Each month, the visionary founders of AllBright will share insights from their extraordinary careers, to help you get on your A Game. Whether you’re a startup founder or a small business, an entrepreneur or an exec, you’ll find inspiration here...
People love stories.
I’m often asked to recount the story of how I launched my startup Love Home Swap. It’s a neatly parceled tale of how I watched the film The Holiday on a plane trip, wondered if such a business actually existed, and then went on to found it myself. Five years after launching, I sold the business to hotel group Wyndham for $53 million.
All of this sounds very effortless.
It wasn't. It never is.
During that time there were great highs, and there were enormous lows. There were times when I felt like giving up, but I didn't. And every other emotion in between, from boredom to frustration to elation. It's always like that.
I think the big thing about a journey like the one I went on with Love Home Swap and the one I’m on now — building AllBright into the leading career network for women globally – is that you have to be very, very gritty. I talk a lot about grit. Why? Because the thing that separates those successful stories from the ones that don't make it – which is the majority – is your ability to keep going and to grind it out.
You've got to be powered by the dark as well as the light. My co-founder at AllBright Anna Jones and I talk about this, that part of what keeps you going is the promise of the sunlit uplands and everything working out, and generally you're driven by a purpose or wanting to create change or make a difference. But don't underestimate the power of, ‘I'm going to show them’, or ‘I'm not going to fail’, or the hit list that you have of the people that you feel, ‘I really want them to see me succeed.’ I think those things can power us on in equal measure.
One of the things I always talk to my children about is that grit trumps genius every day of the week.
It's good to be brilliant. But it’s about perseverance, and I try to model that every day. Grit is the quality that differentiates the things that don't work from the things that do work, or the people that, no matter what life throws at them, keep on going. It’s what kept Anna and I going in 2020, when the pandemic meant we were forced to close our club in London and quickly pivot into a digital platform. What kept us driven was our mission to change the future of careers for women. And of course, grit.
I firmly believe grit can be learnt.
It's like a muscle.
You've just got to keep picking yourself back up, and literally gritting your teeth.
Just ask my dentist who has been telling me off for teeth grinding – I practice what I preach.
About Debbie Wosskow: Debbie is a multi-exit British entrepreneur, recognised as one of the most prominent in the UK. She’s known for successfully launching and scaling businesses in the areas of digital disruption, the sharing economy and female empowerment. In 2016 she was awarded an OBE for her services to business.
