She's The Boss Chats

What a story! Melissa is the co-founder of Bondi Chai, the first powdered chai product available in Australia and she and her partner Martin started it after discovering chai in New York when they were there for the beginning of the millennium.

Melissa is so warm and engaging, and clearly, she and Martin are madly in love, so it's a really positive, uplifting episode. They have the classic startup story. Born and bred in Launceston as one of a set of twins, Melissa, and her sister bought a house at 18 because they knew that it would give them a strong financial foundation, having grown up with a single Mum and seen her struggle.

After many years of admin jobs, and after meeting Martin after a divorce, Melissa was up for something new! Bondi Chai has now been around for 17 years but the two naive founders had no idea what was in front of them. From finding a manufacturer (their first order was 2 tonnes!), to building a customer base, a brief foray into supermarkets, and then building a network of independent cafes that would stock their product, Melissa has been on a wild ride that still continues. Now supplying a number of countries globally, and with Heidi Dugan helping them to sell into China, the sky is the limit for this brand. You will be totally inspired by this story.

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Christine is an absolute firecracker! Having grown up in North Palmie in NZ, Christine loved sport, particularly hockey. Once she discovered hockey, she became totally focused on it and it informed many of her early career decisions, as she wanted whatever she was doing to fit in with the sport! She studied for as long as possible (because of the student allowance and flexibility it offered her for training), and she rose through the hockey ranks until she was playing for NZ.

Christine has so much enthusiasm, it is positively bursting from every pore, so when she was told that she would have to have an operation to fix her Achilles tendons in both feet, the doctor told her they would do them both at the same time as it was the only way they could guarantee that she would stay still long enough for them to heal! And then she went back to playing, coaching, and working with elite athletes just like her.

After a move to Australia to follow her partner, it wasn't long before the two of them decided to set up a business coaching leadership skills to women. The WALT Institute was named by a friend and mentor of theirs, as an acronym for Womens Authentic Leadership and Training. Great name! You will love Christine's passion and positivity in this interview!

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Em is a total life force, and you will love this interview as she is very honest about her life and how she has gotten to where she is. Having grown up in a tiny village in Somerset as the pampered youngest child, Emily loved her childhood and school years. When she finished, she got into hospitality in order to have fun and pay the bills while she was at uni in Winchester...and then she kept going. After her Aussie boyfriend suggested they move to Australia, she ended up in north Queensland and had the biggest culture shock of her life! By that stage she was 35, still working in cafes and she found it really hard to acclimatise after London.

They both agreed to move to Melbourne, and it was while she was recovering from her relationship breakup, and still working serving tables at a cafe, that a customer asked her why she wasn't doing something more with her life.

From there, Em became a relationship coach, and using Facebook lives s her marketing tool, built up a big network of followers. Then she fell in love...and got dumped...and that changed everything. These days Em is a mindset coach and has coined the phrase 'Unashamedly Human'. This whole episode is a long and meandering story of life, love, and how to make the best of it. You will love it!

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Oh wow! Natasha Price is brilliant. She is an elite adptive athlete, an entreprerneur, speaker, awards winner and author. Tash is truly a woman who has overcome obstacles most of us couldn't even begin to comprehend, and yet she is the most positive, inspiring woman I have interviewed yet! Born in England, Tash's father was an A-League soccer player for Aston Villa, which led to some bullying at school, making life difficult for her as the family also moved around a lot due to football commitments. In year 12 she got sick and, with no support from her school after medical issues, she was kicked out. Tash went on to complete school by herself.

Upon leaving school, Tash, who has Type 1 diabetes, headed to Australia for a 12 month holiday. Her story of having her car (and insulin) stolen in a remote part of WA, and the repercussions, are a massive story in itself, but this was only the beginning of the challenges life has thrown at her. Upon returning home, she persuaded her entire family to move to Australia, before she returned, for what she thought would be a year, to the UK with her little sister to look after her while she completed her education.

At this point, Tash's story becomes quite harrowing. She woke up on Boxing Day at a relative's house, and was blind in one eye. A week later, she lost the sight in her other eye and yet the doctor's didn't know what it was, so they didn't offer any treatment. As a result, Tash suffered permanent damage to her sight and has never recovered any sight in one eye, and has limited vision in the other. The doctors still couldn't work out what was wrong.

She later went on to lose the use of the lower half of her body and then, cruelly (and very fast), became completely paralysed to the point of not being able to even speak. It took four years of rehab for Tash to regain some independence and at that stage, she managed to return to her beloved Australia to be reunited with her parents. But she was bedridden and very unhappy.

Then, in 2017 she watched the Brisbane Marathon from her sick bed and told her fmily that she was going to compete the following year...and she did! Despite just about everything that could go wrong, going wrong, she completed the marathon which led to a training camp for wheelchair atheletes, which led to her trying to find a coach. Enter Adam Shepherd.

These days Tash and Adam run InvincAble - giving visibility to disability and empowering people regardless of ability, they do a lot of motivational speaking, coaching and consulting on Diversity and Inclusion. She has even become an author! Tash's story is truly inspirational, and if you realise what she has overcome herself, it should put any of your own issues into perspective. I can't wait to see what she does in the future. She's amazing!

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Heidi Dugan is by no means your usual television celebrity! Growing up in Australia in a family that valued self-improvement, she knew intimately the advice and encouragement of every well-known self-improvement expert from Tony Robbins to Wayne Dyer and everyone in between. As a university student, she signed up for a program to learn to teach English as a Second Language in China, which led to her being in a TV studio twenty years ago, on the day they decided it was time to have China's first foreign-born host. Heidi got the gig.

Since then she has hosted a daily show called 'You Are The Chef' with over 6 million viewers per episode! She is fluent in Chinese and has a Chinese husband, and is dearly loved by millions. These days, Heidi has added another string to her bow by working with Australian lifestyle brands that want to access the Chinese market. Her endorsement can make the difference in whether a brand will sink or swim, and she loves introducing new products into the Chinese market as she knows it so intimately. You will love Heidi and not only what she has achieved in the past, but also what she is doing now for Aussie brands.

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Genine Howard is just fabulous! She now teaches women how to unwind everything they have been taught about business, step into their own feminine power and intuition and lead the life they have always wanted! She always looks like a model but she's the most down-to-earth woman you could know.

Genine grew up in the outer suburbs of Melbourne, before heading north to Queensland as soon as she graduated. After arriving with almost nothing but her car and her optimism and can-do attitude, within a week she had a house, a job, and a new life. From tour guide to management and then a segway into magazine publishing, Genine is not a woman to sit on her laurels!

After a brief stint back in Melbourne, Genine is now living the life she always wanted on the Sunshine Coast, and she has picked a lot into her life so far. You will love her story!

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Kerry Howard is a psychologist, an author, speaker, coach, advocate for change within the health system, adventurer, and all-round bad arse!

You will love her story.

After growing up as the youngest of 5 with a single Mum, Kerry somehow blamed herself for her father's departure from the family a few months after she was born. This has informed many of her decisions in adult life. She also got knocked down by a bus which led to PTSD and her becoming a psychologist and specialising in trauma.

After growing up in a variety of homes, starting off in outer suburban Victoria, Kerry took off overseas as soon as she finished school.

After she returned, she married very young and soon had two young kids. After her marriage broke down she headed to security and stability in Canberra.

Using her secretarial skills to work for government departments, Kerry soon rose up the ranks, and it was after the birth of her kids and her divorce that she decided to have some counseling, and then become a counselor.

Kerry has written two serious books - and one about dating that is very funny and compares men to shoes - and has had a psychology counseling business for over a decade. But that's all about to change.

As we were recording the interview, Kerry is planning a long trip overseas to reassess her life and see where she wants to go next. You will absolutely love this woman and her adventurous spirit!

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Wow! This interview with the amazing Lucy Lloyd is a bit special! Lucy is the co-founder of Mentorloop, which is all about mentor matching, and making mentoring mainstream, and she shares her story about building the business, raising investment and how they coped during COVID with an openness and honesty that you will love.

She came back from the UK after working in digital marketing for many years, and soon after she and her friend, and co-founder, Heidi Holmes had the idea of making mentoring much simpler for people. Lucy was a little reluctant at first but Heidi encouraged her to give it a go, so they created a strategy, built a SaaS platform and went to market. the premise for Mentorloop is simple, people can register as mentors or mentees, and find their perfect match online. The software then keeps the relationship accountable for each mentor-mentee partnership with scheduling, reminders and more. Mainly aimed at corporates and big business, it has been a huge success to date.

They have done two cap raises for the business. One for $250K to get them started, and then a further raise of $750K to allow them to scale. She is very funny where she describes how they started off with big hopes for one or two investors, and ended up with 14 - all of whom they adore - many of whom invested less than they had initially thought they would allow.

With 8 aunts on her monther's side, she has had some amazing role models and mentors of her own on her journey. You are SO going to love Lucy's interview!

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lloydlucy/

https://www.youtube.com/user/Mentorloop

https://www.instagram.com/mentorloop/

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Ann Dettori has a fascinating story to share. After having four kids, she decided to get back into the workforce part-time, started a job with a book printing company as the bookkeeper, and ended up talking it over! Her business Post Prepress has only grown from strength to strength and she creates books for many of the big traditional publishers.

Then she started Independent Ink, a one-stop shop production company for self-published authors, and then co-founded Indie Experts, where they help authors from the idea through to the published book and beyond - understanding the overall goal of the author and helping them market the book once it is published. She offers some great insights into the publishing world and has, of course, also published her own book, The Entrepreneurs Guide to Self Publishing.

Ann is one of the nicest and most generous women you will meet and you will love her personal story of growing up in an Italian family in Queensland too!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.