Page 129 - Marky Stein - Fearless Career Change_ The Fast Track to Success in a New Field (2004)

Ten Success Stories About People Just Like You

7. Just Dive In! No
8. Entrepreneurship Yes He opened his own career
coaching private practice.

From Corporate Events Planner to CEO in 12
Weeks Using Entrepreneurship
Name: Alice
Former occupation: Events planner
New occupation: CEO, discount travel and entertainment company
Primary strategy: Entreprenership
Other strategies: Just Dive In!, transferable talents
Length of time from career decision to a paid position: Three months
Cost (if any) of transition: U.S. Small Business Administration and
home-equity loans (explained below)

It would be hard for most of us to imagine a job that was more
fun than Alice’s. Alice had the good fortune of being an events
planner for a well-known computer company in Texas. She sched-
uled corporate events like large-scale seminars, picnics, and fairs.
In addition to planning internal events, she was in charge of book-
ing travel, entertainment, and sporting events for executives and
employees of the company.
Because her company was so large and so many people were
interested in these events, Alice was sometimes able to negotiate
discounts of up to 60 percent from vendors for theater, opera,
sports, cruises, and a host of other goods and services. For most of
us, this might have been a job to keep for life, but Alice had a spe-
cial dream of starting her own discount travel and entertainment
business where customers could buy tickets on the Internet, and
she had a strong calling to be a philanthropist.
Right at the heart of Alice’s plan was the idea that for every
ticket sold, 30 percent of the profits would go to charities and non-
profit organizations. It was absolutely essential to Alice that she over-
saw a company that was committed to giving back to the commu-
nity. Her talent, as she saw it, was philanthropy. Owning her own
company was only a vehicle for her to be able to give generously to
her community.

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