Laura Butler-Madden is an award-winning interior designer with 14 years of expertise restoring and transforming period properties. Laura hasn't left her design career. She's simply added a second one.

For anyone starting a business, this may feel like a lot given how many hats you’re already wearing, so I was keen to chat to her about why and how she decided to do this.

Keep listening to hear a practical guide on how to build a second career alongside your first.

Laura's advice:

• Just because you can do something well doesn’t mean you should be doing it
• Go for what makes you happy and contented
• And simultaneously look for a gap in the market
• When you are in control of a business, you can shed the extra processes
• As long as you have the basics - like understanding spreadsheets - you can manage
• You don’t need a big team - but it also means you have no support group
• So you do need to be resilient to do everything yourself
• Patience and resilience are vital - just keep going!
• At first, there may be more lows than highs
• The big plus is the freedom
• Make sure you relax sometimes
• And acknowledge how far you’ve come

FF&M enables you to own your own PR & produces podcasts.
Recorded, edited & published by Juliet Fallowfield, 2024 MD & Founder of PR & Communications consultancy for startups Fallow, Field & Mason. Email us at hello@fallowfieldmason.com or DM us on instagram @fallowfieldmason.

MUSIC CREDIT Funk Game Loop by Kevin MacLeod. Link & Licence

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