Eureka moment?

I recall sitting in a meeting room, having yet another meeting on the 12th floor of my office building at the time. I was looking at my notes but when I looked up, it struck me that every face around the table looked similar, in terms of gender and race, and they were different from me. This was my eureka moment.

I started questioning the lack of ethnically diverse professionals in senior roles. It became a nagging question at the back of my mind, as I interacted with people from an ethnic background who were competent at their jobs and wondered why they struggled to get promoted or noticed at work. I decided to do something about it. And that's how Career Masterclass was born.

Finance

Career Masterclass started out as a passion project, and initially, revenue came through organisations who sponsored our in person Masterclasses and our annual STRETCH conference. We also designed an amazing career planning workbook which we sold at our events and on our website.

We're fortunate to have a tribe of people who believe in our mission and cause. Now, we are revenue generating and in addition to individual subscription sales, we have cultivated good commercial relationships with organisations who buy enterprise licenses to our digital platform, hire us to run highly bespoke talent accelerator programs for specific cohorts and who also have sponsored our flagship conference.

To fund the next phase of our growth, we recently began a crowdfunding campaign on Seedrs that has done extremely well, with over £300k raised barely two weeks after going live to the public.

Regrets

I wish I had known that the entrepreneurial journey is a fraught one and that my roller coaster journey was normal  -  I would have spent less time worrying!

What would you have changed?

I would have started earlier and invested time and effort in cultivating a valuable network. People are often willing to help but if you don't ask you'll never know.

For more information visit Career Masterclass