Great risks can lead to great rewards. Success builds on success. You have to succeed enough to get a platform. To do that, you must recognize that risk taking is an integral part of success. Virtually no woman gets to the top in any arena—not in corporate or privately owned business or academia—by remaining below the radar. You must learn to stand in the spotlight, take risks, accept ambiguity, and be willing to accept failure and then move on. Every success is a transformation of an earlier failure, so if you fail, you quit too soon.

If you want to move up, be willing to put your chips on the table, and risk what you’ve already got, to move to the next level. One of the biggest risks the author took was getting into the vineyard and wine business in Texas, something no-one had ever done and most said couldn’t be done partly because of antiquated laws. When representatives of the bare-knuckled liquor industry began instigating 3 A.M. legislative committee meetings to keep me out of them, I began to realize it might not be just my business at risk. Still, I pressed on.
Sometimes you need to convince others to gamble on you to reach your full potential. Lisa Wong, while still a teenager, convinced her parents to turn over to her the $4,000 they had saved for her college education so she could start a restaurant. She now has 3, including an extremely sophisticated venue. She has partnered with a master chef and has one location on San Antonio’s famed River Walk, plus she has an outlet at the Spurs stadium, where she does a brisk business in Margaritas and fajita tacos, earning several million dollars a year.
Look for opportunities, then take a gamble, if the price is right. Deb Nyberg, a mother of three who was eking out a living on a farm with her mechanic husband, gambled on a website “Field of Dreams” and bought a defunct Internet domain, called Bizwomen.com. When Business Journals bought the Bizwomen.com domain name, Nyberg got a very big payday.
Recognize that non-traditional businesses offer exceptional opportunities. Candace Houston owns and operates her own real-estate inspection company, Rosie The Riveter Inspections, which offers buyers, sellers, and investors a third-party impartial opinion concerning real-estate property. Linda G. Alvarado, a Hispanic-American businesswoman, started her own construction firm in 1976, breaking many barriers in that historically male-dominated world. As co-owner of The Colorado Rockies Baseball Club, Alvarado is also the first Hispanic-American (male or female) to own a major league baseball franchise. (Profits from the sale of these sports franchises can and do reach the hundreds of millions of dollars.)
Use what you know and bet on yourself. Norma J. Williams, president and CEO of NJW Companies, Inc., was standing in an unemployment line in 1986 when she realized that, as a veteran human resources professional, she had the know-how to get herself and many of the people in that line back onto a payroll; and that’s what she decided to do. Norma launched 2 multi-million-dollar executive search companies. Dr. Michele Hoskins is the African-American CEO of Michele Foods, Inc. and a divorced ex-school teacher who had children to support, no money, and no mentor. She launched a company with a secret syrup recipe handed down to daughters from a great-great-grandmother. Today, Honey Crème syrups and the company’s products can currently be found in more than 4,000 food stores nationwide.
Start from where you are with what you’ve got. Lucinda Yates, president of Designs By Lucinda, rose from divorce and homelessness by launching her “company with a conscience,” which makes fund raising pins for nonprofit organizations. In 1983, she was working hard just to put a roof over her head and support her young child. Lucinda then turned the attic of her apartment into a jewelry studio, where she created a pin that was a simple, geometric representation of a house. She then decided the pin would be a fund raiser, raising both money and a greater awareness of homelessness. Her company now has a line of 11 theme-based fundraising pins—and international distribution.