Making the Leap: A Personal Journey

Today we’re taking you back in time on a personal journey. A great slideshow provided by the McCombs School of Business at UT recently reminded us of the challenges and excitement we experienced as we decided to become business owners. And the advice is solid–not just for the development stage, but for the growth stages as well. Entrepreneurship is in our blood and it was a big part of both of our families. People ask us: “How did you make the leap?” Well, here is Chellie’s story.

Planning & Patience

When I graduated from Baylor in 1998 with a BBA in Business Management and Real Estate I had one goal – to one day own my own company. School loans overrode that goal and I took a decent paying job working for someone else. The goal grew to a desire long about the time my husband and I started talking about growing our family. You see, I grew up in a household where my mom owned her own business. She was a beautician and had a quaint little shop much like the one portrayed in Steel Magnolias in our garage. I would hop off the school bus, run home and plop down in a big comfy chair she had in the corner of the shop. I’d listen to the ladies gossip about anything and everything. Then when the last customer left looking beautiful, we’d start our evening together.

I have wonderful memories of my mom’s shop and the fulfillment it brought us all; I wanted my child to have a similar upbringing. Decisions had to be made and a future of steady paychecks and 401k contributions become a thing of the past. A contract position was coming open at my current employer that would allow me a work-from-home opportunity with flexibility in the number of hours I worked in a day. It was a huge leap of faith, but I went for it! We prepared for this change six months in advance with a rigorous savings plan. More than half of my monthly paycheck went into savings and all major purchases went on hold. The first three months were tough until the commission checks started coming in. To top things off, three months into this job change, I was pregnant and my childhood memories were now put in motion for my own daughter. The first year had its fair share of financial challenges since the previous salesperson sold the base for the year. It was up to me to go above and beyond in sales to make a decent living. I ended year one making about half of what I had made salaried, and it was fine. We survived it, and it was a great learning year for us.

Six years later I took on a bigger challenge – being a business owner of a corporation. I left being a solo practitioner for the big leagues, complete with a business partner. Once again the monthly pay changed back to a steady paycheck, but on a smaller scale. When you start a business, you have to take time to grow your client base, grow the bank account and sometimes you have to make sacrifices. The first year of life as an owner of Monarch Media, I worked two jobs to keep our household finances in check. It was tough. But again, we survived. So my advice to someone thinking about making the leap is to plan as much as you can by putting money into savings and be patient. The wait is well worth it!

— Chellie Thompson, Cofounder, Monarch Media & Consulting, Inc.