Member Article

Award Winning Leeds Entrepreneur Launches Debut Book

Leeds and London Lawyer who was ’shy child’ supports SMEs Sharing Secrets of Success and Reveals How her Mother and The Queen are her Inspiration.

After having spent nearly 20 years working as a lawyer, and 7 years running her own businesses supporting SMEs in protecting their assets in a difficult market, Leeds and London based lawyer Rashmi Dubé has dipped her toe into new territory, adding author as a further string to her bow by launching her book ‘Making A Splash’, at Waterstones Leeds and Covent Garden.

In running her Yorkshire based business, Legatus Law, Rashmi draws upon her own experiences as an SME, providing a very specialised service, tapping into the understanding she has about the challenges of running a small business from start up phase. She sees creating positive relationships as a huge asset in any business person’s arsenal and her skills in networking have been commended by colleagues and peers alike for many years.

As part of her own personal development, as well as a commitment to support fellow SMEs, she felt compelled to write this book.

She said: “Launching this book is surreal for me. It’s taken a few years to write in amongst launching and growing a business and despite my persona in business I am actually a really shy person, so putting myself out there in this way is a bit scary. There were times I thought it would never get finished, but the feedback I’ve had so far has made it all worthwhile. Sharing my experiences and tips is empowering as I know others will benefit from this and I’ve had some lovely testimonials already of people who have now taken a fresh look at networking and started to reap the rewards”.

Rashmi added: “It’s no secret that I network and that I actually enjoy it, well, I do now that I have the skills in place to know what works and what doesn’t. It wasn’t an easy journey so looking back even I find it difficult to believe how far I’ve come. I am a positive person and I love to help others and I also believe in seeing opportunities in every meeting. I truly believe that if more SMEs re-calibrated how they viewed networking, moving away from the traditional thrusting of business cards at organised events, to more relationship focused networking, they’d be generating more new business”.

As a leading Yorkshire entrepreneur, Rashmi believes in the power of building genuine relationships. The book caters for all networking abilities whether readers are dipping toes into networking for the first time or looking to improve existing skills, and includes content on Knowing yourself; personal appearance and messaging; preparation and follow up; gender differences in networking and networking in the digital age, with each section packed with ideas, tips and experiences from people who have achieved a lot by networking - both professionally and personally.

A particularly interesting section in the book addresses how Rashmi overcomes her ‘default state’ of being ‘a shy girl’, channeling her alter ego and multiple personas she calls on for inspiration, to enable her to address a room with confidence.

Rashmi who is well recognised in the industry for her business acumen has a number of awards under her belt including the Corporate INTL Global Awards 2014, Forward Ladies 2014, Global Law Experts 2015, ACQ Global Awards 2015, Women in Law Awards 2016 and Corporate Livewire Innovation and Excellence Awards 2016. She has also been featured in The Telegraph, BBC, Law Society Gazette, Elite Business Magazine, London Economics, Ulster Business.

Having previously worked as a solicitor at Irwin Mitchell and built a strong network of business contacts up in the region, Rashmi is already well known in the financial sector in the city and as well as working directly with clients she is also working alongside many partners such as insolvency practitioners, turnaround advisors, and accountants, to help support their clients with her services - much of her business is referral based and generated through networking.

She is also an advocate for women in business, having spent many years in a highly male dominated environment and is keen to inspire other women to continue to work to break through the glass ceiling in this industry. Etta Cohen, Founder of Forward Ladies said: “Whilst there are many women who work in law these days, there are few who sit at the top of the firms corporate structure. I’m excited to see Rashmi expanding her business and hope it will inspire other women to push forward in this sector”.

The book is available at Legatus Press and on Amazon.

You can find Rashmi tweeting at @RashmiDube and @LegatusLaw

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Laurel Nicholls .