We all have a talent for something. We all have passions. And if we look closely at our environment, we can certainly find at least one unsolved need. If you add up these 3 ingredients, actually you can start over your career by creating your own business. Can you?
I am convinced that yes, and this is exactly the story of Zsofia Pintz. A European patent attorney who set up her own company and today she helps hundreds of candidates to prepare for the EQE (European Patent Attorney qualifying examination), which is considered to be one of the most difficult legal exams, based on the average success rate.
“I think changing the environment boosts your creativity. It also liberates you to try bolder things in your career. When I moved to Brighton, I was preparing for my own EQE exam. At that time, there was not much information, advice about the exam or any study materials online. So I started putting my notes and templates together and started an EQE blog to share these publicly. I didn’t think about this as a business at the outset. I simply shared my best practices for my EQE preparation.
As for some candidates it’s difficult to prepare alone for months, after passing my exams I discovered that tutoring was much needed by my fellow students. So I started to organize guided study groups to help candidates prepare. I was amazed how the number of the participants dubbed, tripled each year. Today I am really lucky to be able to (almost) make a living off this business, that was once just a few blog posts. I am often amazed myself how it all happened. I simply wanted to support others in their exams. I just did it for the sake of doing it. This genuine urge to help others led me to where I am today.
The other thing that might have contributed to my success is my full dedication to this project. I often worked 60-70 hours a week, updating my legal knowledge, preparing for the courses, tutoring my candidates and even providing additional meetings for free. As most of my candidates have busy jobs at patent law firms or companies, they are not available during the day. So normally I spend my evenings and weekends teaching. And I think this is what people feel. I am not just there because they paid, I don’t simply end the session when the time is up. I stay until they have questions, I answer all their messages, and I am really excited for each of them to pass their exams.
It took me 3 years to get there. So another important thing I would say is to hold on until you find what you really want to do. For me, it was a very difficult period. I consider myself extremely lucky because it turned out that what I enjoy doing the most, is actually something that didn’t exist on the market in that format when I started. It’s an important combination if you want to start your own business, to find something that is highly demanded, and you are genuinely interested about.
Now past students recommend me to others, and my courses are always full, but even at this point it happens to me that I feel that I need to know more, I should have done better, and so on. So I never start from a position where I suppose that I know everything. On the contrary. For me, it’s very important to ask for help from more experienced attorneys. I also contact my so-called competitors – even if I don’t want to compete with them in a negative sense of competition, we are all there to support people – but I ask for their advice from time to time, recommend their courses to candidates and I show appreciation for their materials.
When I started posting about my courses, I didn’t take any marketing courses whatsoever. I just simply wrote about what I did, and why I thought it was useful. So I leave it to people to decide if this is something that can help them or not. I often hear that I look like someone who really believes in what she does. But I don’t do anything in particular, I prepare for my courses with full dedication, I put in all the hours needed, and all I care about is that my candidates succeed.”
When you talk to Zsofia, you have the impression that it’s just so smooth. Even if she didn’t say that. She worked tremendous hours, with not much return in the beginning, but she persisted. She also took some time to find her niche and she admits that sometimes she still feels like an impostor. But you feel that there is much more behind it. There is something light, and genuine about the way she approaches things. And I think that comes from the fact that she focuses on giving value first and not on the traditional interpretation of success. She achieved the latter as a result of the first one.
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