Ivy’s
story
It came from a place of love and good intentions
but that didn’t make it great advice
For as long as I can remember, I had a video camera in my hand. I would run around making short films or creating montages of family photos to play on the TV later.
So, come 18, I knew what I wanted to be. A film director. I would go off to university study film, become a film director, and life would be golden. But that ended when my Dad said,
Get a real degree!
He argued that filmmaking was okay as a hobby, but it wasn’t a proper degree and wouldn’t lead to a proper job. I listened. I went to Edinburgh University and got an MA(H) in Psychology. I had a wonderful time, made great friends, and discovered something about myself.
I was good at listening and loved helping people. I would host parties and make big meals where we all came together to laugh, occasionally cry, and put the world to right. After Uni, the same advice was waiting.
Get a proper job!
I moved to London and got a fancy corporate job in the City. It turned out I was good at it. I began making proper money. But I wasn’t happy.
Increasingly, I thought about when I was happiest: at those big meals, surrounded by creatives, sparking off each other. Supporting and helping us all to grow and become better versions of ourselves. It was my light bulb moment.
Everything was about to change...
Within a short space of time, I left the City and opened a restaurant. It was everything I could want: a place to express myself and collaborate with talented, creative people.
After 10 years, I was still happy. Maybe even happier. I was now married and had a gorgeous son. I was also made an offer I couldn’t refuse (you can take the girl out of film…) I sold the restaurants.
During all this time, my husband had built up his own successful design studio, but like so many of my friends in the creative industries, I was fascinated by how they saw business differently from me. What I understood intuitively, they would shy away from.
Their motivation was to do great work rather than make “proper money” and I saw that it would often create a deep rooted tension between money and the value of their work
It reminded me of what my Dad thought about creative jobs not being proper jobs. This was my second lightbulb moment.
I knew what was next for me and it would change my life...
And it involved everything I had learnt up until now.
I would coach skilled creatives to live fuller, more rewarding lives. I would teach them to believe that what they did was a proper job, an important one, one that they could earn proper money doing. And that achieving all this was not just simple but could also be a lot of fun.
Ivy Malik Coaching was born.
Since then, I have helped thousands of creatives realise how simple it is to reach their true potential while being fully rewarded for doing so.
Ps. I think it’s important to note that my father has always done what is in the best interest of me and always gave us kids the agency of choice. He is my biggest supporter and has been my business mentor for decades. He is a brilliant human.
