Recession, a blessing in disguise?

A contingency plan…why would we possibly need a contingency plan???

I can honestly say that the recession of the early 1990’s had no effect on my life what so ever. My father a policeman and my mother a housewife with 4 children to support, always managed, and still do live within their means. Don’t get me wrong, as children we never went without and enjoyed holidays abroad every year, we would jump into the caravan, drive through France and spend 4 weeks on the coast in Spain.

I’m the eldest of four children and I have two sisters and one brother, my sisters both live in Perth, Australia and my brother in South London, my parents retired to Spain some years ago.

I’ve always been very independent and at the age of fifteen I secured a Saturday job at with a company called Bejams or now known as Iceland Frozen Foods.

I left school in 1990 to go to work at the age of 17 and I worked for Harrods, I worked long hours and weekends too and after a year I decided that I had better things to do at weekends and wanted a 9-5 job instead!

So…back in those days I hand wrote 100 letters, sent my CV to the City Banks and started my banking career with National Australia Bank and got a taste for City Life…

I bought a brand new car at the age of 18 and my first house by the time I was 20. Everything was great and a decade later I found myself self employed and running a successful City Recruitment Business with my husband and his business partner. Life couldn’t be better.

In early 2008, the builders had moved in and had started knocking through the back of our house as planned, the kids were in full time day nursery and business was great, why would we need a contingency plan?

And then it happened, overnight, totally unexpected Lehman Brother’s collapsed and the UK followed the US into a Global Recession. Business started to dry up very fast and so did the bank account, where was our contingency plan...that’s right, we didn’t have one!

So now, I’m 35 with 2 young children to support and a modest mortgage and lifestyle to maintain.

My world was starting to crack around me. Having no income for the first time in 20 years meant that I had to make some serious changes to my life.

I sat and hoped for months and do you know what happened? That’s right nothing, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

My confidence had been knocked sideways, my self esteem was lower than low, so what did I do?

Firstly, I had to get back my CONFIDENCE and SELF BELIEF. I had to get back on the road to success. So I wrote down my goals and started to devise a plan

Secondly, I had to identify what it was that I LOVE about my job.

Thirdly, I had to stop making excuses, doing nothing and instead change my mindset and take ACTION.

It’s been hard, probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to deal with both physically and mentally.

We are all faced with challenges at some stage in our lives and with no work for over a year, 2009 for me was definitely a life changing experience although it took me almost a year to realize!

The recession has highlighted to me what’s important in my life, where I should focus my time and energies.

And although it’s been challenging at times the time I have spent with my children has been amazing, I’ve learnt so much about myself and wouldn’t change any part of the past couple of years.

Out of the recession I created my new business Chilli Pepper, mentoring individual’s through the job seeking process when looking to move internally with their existing employer or externally with a new employer.

I’ve embraced the change and feel a whole lot better for it!

As once said by Martin Luther King, Jr.

“The ultimate measure of a person is not where they stand in moments of comfort and convenience, but where they stand in times of challenge and controversy.”

For me the recession was a blessing in disguise!

Nikki Hutchison, founder of Chilli Pepper Global http://www.chillipepperglobal.com/ advising you on every aspect of the job seeking process guiding you step by step whether you are looking to move internally or externally.

Will it always be a Man’s World?

“Some of us are becoming the men we wanted to marry!”

A couple of weeks ago I was very fortunate to be able to attend the 30th Anniversary of Women in Banking and Finance (WIBF) http://www.wibf.org.uk/ held at the House of Lords in Westminster. I listened with great interest to guest speaker and Patron, Baroness Fritichie who talked about a number of changes which have greatly improved the rights and status for women in the 21st century.

Did you know?

• It was in 1973 that women were admitted onto the floors of the London Stock Exchange for the first time.
• From 1975 it was made illegal to sack women for becoming pregnant.
• Barbara Castle as Secretary of State for Employment introduced the Equal Pay bill which was enacted in 1975 together with the Sex Discrimination Act. This Act made it illegal to discriminate against women in employment, education and training.
• In 1979 Margaret Thatcher became the first female Prime Minister.

The banking industry was soon to become one of the largest employers of women but still the number of women in senior managerial positions was less than 1%.

This figure has risen over the years and according to a recent article in the FT.com at 13.6% the UK has the sixth highest proportion of women at board level in Europe, however this figure accounts for just one woman on the board in 84% of British companies and only 17.5% have more than three so will this figure improve over the coming years?

The European Commission has warned this year that if companies did not move voluntarily to ensure gender balance on executive boards, it might force them to do so. Read the complete article http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5bbf3712-f0ec-11df-bf4b-00144feab49a.html#ixzz15Od8p6ws

Whilst it would seem that women have come a long way in a ‘Man’s World’ they still have a distance to go until they achieve equality.

Baroness Fritichie ended her speech with the following poem which she wrote about 15 years ago when she reflected on the life that she had intended to live!

Someday My Prince Will Come

Someday my prince will come they said when I was small.
Brave and true, kind and strong, handsome, dark and tall.
I’m only a woman doing my best, waiting for my turn.
Supporting, listening, smiling, nodding, and knowing I have much to learn.
Only men could do the tough stuff, telling others what to do.
I just ran the home, the kids, my job, filled the larder, cleaned the loo.
Along the way I met some stars, pretenders who didn’t tarry.
And then one day I realised I’d become the man I wanted to marry!
By Rennie Fritichie 1996

Nikki Hutchison, founder of Chilli Pepper Global http://www.chillipepperglobal.com/ advising you on every aspect of the job seeking process guiding you step by step whether you are looking to move internally or externally.