Posted by Nicholas Stabler | 17 December 2008

Emma Isaacs

Business Chicks

27 Comments

Tags: networking, women in business

Emma Isaacs, at 28, has bought four businesses and sold one. She is Chief Chick of Business Chicks - Australia’s largest national membership network for all women in business, and Managing Director of Last Thursday Club - the monthly event for big thinking professionals.

More recently Emma has founded Studio Bodyfit, a personalised fitness studio for women in the Sydney CBD. As if this isn’t enough, she’s also the President of the Entrepreneurs Organisation Sydney.

You have previously emphasized the importance of community in many aspects of daily life in general. Can community be just as important for a new business as a support foundation, as well as simply a target market?

All business is community. You’ve got your community of staff, your community of customers and your community of other stakeholders. There’s nothing more important than finding out who your community is in the early stages of establishing a new business and nurturing those relationships.

Concepts such as openness, sharing and networking are refreshing in such a competitive corporate world. Have you seen these values enrich the relationships within your networking groups?

es of course and I think when you set up a network like that, actively encouraging everyone to act that way, that’s the result you’ll get. We’ve seen amazing relationships and friendships born through Business Chicks and Last Thursday Club because that’s the culture we’ve created. You need to be open to share knowledge, ideas and contacts and you’ll find that your behaviour and actions are reciprocated.

Would you describe yourself as a risk-taker, someone who carefully measures risk before acting or both?

I act a lot on intuition and I’m very comfortable with risk. I’m fortunate that I have teams around me that are much more interested in facts than I am so the due diligence is always completed.

In this current marketplace it seems increasingly important to take advantage of opportunities when they arise. Is this something that can be learnt from experience or do you think it is largely instinctive?

I think the confidence comes from experience but I believe entrepreneurship is largely instinctive. If I had to choose if entrepreneurs were born or made, I’d strongly lean toward born. I think savvy businesspeople can be made but I think you’ve either got the entrepreneurial streak or you don’t. I get approached a lot by people who say “I really want to be an entrepreneur, how do I do it?”. I think if someone is asking that question, then they’re most likely not built with entrepreneurial traits. Most entrepreneurs just get on with it and don’t spend much time indulging in procrastination. They realise that they may have to make mistakes along the way, but at least they’re in action.

After running a number of companies, are you finding it easier than in previous times to start-up and build your new business Studio Bodyfit? Are you more aware of what needs to be done?

Sure, it definitely gets easier as you learn the lessons and master skills that you may have once found hard. I’m also really blessed to have talented people around me who can help with the process - they’ve been with me to set up the other businesses, so it’s a team effort and I’m not on my own.

Do you find yourself looking at your personal experiences as a customer when devising ways to give your own customers that little bit extra?

Incessantly. It never leaves you. When you’re an entrepreneur you never stop seeking new ways of doing things and you’re constantly asking yourself the question “would I have done it that way?”. Between my husband and I we run eight businesses and there’ll never be a dinner that we don’t go to when we’re analysing the design of the menu, or their promotions, or the customer service. Even on our honeymoon we were looking at businesses and analysing them - like I said, it never leaves you!

How important is it for you to have a genuine love for your work? Could you do what you do if you were simply going through the motions?

It’s everything! I wouldn’t be involved in any business unless I had a genuine interest and passion for that business. It’s more important to me than making a lot of money. I want my work to count for something and I want to leave a legacy.