Ahead of Her Time How a One-Woman Startup Became a Global Publishing Brand (Conscious Leadership i n Practice)

by Piatkus, Judy; Sofat, Anna

• ISBN13: 9781786785312
• ISBN10: 1786785315
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2021-04-13
• Publisher: Watkins Publishing

Summary

Inspiring memoir by entrepreneur Judy Piatkus, who launched her startup at a time when mothers were not expected to be businesswomen and grew it into a highly successful international brand. The story of a pioneer of female entrepreneurship, values-led management and the rise of personal development publishing.

Judy Piatkus did not come from a monied background and began her career as a secretary after failing to achieve a university place. By the time she founded Piatkus Books from her spare bedroom, she was married with a disabled small daughter and pregnant with her second child. Gradually she learned how to be both a publisher and a managing director and to combine that with her family life as she had become a single mother of three. A lot of mistakes were made but she also got a lot of things right. The company prospered, thanks to the risks Judy took in tackling new subjects in the marketplace and also her approach to running the company, which focused on transparency, honesty and trust and was rewarded by the loyalty of the staff, many of whom worked alongside Judy for upwards of twenty years.

Throughout the book Judy describes her learning experience as an entrepreneur, what it really means to run a company, the many triumphs and the pitfalls, what worked and what didn't, how the company learned to reinvent itself through lean times and how it felt to finally strike gold.

Author Biography

Judy Piatkus is an entrepreneur, publisher and business coach specialising in conscious leadership. She founded Piatkus when she was in her 20s and grew the company to become an international brand, before selling it in 2007, just before the global financial crash that she had shrewdly foreseen. She is now a keynote speaker, an angel investor, and a coach and mentor to start-ups. In 2011 she founded Conscious Café, a network that brings people together for connection and discussion. Find out more at: judypiatkus.com