DARE TO DO IT! As a psychologist working in the NHS, I experienced daily challenges relating to how ‘the system’ clashed with my own vision for client care. I used to sit in team meetings and feel overwhelmed with frustration, feeling passionate about wanting to help clients, but feeling powerless to do that in the way I felt was right.
I remember sitting in the garden of my little terraced house one sunny evening age 31 and writing a ‘should I stay or should I go’ pros and cons list. I remember this being tough. I believed in the NHS and what it stood for, but I felt trapped, hopeless and stressed out. There was plenty of ‘buts’ and ‘what ifs’ on that list and I was acutely aware of the security offered by NHS employment. Could I really risk it all- the career that I’d worked so hard to achieve, qualifying only a few years earlier?
It could have gone either way but something made me decide to go for it, and after having my first baby a year later, I never returned to the NHS. My husband and I launched ‘the Purple House Clinic’, our own private practice, and then ….fast forward a few more years, we franchised it! Now, there are 6 franchises and counting and there’s currently 9 different clinics.
Private practice does not hold all of the answers (unlike the NHS, it’s not free at the point of entry), but it has given me, our franchise clinic owners and all the other douzens of clinicians that work with us, the freedom to be more responsive to client need and help thousands of people who otherwise may have been stuck for years on waiting lists, or never got the ‘right’ help. As a network, we currently provide approximately 18,000 appointments per year and I am extremely proud of all of the work we do. We are truly using business as a force of good in our communities.
I never could have predicted the growth of Purple House (and back then as a 31 year old, I didn’t even know what franchising was!). It’s not all been plain sailing either, and there’s been plenty of ups and downs. But one thing is for sure, I’m glad that I dared to do it. If you wait for all the stars to align in life, the things we really want to do, and the things we really want to change may never happen. Sometimes you have to just do it anyway, and adjust your path along the way when there are bumps in the road.
I hope this provides some inspiration for someone who might be at a cross roads in life - my advice "go on- dare to do it". 💜
#psychologists #franchising #privatepractice
Congratulations to Homewatch CareGivers on their well-deserved wins at the Franchise Innovation Awards! 🏆 The company's innovative franchisee support, service introduction, and operations and technology are truly game-changers in the in-home care industry.