The feminine touch

Who has not at some stage dreamt of starting up their own firm, whether it's a restaurant, a café or maybe even a small shop? Who among us has not wondered what it would be like to be your own boss and never again have to obey the dictats of the line manager? Perhaps, though, these are not the questions we should really be thinking about. Instead we should be asking ourselves what kind of woman it is that is prepared to risk everything in order to live the dream. Yes, I mean woman. Men are stereotyped as the resolute risk takers, but the female presence on the real estate market, especially among consultancies, is becoming ever more pronounced. So what kind of woman is prepared to give up the security and stability of a salary in a large corporation for the uncertainty of not knowing where the next pay cheque is coming from?
One such person is Renata Osiecka, who three years ago left Panattoni to become the managing partner of Axi Immo: "I'd always wanted to have my own business, but you have to feel mature enough to start up. Then you can judge the risk and the opportunities," she says. During the credit crunch she saw an opportunity to gather up a team when people were coming onto the market. From a small team of five, Axi Immo has grown into a business that now employs 22 people and offers a wide range of real estate services from tenant representation to project management. According to Renata Osiecka, certain qualities are required to set up such a business: "Building your own business doesn't happen overnight. It's a process where you need not only passion, but patience, as well as a systematic approach where you improve the business every day." However, passion can be a dangerous addiction: "Fifteen years ago I realised that real estate was exciting. Creating a strategy for a project was something that drew me in." Despite this, she categorically denies being a workaholic, but stresses the importance of working effectively: "You shouldn't work twenty hours a day just because your boss looks at you strangely," she says. "If you don't keep your family life balance, you will not be effective at work."

The vagaries of the market
One of the reasons why Ms Osiecka set up Axi Immo was because of her belief that a niche existed for smaller, more dedicated companies. "What encouraged me was the very positive support from our clients. In fact the first year was much easier than the third. It gave me a lot of good spirit," she says. Indeed, one of the first clients that Axi Immo won was her former employer, Panattoni. But, the company also received support from PointPark and Real Management, as well as Prologis and Segro. But now much has changed in the three years that Axi Immo has been on the market, with many new companies and smaller developers becoming active. "The market is not mature at all," Ms Osiecka explains, "more advanced services are required and clients require much deeper competencies than even two years ago." Originally, the company began by specialising in the industrial real estate market, but it has now gone on to add retail and office departments. Ms Osiecka admits, however, that the office department is still small and requires more focus. "The office market is the most mature market. It has the most competition, but also the most clients, the most volume and the highest number of transactions," she says.
Unlike Ms Osiecka, Marta Machus-Burek does not admit to having always wanted to set up her own business. Now, however, she is the founding partner of Astaris Property Solutions. She ascribes the foundation of her company mostly to fortuitous circumstance. Originally she was employed by Donaldsons, until in 2007 the company was acquired by DTZ. Eventually she left in 2009, after having worked, in effect, for seven years in the same firm and risen to the position of director of retail asset management and board member. "After eight years," she says, "I was looking for other opportunities. There is this curiosity: what would it be like somewhere else?" She describes the process of how she came to set up her own firm as almost accidental, retelling how one day three people met outside Warsaw and the idea of a partnership was born. She describes that first company as a sneak preview and explains that "the partnership lasted about six months, I think, but I got involved in a couple of interesting projects thatI wanted to continue. I wanted to see the limit of my possibilities, so quite simply I thought I would try it. I still didn't feel I knew what it was like to run my own business." Ms Machus-Burek, however, was not prepared to go it completely alone. "Advising clients is not a one man show. There is always a team. It is important to build up a team that shares the same attitudes," she says. As a result she went looking for others to join her and eventually invited Jolanta Wawrzyszuk and Thorsten Machus into the business. Astaris now offers services including tenant and owner representation leasing, investment advisory, land development consultancy, feasibility studies and a range of commercial real estate consultancy.

What is responsibility?
Ms Machus-Burek describes setting up a business as an enriching experience: "I have learnt much more about how a business works in general. I've learnt finance, law and a new dimension of people management. It's not always been a pleasure, for example, taking legal action to claim payments or dealing with the tax office, but nonetheless the experience was needed. What it comes down to is full accountability for everything you do, for all my clients and for all those who work for me." When asked about how hard she worked, she jokes that there are two types of people: those who take the credit and those who work hard. She then makes it plain that hard work is not the only requirement for success: "You need to be more efficient," she says, "you need to precisely allocate jobs and tasks. You also need to be more sure that the client's project makes sense for you. It's important not to spend a long time on projects that have deep problems such as land issues, so you need to assess the project more quickly and accurately. In a large corporation there are different departments doing different things. But in a smaller company it has to be much more personal, because there are no other people." No matter how large her company grows she does not believe that she would devote all of her time only to its management: "I am a job doer and relationship builder," she says. "Personally I would not be happy closing myself behind the doors and being the managing director - no matter if it's my company or another company. I like to have contact with clients and meet people." Overall, like all the other female entrepreneurs we talked to, she came across as both supremely confident and contented. "Success is a journey, not a destination," she explains, "And the way to success is always under construction. Every day it is under construction. When your personal goals are in line with your career goals, then you're going in the right direction. What is important is to be aware of those goals. Being aware that you're doing things you like is very important and even more crucial is knowing that goals once reached, require new ones to be set up, again and again... and that they change with the experience gained and the passing of time. And this is great."

What next after King Sturge?
Last year in May, Jones Lang LaSalle announced that it was buying King Sturge. Worldwide, this left many of King Sturge's managers in an awkward predicament. Would it be better to stay with the company or find a position elsewhere? However, as the old saw says, with every crisis comes an opportunity. One such woman who decided to take advantage of her changed circumstances was Olga Mrazkova, the former head of finance for the Czech and Slovak republics. She has now founded Dirigo, a company that offers services from auditing and accountancy to asset and property management. "It was just a decision that came after quite a few months," she says. In October she left Jones Lang LaSalle and by December her new company was registered. Overall, she had spent over ten years working at King Sturge. "There were only 15 people when I joined. I set up all the internal procedures. Five years later we set up the Slovak office and I was in charge of their finances too. I was there when the credit crunch came. This was a very difficult time with lots of changes but one year later we were back in profit. I grew with the company and learned a lot there." After corporate life she now appears to relish the challenges of being small again, saying that she can concentrate on the things she loves. "There are no big rules. I'm setting up the rules for myself," she says. "I want to concentrate on smaller clients, those that are too small to have finance directors in-house. I want to help them with their office administration, their internal procedures, their profitability and efficiency, as well as their property management and their real estate." So far she has five clients. "These people have got bright ideas and big plans," she explains, "but they don't have people to help them. They want people who will bring fresh impetus and some improvements to their businesses. I have my brain and I want to use it as much as possible. I've no plans to create a big company within a year or two, I want to focus on quality first. Let the clients feel that they are really important." Nonetheless, she is considering a slightly unconventional manner of growing the company. "I want to employ all the women on maternity leave," she explains. "They are quick, efficient and reliable. When you have a child, it is so hard to get even a part-time job. There are not many companies in the Czech Republic who are ?mother-friendly'. Even if I have children, I will still want to work. I don't want to disappear from the business."

We are in it together
Two other women whose career paths were directly affected by the King Sturge acquisition are Agnieszka Michalczewska, the former head of the retail agency, and Tatiana Spencer, a former agency director. Both women decided to go into business together and they have now set up Aspenn Retail Partners, a firm that offers a wide range of services, including feasibility studies, land acquisitions, tenant mix, rent roll budgeting, as well as leasing and investment advice. "For managers such a merger is always difficult," explains Tatiana Spencer, "you either accept the secondary role or you do something else." After the merger the two women decided that it was now or never to start their own firm: "Since we enjoyed working together, we thought we should seek a way to pool our strengths. Sometimes we understand each other without even speaking a word," says Ms Spencer. One of their reasons was also that they are both mothers who value the flexibility of managing their own time. "You are free to decide when you work," says Ms Michalczewska and then she explains that in a corporation, not all the work that is done directly concerns the clients. "Now we can be fully concentrated on our projects and focused on the needs of our clients," she says. Tatiana Spencer agrees that she is now more able to serve her clients, however, as she explains: "now as entrepreneurs we have other duties, which as part of a large company we did not have to worry that much about. For example, organising the office, approving payments, establishing a marketing strategy, dealing with accountants and managing accounts receivables." So far both women seem astounded by how well their company is doing. "I hope we will continue to have so many potential clients, but now we have to be selective," says Ms Spencer. Ms Michalczewska concurs: "There definitely seems to be a place in the market for our company. Today's market is difficult, not like it used to be a few years ago. This means you need to analyse more and you need to be better prepared. Clients want somebody experienced who can focus on their needs. There are a lot of opportunities. The retail market is big in Poland. Even if there are fewer new developments being launched, shopping centres will not disappear and one day they will need to be re-leased or re-positioned," she says. Again, both women exhibit the same kind of passion that Ms Osiecka believes to be so important for self-employed businesswomen. "You get up in the morning and you really want to go to work," says Agnieszka Michalczewska. "You work for the clients you choose. Our motivation is really strong. It's not that you have to go to work, but that you want to!"
Perhaps the one feature that all of these women share is their drive and determination. "I'm demanding towards myself" says Renata Osiecka. " I always look in the mirror and try to challenge myself". But it is perhaps irrelevant that there are Ms Osiecka's words, because they could have just as easily been said by each of the women we talked to.