Octavia Goredema – Social Enterpriser and all round super woman!
Photo by: Natalie Lawrence Photography
What is the Twenty Ten Club?
The Twenty Ten Club is an award-winning networking organisation for Black female business owners. We host monthly events in London for our members to connect and share what’s going on in their respective businesses. On top of that, every week we profile a Black female business role model on our website at www.twentytenclub.com
The Twenty Ten Club is passionate about supporting the next generation of young ladies who will follow in our footsteps. To that end we volunteer with Young Enterprise London and next month we are hosting our first ever teen mentoring evening at St Matthew Academy in Lewisham. Fifty female students from the school will have the chance to connect with 15 entrepreneurs from the club and I can’t wait! If it works well I’d love to offer the opportunity to more schools in London.
What led you to set up this club and why specifically for women?
I decided to start the Twenty Ten Club at the start of 2010 while I was adjusting to life as a first-time mum and also busy working on my first start-up.
I desperately wanted to connect with other business owners on a regular basis who I could learn from and also share experiences with. However, it was hard for me to get out and network as much as I wanted to as I was caring for my daughter who was only a few months old.
At the same time I was, and continue to be, in complete awe of the sheer number of Black women I had come across who were running fantastic companies. As a young Black woman this inspired me greatly and I wanted to provide a platform to share the successes of these business role models with others, that’s how the weekly profiles on the website started.
There are many layers to the Twenty Ten Club, how do you manage to stay on top of them all?
I love my job at the Twenty Ten Club so keeping on top of everything really isn’t a chore as I find all the programmes and events we work on exciting. Also, the Twenty Ten Club’s members are a group of super talented, engaging and supportive women who make running the club easy. Everyone has been fantastic about championing and supporting what we do.
What have been your biggest challenges/ setbacks?
I’ve been really fortunate in that we haven’t faced a major setback so far as the club has grown steadily through word of mouth and last November we won a national social enterprise award at the Future 100 awards which was truly fantastic.
The biggest challenge so far has probably been juggling my time between the Twenty Ten Club, my new start up and my family. I’ve learnt a lot about time management techniques over the past year!
Tell us about the future of the Twenty Ten Club:
We will be announcing an exciting new school initiative in the coming weeks so keep an eye on our website for more details…
Where can we find you?
Website – http://www.twentytenclub.com/
Twitter – http://twitter.com/#!/TwentyTenClub
Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/TwentyTenClub
LinkedIn – http://www.linkedin.com/groups?mostPopular=&gid=3005303
I was fortunate enough to have been introduced to Octavia by Lyande Kaikai designer and co-founder of Jewel Clothing and I am eternally grateful. Octavia is such a positive ray of light and the Twenty Ten Club is a group of real women that are passionate about their businesses and also passionate about supporting other women. Initially I cringed when the idea of a networking group was posed but thought that I would give it a go. I haven’t looked back. I have met some formidable women of all business backgrounds. These women are real, it is not a case of turning up and bragging, highs and lows are discussed, but I can guarantee that you always leave feeling motivated and ready for action, this is down to Octavia. I am very excited about Octavia guest speaking on successful networking as many of us get it oh so wrong and she gets it oh so right. There is a lot to be learnt from this lady I just hope that I am able to catch her speaking on 22nd May.
Tickets are £5.00 in advance, proceeds to charity: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1024001817/efbeven
