Work with passion; not for paychecks to succeed in life
While life in today’s world has changed over time among the growing young population that work expecting a big fat paycheck, success stories have proven that it’s the passion to work in a particular sector – not the money – that has driven most entrepreneurs to succeed.
Women entrepreneurs from various industries shared their success stories to inspire many other women in the workforce today at the launch of ‘Womenwill Programme in Sri Lanka’ organised by Google Business Group at the MAS Innovation Centre in Colombo last week.
The 2017 World Bank Report statistics reveal that only one in three women take part in the labour force. Out of 53 per cent of women in the world, 70 per cent are economically enactive while there are only 2.85 million working women from 8.5 million active women. The report further states that in Sri Lanka the female labour force participation rate has declined from 41 per cent in 2010 to 36 per cent in 2016.
Ajita Kadirgamar, Editor and PR Consultant at the event stressed that Sri Lanka has the 17th largest gender gap in the world. She said, “Most women go for government jobs due to job security. The private sector must take the challenge to provide security for jobs for women.”
She also elaborated that women in Sri Lanka must have the passion to work in an industry and not for the paycheck they receive by the end of the month. “Do what you love and do anything with passion not for the paycheck. Many women entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka have achieved success in their lives because of the passion they have for that sector.”
zMessenger Co-founder and CEO, Jayomi Lokuliyana shared some of the challenges of building her company from scratch. “You won’t get paychecks for several months, things don’t go as you plan, juggling will take its toll on you and failure becomes an inevitable part of entrepreneurship,” she said. She also explained some barriers she came across such as it’s a men’s world still at large, lack of networking and access to funding. Come out with your own story as an entrepreneur, she noted.
At the event it was also discussed that female entrepreneurs have the potential to create many job opportunities and also at companies headed by females, the chances of employees leaving the company is minimal. It was also pointed out that women need to start by believing in themselves first and later convince other women to join the workforce.