LaShante Walker

I would contribute my success to always having role models of entrepreneurs. From stories about my grandfather, who was a successful entrepreneur in a rural area, which was unheard of - he had many businesses and was very, very successful at the work. I didn't even get to meet him, he died years before I was born, but I always heard stories. Even people from different cities and areas knew about him. My family - I come from a family of entrepreneurs, so seeing those role models helped me know that I could be successful in that area.

I would say just to be encouraged and remain consistent, because being an entrepreneur is not always easy. But if you remain consistent in the work and keep yourself inspired and encouraged, then you can see the fruits of your labor. Staying consistent when you're opening up a business is definitely one of the biggest things that you need to be doing.

I would say, because this is one of the things I learned at a certification course at Cornell for women's entrepreneurship - don't spend your own money bootstrapping your work if you don't have to. I bootstrapped my business and invested my own money on the front end, where they're like, there's grants, there's funding, there are other resources out there, you don't have to bootstrap your business. So that's the best advice I could give them - seek funding sources outside of your own money to help support your business if you're gonna launch out. That would help protect their own savings and kind of give them a cushion so they don't feel like they're drowning in trying to fund their business in the beginning.

Some challenges have been being able to highlight the work on social media platforms and gaining followership. Because it's so many people doing so much out there, and the market is heavily saturated, you just have to really figure out which platform is yours. One of the things that I have found difficult is narrowing it down to which is the best platform for me to be on, because I've been on all of them. I listened early on to some successful entrepreneurs who said find the platform that works best for you. Like, TikTok doesn't work well for me, but Instagram does, and LinkedIn. Finding a platform that works best for you, but also a platform that I can easily work, has been some of the challenges that I've had to navigate in order to get my business out there and to promote the work that I do. As for opportunities, I think I have some opportunities to do more work outside of what I have currently done. I think I can explore podcasting - I love public speaking, and from what I hear, I'm pretty good at it. So in order to expand what I'm currently doing, I think a podcast would be the way to go. I'm exploring what would that look like in this upcoming season to have a podcast on YouTube and be very consistent in producing content in that area, so that I can build a larger base.

A major value to me in both areas is balance. I've had to say no to some things just to find that, because I want to make sure that my well-being is always intact, in addition to that of my family. Balance is important, but also, I would say family is a huge value of mine - spending time with my family, making space for them, to also include them in my work. If I'm gonna be busy doing the work, especially like in the infancy stage of my business, I made sure that my family was included so that I could also maintain balance as well.