week Also tagged Business Growth, Female Entrepreneur, Professional Speaker Leave a comment
The Election we had to have.
I usually keep my blogs to share things that I have learned and discovered in the pursuit of building a business. But as a business leader this week of course I have been left bewildered. Recently I wrote about the disgrace of both major parties advertising and promotional campaigns And clearly I was not alone [...]
Grow!
Each trimester at RedBalloon we galvanize the plan by announcing a theme. The theme is always based on what is the most critical thing for the business to achieve right now! Last trimester the whole company got behind a ‘Red Dawn’ theme. Everyone chipped in as we launched the new version of the website. Some [...]
Posted in best places to work Also tagged Business Growth, Employee Engagement, Leadership, Work life balance Leave a comment
Where is Naomi… this week
Speaking with my new RedBalloon colleague Philippa Lowe this week, she has joined the business to support the communications efforts. She asked me the obvious question ”What do you do in a week?” I mentioned what I get up to and she responded “well if I’m interested in what you are doing other people might [...]
Posted in This Week Also tagged Business Growth, Female Entrepreneur, Professional Speaker Leave a comment
What is bothering me…
Trust is such a fragile thing. One knows that to be trusted is to trust. But what if you give trust – and it is not reciprocated. Is it a one off, can never ever be regained? Does trust need to be earned back, or proved? Isn’t this a contradiction in terms. Jim Collins told [...]
Communication about Bad Apples
Bad Apples can still do damage even after they have left the organization. Cleaning up the damage and rebuilding culture will take consistent and considered effort. My previous post 'Bad Apples' raised the question of authentic communication to the rest of the business - to ensure that culture is not impacted. At RedBalloon being completely [...]
Posted in Lessons Learned Also tagged Employee Engagement, Fun at work, Managers at work Leave a comment
Bad Apple
In the last few posts I have been talking about what it takes to be a Great Place to Work. It’s all about trust and purpose. One of the questions I had recently at a speaking engagement is very relevant ‘What if you have a rotten apple inside your organization– someone who is not just [...]
Posted in best places to work Also tagged Business Vision, culture, Employee Engagement, Leadership, Managers at work 2 Comments
Have Faith
I have trawled through online articles featuring best employers and companies with high engagement scores (I'm curious as to what others do of course) and I can’t help but notice the negative comments some attract along the lines of “it’s easy for you” from people all over the world. The truth is any organisation no [...]
Posted in best places to work Also tagged Business Growth, Business Vision, Employee Engagement, Managers at work, productivity, Recognition and Acknowledgement 1 Comment
Thoughts from a RedBalloon veteran
On Friday it was time to farewell an original RedBallooner - Sarah was with us in the very early days - and has seen the business grow from 9 people to its present 50. She has caught the entrepreneurial bug and started her own show a named ‘Lady Bug’ as a fully fledged interior designer. [...]
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