If mothers did not have their hands full already with demanding kids and family, here is abreed of super Moms who dare to venture in the volatile entrepreneurial universe and succeed beautifully. This month’s Headstart event was a dedication to this super human being – the Mompreneur. You will be surprised by the range of solutions provided by Mompreneurs inspiring entrepreneurs of every age, gender, class. Amongst the many topics covered, tech, music and media were some of the highlights covered during the event.
“You have to be a jack of all trades,” said Padmaja Duuvuri, mother of a bubbling teenager, another child entering the teens and an 8 year old Arete Technologies i.e. a Web Solutions company. Working with a stock exchange firm did not give her the flexibility to manage her responsibilities at home. After exploring a few options, she followed her passion towards web applications and design and thats where Arete Technologies was born. Being a part of multiple platforms such as TIE, BNI, Bloggers Network gave her the freedom to pursue her dream. She insists on the need for being positive, constantly re-inventing yourself and introspection.
What is different about Mompreneurs is that not only did they talk about their product, but also spoke about their personal journey.
“My biggest achievement is my child. He is the co-founder, decision maker, ideator of The Content Company”, so said Aruna Singh, as she called her son over to the dias showing him off with pride to the audience. Giving your family and kids priority is important, but what is most important is to love yourself. “Only if I do what I love can I be a happy mother,” said the MD and CEO of The Content Company. Her personality spoke about everything her company stands for i.e. creating unique content into commercially viable solutions like comics in genres of horror, augmented reality as well as content in system robotics. “Leverage the flexibility a startup can provide to reach out to your kids and respect them enough to know that they will behave,” she said about striking a work life balance. For a crowd that is used to seeing mostly male entrepreneurs and angel investors talking about technology and applications, Aruna was a breath of fresh air. It was a first to see an interactive mother-son combo at Startup Saturday.
Talking about content, present amongst us was a musical content creator Aditi Shah, founder of Musical Bonding. On her return from the U.S Aditi identified the lack of open spaces for kids to play and interact in a clean, safe and creative environment like facilities available in the U.S. Form organising art competitions for 10 students to the number dramatically increasing to 500 purely on the basis of word of mouth i.e kids bringing their friends to the event, she has grown leaps and bounds in her musical journey. “Support from her family and especially volunteer parents are a major support system when I started this company and continue to be,” she said. Identifying friends, family, co-workers and people who believe in your dream is very important and all the mompreneurs stood by the fact that their main source of help comes from fellow moms who either work with them from home or help in a part time arrangement, be it with work or help with taking care of the children.
But here’s a Mompreneur who did not have the convenience of a support system. Her husband was transferred to a new city and she was in a dilemma of how to set up her new home. Rajshri Purohit, was met with a constant dilemma of which fridge to buy at the best price, which internet service provider to use, issues that anyone new to a city will face without any friends or help network. That is when she got the idea of providing a simple solution to this problem. Chief Technology Officer of Simplibuy Technologies, Rajshri believes that women should not wait for things but must go and make them happen.’ She created a platform called WICFY where people can share and discover products, prices and places around them for optimal shopping. “Starting and growing a company is not easy but then motherhood is not easy either. It is often said labour is the maximum pain a human being can experience but I would say start ups give you something similar. When we incorporated our company, my daughter was 5 years old and son was just a year old. It was like having to look after 3 kids aged 5, 1 and a just-born company. You have to love your venture as you love your child. It is made out of your blood, flesh and bone. The upbringing of a company and developing great culture for it is no less than raising a kid,” she said when asked about the many challenges she faced. More importantly for a mompreneur the additional challenge is to give priority to the kids along with making them understand the value of the work you do. “I Strike a Do Not Disturb i.e. DND deal with my kids. When I have meetings, I tell them I will be unavailable for an hour post which I will play a game of Monopoly with them. Its a fair deal and if you keep to it they will respect your word.”
Being a mompreneur takes more gut and gumption than any job profile entails, if you know women venturing in this tough universe congratulate them for their courage and help them in what will surely be a success story, because as we all know, “Moms know best.”
A Memento dedicated to All Moms! 🙂
@diipti is an entrepreneur, writer, photographer, traveller, blogger!