Leslie Topps

My journey really began with my parents, watching the way they worked and handled themselves in their career fields. My father had a long, extensive entrepreneurial spirit that I picked up, and my mother was very dedicated. I'm from Little Rock, and I moved to Memphis to go to college at the University of Memphis, where I received a bachelor's degree in communications and radio broadcasting and graduated cum laude. I got an internship with a radio station and they hired me before I graduated. I worked there for about 7 years doing everything except sales - I was on the air, I was the Assistant Promotions Director, I did the switchboard, and I worked with a lot of people in the music industry. I moved to Atlanta in 2011, transparently because I felt that as a woman I wasn't going to be able to move up the ladder in that particular environment, although I felt I was qualified. I moved to pursue a career in music production and found a job in a music producer's building, which I thought was perfect for networking. Little did I know I would pick up on the skill of publicity with my background from radio and communications. I started to learn how to conduct phone interviews with influencers and celebrities, do red carpet screenings, and work with TV networks. When I saw how lucrative that was in Atlanta, I decided to start a business. My day varies greatly - I deal with a lot of communication management, scheduling interviews and meetings, and hosting different types of events online and in person. I have 3 different phones, an iPad, and 2-3 computers, and I'm pretty much on the phone all day between 11 to 4 or 5 p.m. I try to schedule calls between Tuesdays and Thursdays and work on different brands throughout the week.