Introducing Lisa-Marie Kerr

A note from Kerrie Phipps – I was delighted to meet the enthusiastic and inspiring Lisa-Marie (on the phone) after hearing great things from Wendy Millgate, who’s a facebook friend of mine and Lisa’s Editor. We all love meeting Difference-Makers, and I know Lisa-Marie has and will have a positive impact in young lives across Australia and beyond. Enjoy her story and share it around!

“Lisa-Marie is taking substantial steps to make an impact on the lives of Australian youth – who are our future. Lisa’s own youth was far from ideal but she shows that if you truly want something, you can make it happen. Her book Get Job Ready is extremely practical, is written in a voice young people will relate to and equips them with fantastic tools to build their self-esteem and get a job. Lisa-Marie inspires me by her drive. She supports her family, is a mother of 3 and works full-time as a youth placement officer, yet she is promoting her book and programs as well as that’s her passion.” – Wendy Millgate

Since the age of fifteen, when she got her first job, Lisa-Marie Kerr has managed to get every job that she ever wanted. She has over fifteen years experience in recruiting and employing teens in her own businesses and in others.

Lisa-Marie recently discovered that her lifelong passion and purpose was to inspire and make a difference to teens on a global scale. This discovery led her down the path of writing her first book for teens, Get Job Ready: A teen’s guide to getting their first job.

Lisa-Marie Kerr is determined that she will help teens start their success journey in the world of employment by empowering them through self-belief and giving them the right tools to get that job.

When she is not working with teens, Lisa-Marie is a wife and mum to a gorgeous 6-year-old and stepmother to two amazing teenagers.

1. Describe a significant business (or other) challenge you have faced. How did you approach it? What did you learn?

My whole life I pursued career paths that I was passionate about. This essentially was always the key to my success. Six years ago, I stopped following my passions and entered into a business I thought I wanted to do, and that I felt obligated to do. Two years ago after much blood sweat and tears, my husband and I lost EVERYTHING!

Things were so bad, I didn’t want to live anymore, and I almost checked out for good.

The gift in this overwhelming loss was the rebirth of myself, and the discovery of my true purpose and passion. I didn’t know how, I simply knew I wanted to make a difference on a global scale to teens. And so “Get Job Ready” was born.

I promised myself from that moment on, I would only ever pursue things that brought me joy and made a difference to my life and others.

2. How did you move from dreamer to achiever?

When you lose everything financially, and emotionally you are clinging on to life by a thread, you soon realise that the only thing keeping you going apart from your amazing family, are your dreams.

Determined to once again live a full and passionate life, and be a good role model for my children, I set about making my dreams a reality. At first my dreams were overwhelming! They quite literally paralysed me with FEAR! Fear of failure again!

However in spite of this, I made a plan. I broke my dream down in to small bite size tasks and set about ticking them off my to do list one by one.

Before I knew it, I was surpassing some of my original goals and had to set about creating new ones.

3. What plans do you have to expand your business further?

My overriding dream or goal for my business is “To make a difference on a global scale”. Writing my book was one of the first significant steps towards that dream.

The next step I am now working on, is a Teachers Resource kit, which will include lesson plans and activities. It is my dream that “Get Job Ready- A teen’s guide to getting their first job” will be taught in every high school across the country and become a part of the national high school curriculum.

From there I would then like to see it adapted and taught in countries around the world.

4. What is your approach to marketing and how did you (or are you) becoming known?

I invested in PR rather than marketing. I invested in PR to get my story out there and to become recognised as an industry expert in my area of expertise and passion. I chose this method over marketing as I believed I had a story that was newsworthy and people would be able to connect with.

Apart from that though, my marketing is on a much smaller scale. I quite simply and quietly go about trying to make a positive difference to every person I come in to contact with.  This has seen people I hardly know become cheerleaders for my cause. I don’t do sales, I do relationships, and it seems to make all the difference.

Be inspired by other young achievers here – Young Achievers

CONTACT DETAILS
Name: Lisa-Marie Kerr
Role: Founder
Business Name: Get Job Ready
Address: 26 Lade Street Coorparoo QLD 4151
Phone: 0424 273 853
Website: www.getjobready.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/GetJobReady
Twitter: www.twitter.com/getjobready