Gen George - There's more to life than what you see
“The world needs greater collaboration”
Gen George’s life may seem predestined by a strong character, generous heart and a willingness to be brave; but the more you get to know Gen the more you realise there’s more to success than what you see on the outside.
Gen is the founder of One Shift - an online job networking site that matches employees and employers, Skilld - online recruitment for local businesses; and co-founder of Like-Minded Bitches Drinking Wine - a group of women offering support to help each other to grow their “business and empires”.
When Gen started her first business at 23, she was very clear about defining what success looked like. 9 months later she raised $5 million; and in under 1 year the business impacted over 40,000 businesses, attracting over 850,000 users and earning $20 million.
How could so much success happen at such a young age? Well, Gen’s remarkable eye for business and her strong work ethic started at a very young age; and despite her parents wealth she never relied on handouts.
Gen had her first job at 13 - working at Oporto (where she could barely see over the countertop and). It was here she discovered the value of money to give you the freedom to do what you want in life.
Her first encounter with entrepreneurship happened when, after doing a great job as a babysitter. She landed more and more jobs and eventually, unable to handle all the work, she turned to her schoolmates as a pool of labour and started taking a cut - until of course, her suspicious and slightly concerned Dad decided the ‘gig was up’.
Gen gives a lot of credit to her family for giving her the start she needed, “growing up with siblings and a close-knit family taught me the importance of respect and equality”. Equally, she shares how we can’t take anything for granted and that success doesn’t happen because of where we come from or what we have but rather
“ it’s how we choose to direct our life that makes the difference”.
In fact, it was an adventure to Europe where Gen learnt the valuable lesson of standing on your own two-feet and doing whatever it takes to make stuff happen.
Super-excited about landing a job on a SuperYacht for the Saudi Royal Family; she had one small problem - she had only 20 euros to her name and another month before the job started.
As any 21 yo would do, Gen called home for the money but instead of getting a steady flow of cash into her bank account, her dad told her to “go get another job” - and that was exactly what she did, and as cliche as it may seem she did what any smart young traveller would do and approached the hostel she was staying at and offered to cook and clean in exchange for a bed and food.
Not only did it pay off, it was lessons like this that helped shaped the person Gen is today - not taking anything for granted and appreciating that success comes from hard work and doing what needs to be done.
While Gen’s had enormous success in business, she is incredibly humble and acknowledges that success ultimately comes down to having a good solid support network.
Gen says, “the world needs greater collaboration. We need to be more supportive of people’s desires to have a positive impact”. Even with her direct competitors, Gen likes to collaborate. In her opinion, “the world is big enough for everyone”.
With this belief, Gen joined forces with Jane Lu and created the women’s networking group ‘Like Minded Bitches Drinking Wine’ which has grown to over 115,000 members in four short years - and is now global with meet-ups happening in almost all major cities around the world.
Gen’s message to other women is to “firstly define what you want success to look like for you - not want someone else is doing. Secondly, you need to know that you may not get it right the first time, and that’s okay”.
To connect with Gen you can find her on Like Minded Bitches Drinking Wine, Twitter or LinkedIn