Swindon Lives - International Women's Day Special - Ellen Watts

In honour of International Women's Day, we're celebrating the inspirational women of Swindon. We spoke with Ellen Watts of ElleRich Training Ltd about her own experiences, both personal and professional.

What would you say is your most valuable skill?

I think my most valuable skill is my ability to inspire.  For the last 17 years I’ve run ElleRich Training Ltd, I’ve trained a whole variety of business building skills from customer service & sales to team building & leadership skills, the single thing that I enjoy seeing the most on the feedback forms at the end of the courses, and in the emails that follow, is how much people were ‘inspired’ by the training to see things differently & to make the behaviour changes to get better results for themselves and their businesses. Now with my new book, Cosmic Ordering Made Easier, I am hoping to inspire people to have a go at working with the Universe to get more of what they want more often.

Do you have family (and/or children)? 

I have a wonderful husband - Rich who is my best friend & business partner too.  We live with our 2 Rhodesian Ridgeback  ‘kids’  Merlin (aka Squirley) & Sumatra (aka Zooms) and my New Forest Pony, Meg.  We also have a super bunch of nephews and nieces and now grand-nephews and grand-nieces which is absolutely perfect, as we get to play to the cool Auntie & Uncle with noisy & messy toys and plenty of cake & ice-cream etc. Then when they’re all hyped up and over tired - we can give them back to their parents - best of both worlds in my book. I also have a wonderful circle of friends who I consider my ‘chosen’ family.

How do you maintain a work/life balance?

Mmmm - suddenly I’m acutely aware that I’m answering these questions at 9.00pm on a Sunday evening!! The truth is I’m a bit of a work in progress in this area & just a tiny bit of a workaholic! - I do like to be productive and I do take on a lot of projects but the key thing is I really love what I do - all of it - so it never really feels like work. I love training, adore networking, get a buzz out of coaching, get inspired by writing, and speaking to large groups gets me so excited I can’t sleep! To balance those high energy good feelings though I do have low energy good feeling activities and those include walking the dogs in the lovely Cotswold countryside and time with my pony - bushing her, clearing up her field and very occasionally riding her are all peaceful (non talking) contrasts to my high energy outputs.  

Are there any strong female figures who you would cite as your idols?

Many spring to mind but here are just a few.

Helen Keller for her ability to focus on what she had for the good of others rather than on what she was short of and what others should be doing for her.

Eleanor Roosevelt - for her determination to overcome her fear of speaking in public and for her realisation that ‘no one can make you feel inferior without your permission’.

Mae West - for her blatant love of life and being a woman in it.

Louise L Hay - who, having overcome cancer,  wrote her first book aged 50 and has gone on to create the most wonderful publishing house and training programmes that have helped thousands all around the world.  At 87 - she is still active and on the speaking circuit today.

Have you ever had to give up or miss out on anything in order to pursue your career?

Sleep mostly - but I’m very lucky, I can manage pretty well on only a few hours sleep a night. Other than that, no, I’ve managed to combine most of my passions into what I do for a living. I have a very ‘portfolio’ business and if I enjoy doing something I usually try and work out how I can bring it into the business in some way.

Based on your own experiences, what advice would you give to fellow females looking to get into your profession?

The same advice I would for any profession or business - get very clear about what you want your business to look like and why you want to do it and then go after it fearlessly. 

Surround yourself with like-minded people you admire and join a good women’s network (like Athena) for emotional & peer group support - one that you feel comfortable in and that nurtures you as a person as well as a business/profession. You can join mixed groups too of course, with a view to growing your customer base but a good women’s network with provide you with encouragement, mentors, advice, sounding boards and an amplifier to your marketing efforts as well.

Do you ever experience any discrimination in the workplace because of your gender?

I did, many years ago, when I first started in retail - The first company I worked for was MFI (the furniture people) and I wanted to be a salesperson and then I wanted to be management (at that time there were no female sales people in the company and only 2 female managers (and they weren’t particularly feminine as I remember) Back then women were cashiers and receptionists so I started as receptionist - I used to sell as much as the men but I wasn’t allowed my own commission sheet so would share the sales between my favourite sales guys.  After 18 months I got the hint that my ‘career’ was never going any further and jumped ship to become a trainee manager with Mothercare - where the opposite was true - nearly all the store managers and management teams were women.

I had a great career with Mothercare - they were a super company to work for and their customer service and management training was excellent.  I became an assistant store manager in a very short space of time & then changed career path by becoming the company trainer - it was the shape of things to come.  I can’t honestly say I have noticed any discrimination since I’ve run my own business. That doesn’t mean it isn’t there - I just haven’t noticed it.

Do men ever feel intimidated by your success?

I hope not - I’ve not particularly noticed any signs of that being the case. I’ve never really given it much thought.  I don’t think my industry is particularly gender specific - I know some great trainers who happen to be male and some who happen to be female. I see the trainer and their expertise and their rapport building skills not their gender - I expect others to do that too.

Having said that it’s only just occurred to be that all the freelance trainers I currently use just happen to be women, but that’s not a conscious decision to only use women trainers - I’m only interested in choosing the best, customer focused trainers, with the best work ethics.

As a successful female, where do you see yourself in 10 years time?

Gosh - I will be 58 ½ by then and so will be planning a super-duper 60th birthday party extravaganza for sure.

Business wise, I suspect I’ll have written quite a few more books (I have at least 4 more planned already) and most probably I will have set up my own publishing company too.   I like to think I will be speaking more at bigger and more worldwide conventions and conferences and enjoying more foreign (warmer) travel as part of that. I would like my own radio show and possibly my own TV chat show too.  I’ve made quite a transition this year into more online platforms and can only imagine where they could take me in the next 10 years - the possibilities for leveraging what we all do is mind blowing.   But whatever I’m doing, it will still be to do with inspiring people to do, have and be more of what they want, more often - because that is who I am & what I do.