Wellington
Any start-up business is a work in progress, an environment where the founder is driving whateverthe business sells as well as the business itself.
And in spite of the thousands of textbooks written on the subject, like a sport, it is only whenyou're on the playing field itself that you learn how to play the game.
Such is the case for Umbrella Health and Resilience director Gaynor Parkin. The registered clinical psychologist is used to working with individuals andteaching to a university class. Her experience of running a business and driving it forward is muchless, and is a situation where she's often had to apply her own training.
UHR provides business training modules that help employees (and managers for that matter) betterdeal with stress and make ongoing changes to their behaviour. (see story
Running the eight month old business has been "a learning curve of a thousand percent," Parkinsays.
"It's fun, exciting, very satisfying and rewarding, and also slightly scary. I've had to practicewhat I preach about staying calm, watching what I'm thinking, and how I’m looking aftermyself."
Parkin's been assisted by Viclink as an equity partnerand business mentors, and also completed Grow Wellington's Activate course. From them she's had helpdeveloping business plans, a marketing plan, financial plans and aspects such as employmentcontracts and managing staff.
“The best advice I have been given is to consult with experts," she says. "It is much fasterand more effective than trying to learn all the essential skills yourself.”
Life's been an even bigger juggle since starting UHR, an attempt to balance a home and familylife with the incessant need to drive the business forward.
“With a start up business there is a constant juggle of competing requirements for your time,the trick is learning which tasks are urgent and which ones are slightly less urgent,” she says."Then trying to maintain a life outside the business is equally important".
Her current dilemma is how to protect the intellectual property of her resilience trainingmodules that are delivered over either a day or two half days - with a follow up review a few weekslater.
The vision for UHR is to have a team of experts, and one way she achieves this is by having thecourse facilitated by a clinical psychologist. To be scalable (and Parkin's envisaging that herresilience courses will be available in Australia and the UK in the near future), she's got tofigure out a way to protect the knowledge packages.
"Basically, we have to brand it to within an inch of its life," she says. "But it's verydifficult to stop people saying 'that's a good idea, I could run that sort of training'. A servicebusiness is very different from a technical business."
One aspect she hopes will help is that trainers or people delivering the course "need ourfacilitation to learn these skills and how to apply it," Parkin says.
However, because the workshops are based on scientific research and are evidence-based to producebest practice, the courses have the ability to be changed.
"It's about adapting quickly, changing the material or what's on offer whenever new researchcomes out," she says.
"What someone learns at a workshop could be different in three to six months if we discover thatsomething else is more effective."
Parkin's also determined to ensure that UHR develops beyond herself.
"I want to grow the brand beyond me," she says. "It's not about Gaynor Parkin resiliencetraining. I want the value to be in the content and training that our facilitators are able toprovide for people."