Posted Under: Entrepreneurship, Our Heroes

Today under the “Our Heroes” series we are speaking with Adriana Llames who has been featured on ABCNews.com, Yahoo! HotJobs and The Chicago Examiner. Adriana, a former HR professional, left her 9 to 5 job when her desire to excel was no longer being fulfilled. She followed her passion of matching people to employers and quickly became a successful career coach.  Let’s talk to Adriana to find out more…

DD: Who are you and what kind of corporate job were they at?

AL: I’m Adriana Llames, a veteran career coach, published author of “Career Sudoku: 9 Ways to Win the Job Search Game”, professional speaker on job search strategies and motivation across the country and a featured expert on ABCNews.com, Yahoo! HotJobs, TheLadders.com, The Denver Post, The Chicago Examiner and Mediabistro.

I started in Fortune 500 Human Resources, moving from recruiting to training and development all the while climbing the corporate ladder, eventually transitioning to marketing and sales with a medium-sized online media company. When I left “corporate America” I was a sales executive with a word-of-mouth media company.

DD: What made you leave the job?

AL: Passion, or lack thereof, for people. I’m a passionate person, it’s what motivates me. The company lost its passion for the business, the people who supported it – clients, employees and consumer advocates. My enthusiasm, drive, motivation and determination to excel left when the company lost its passion.

DD: When did you realize that you wanted to be an entrepreneur & why?

AL: When I was 22. Friends and family asked for advice on resumes, interview and job offer negotiation which turned into a call from industry-leading outsourcing firm Drake Beam Morin (DBM) to speak at their C-Level roundtable as an expert on career transition networking. I was hooked. I knew then I loved career coaching, speaking and had a passion for matching people and employers that would turn into my own business.

DD: What did you do to break the corporate jail?

AL: While working full-time, I fine tuned my product and service offerings and wrote a business plan. I spent hours 13-20 of each day working on my company while hours 1-12 were dedicated to my corporate job and the few left over were for the little sleep I allowed myself. I took my time and when everything was ready, I gracefully exited the corporate chains leaving all bridges in tact.

DD: How did you prepare for the employee to entrepreneur transition?

AL: Terribly. I had savings although less than I needed. I had a home office, never realizing I’m a social butterfly and the lack of interaction would drive me bananas.

DD: What are you suggestions for aspiring entrepreneurs?

AL:

Save | money, at least 12 months, honestly. You’ll thank yourself for it.

Prepare | for questions, from friends, family, potential clients and investors.

Create | a business plan, a back-up plan, a marketing plan and a budget.

Plan | on sleeping less, working more and loving it.

Be | understanding of others. Our companies become our ‘babies’, consuming us 24/7. It’s rarely understood by anyone who’s never been one of “us”.

Ask | questions, if you don’t know something. Someone else does, we can help.

Read | blogs, twitter, industry magazines, etc. for resources that will help you

Never | under-estimate yourself or work for chump change

Take | time to be with your family, sleep and rest. Recharged batteries get you farther.

Last, but not least, I rely on www.odesk.com for the tasks that are time-consuming and non-revenue generating. It’s an entrepreneur’s best friend.

DD: How are you doing and how do you feel now?

AL: Exceedingly well. I’ve been a career coach for 12 years and now focus 100% of my time on my business, am a published author, my new book, “Career Sudoku: 9 Ways to Win the Job Search Game” was released with Amazon.com, a featured expert on ABC News.com, Yahoo! HotJobs, TheLadders.com, The Denver Post and The Chicago Examiner as well as a professional speaker on job search and motivation across the country. My passion for matching people and employers has just extended into a new business, WOMHiring.com, where we’ll be using Word-of-Mouth and networking exclusively to match high quality candidates, top rated employers and open positions. There’s only one word to describe how I feel, grateful.

DD: That’s Adrianna Llames, career coach, author and national speaker. She explains that the employee to entrepreneur transition is not an easy transition, however if  you follow your passion then success is definite.

Success to all!