From dreamer to doing it all
North Shore News
November 2, 2008
Caroline Skelton
Photo by Mike Wakefield
Shehla Ebrahim, the doctor behind Afterglow Skin & Laser Centre, was recently profiled in a book about B.C.'s 100 top women entrepreneurs.
Twenty years ago, you could find Shehla Ebrahim standing on Burrard Street, gazing wistfully at the doors to St. Paul's Hospital.
After coming to Canada from Pakistan in 1986, the trained doctor had to undergo a gruelling process to find a medical internship.
"I would look at the hospital and say 'One day, I'll walk into that hospital wearing my lab coat,'" she recalls. "And that's exactly what happened."
After doing her internship at St. Paul's, she did a family medicine residency at UBC, and since 1992, has been a family doctor in the Lower Mainland.
In 2005, Ebrahim was looking for a new challenge -- something that combined her medical practice with her creativity and interest in beauty. In April of that year, she opened the doors to Afterglow Skin & Laser Centre in North Vancouver, offering medi-spa services like Botox, chemical peels and acne treatments.
"After a lot of contemplation and fear, I decided to take a leap of faith, because I've always wanted to get into this kind of business and be in control of my own destiny and be my own boss," she says.
Since then, she's grown her business by between 70 and 80 per cent, mainly through word of mouth.
Ebrahim is one of 22 Lower Mainland and South Coast B.C. women being celebrated in New Pioneers: Stories of 100 BC Women Entrepreneurs, published by the Women's Enterprise Centre. Fellow North Vancouverite Tami Reilly of Go Get Organized, and West Vancouverites Karen Kallweit Graham of Kallweit Graham Architecture Inc. and Helen Bell of Reel Steel were also among the women profiled in the book, released this month and available at www.womensenterprise.ca.
For Ebrahim, the entrepreneurial experience has brought its challenges -- the main one theses days being the juggling act of keeping track of her many responsibilities.
"Not only do I spend time in the business, but I also spend time on the business. I am basically the marketer, the promoter. I'm in charge of operations, I do all the management, I do all the advertisements, and I also do (a lot of) the treatments," she says.
She also still works as a family doctor, with a practice in the same building as her clinic.
"As a physician and as somebody who's always done things, I feel that nobody else can do it better than myself," she says with a laugh.
This perfectionism has meant long hours for the entrepreneur, who has also committed herself to constant training at business seminars and leadership conferences. But she doesn't regret any of it.
"It's been really good for my self-esteem," she says, particularly the fact that she was able to do it all on her own.
Ebrahim's plans for the future include an expansion of her business into the male market, and new approaches to wellbeing. In her clinic, for instance, she is currently expanding beyond the traditional definition of a medi-spa to include services like counselling for life's roadbumps like stress and menopause.
For those women considering an entrepreneurial venture, Ebrahim goes by the maxim: "just do it."
"The only risk that we have in life is not taking the risk," she says. "Have the commitment, and just dream big and it's going to happen."
Plus, she adds with a laugh, "I feel like if I can do it, anybody can do it."
New Pioneers: Stories of 100 BC Women Entrepreneurs can be ordered free of charge at www.womensenterprise.ca.
© North Shore News 2008
Westview Centre
104-2609 Westview Drive
North Vancouver, BC V7N 4M2
Phone: (604) 980-3993
Email: info@afterglowskincare.ca
Hours of Operation:
Monday - Friday 9-6
Saturdays by appointment