Amy Bastow – Founder of The Virtual Piano Academy, composer and musician

Amy Bastow – Founder of The Virtual Piano Academy, composer and musician

My latest She’s The Boss Chats episode is with the amazing Amy Bastow (Jorgensen), composer and the Founder of the Virtual Piano Academy. It’s not often you come across a creative musician who also has a huge entrepreneurial appetite. Amy is a fabulous surprise! After being brought up by her incredibly supportive mum and Grandmother in a tiny outback NSW town, Amy was inspired to get into music, and in fact spent her teenage years in her family’s band, playing on weekends. The piano was her first love and she learned as much as she possibly could from the local piano player which her Mum organised for her in exchange cleaning her house. A sacrifice that has totally paid off!

Amy really wanted to go to uni and qualified for the Sydney Conservatorium but her Mum wasn’t able to afford the fees, so the ever-resourceful Amy won two scholarships to cover her education and accommodation and spent four years getting her degree. Once she left, she couldn’t find any work so she created a website, knocked on every door she could and ended up being rung by Channel 7 to ask her to compose for the award winning show Winners & Losers. That opened lots of doors for Amy, including working for the famous Hollywood Director, James Cameron (Titanic, Avatar) and she continued composing until COVID hit. Since then she has set up a Facebook group called Composify to support other composers, and she was still teaching piano… until her lightbulb moment came after trying to teach remotely via zoom. She has now set up the Virtual Piano Academy (wait til you hear the solution to her problem!) and intends to grow it globally. She’s also doing her MBA. This is a woman to watch!!

Jane Mara – Intuition expert, speaker and author

Jane Mara’s career as an intuitive intelligence expert, speaker and author of two books on the subject, started in advertising land. After an illustrious start, working as a media buyer for some of the biggest ad agencies in Australia (and the world), she went to the ‘client side’ and continued to run marketing departments for some of the big banks. It was only when she mentioned the importance of ‘gut instinct’ and that people should be paying attention to it in business, and her suggestion was responded to with derision and lack of understanding, that she decided it was time to go out on her own.

She talks about her adventures along the way, and how using intuition and gut instinct has helped her, and her clients, in their lives.

Cate Peterson – Founder of YogaHive and Off The Mat and yoga evangelist

Cate Peterson is the most amazing woman and you definitely feel a better person after you have spent time with her. She truly wants to make a difference in the world and she is doing it with Yoga as the core. She has created Yoga Hive, which brings together hundreds yoga practioners from all over the country and thousands of classes, so that we all have access to them and book in a type of yoga, and a time that suits you for classes.

She has also created Get Off Your Asana, a fabulous initiative to help education yoga-virgins about what it can do for your mind, body and spirit. They target non-yoga (and even no-exercise) people to encourage them to explore, and hopefully fall in love with yoga. She also has another business called Off The Mat, where she creates sustainable yoga mats (most are plastic) to be more sustainable and environmentally friendly.

Cate is one-in-a-million! She is so kind, non-judgemental and peaceful, you will love her!

Kylee Stone – CEO & Founder of The Performance Code and passionate about helping women reach their potential in business

Kylee is a woman on a mission. After a long career in marketing strategy with large media organisations, Kylee inadvertently started working with other women in corporate who wanted support and help. This slowly evolved into the launch of Team Women Australia. Kylee’s stories about how this came about are inspiring.

After her work affected her health, she decided to go out on her own and offer guidance, leadership advice and coaching for corporate women who want to take their career to the next level. She also focuses on health as one of the pillars of success. These days Kylee is CEO and Founder of The Performance Code, she’s also the host of The Uncharted Leader Podcast – Ignite Your Passion, Purpose and Potential.

Pinky McKay – renowned lactation expert, author, speaker and the Founder of Boobie Foods

Pinky McKay is Australia’s greatest asset when it comes to breastfeeding Mums! From starting her career as a nurse, she quickly became fascinated with breastfeeding and after qualifying as a lactation nurse, she set out on her own. Starting with consultations, she built her practice until she was the go-to person for anyone having breastfeeding, or sleeping problems with their new baby. She’s so kind and compassionate that no mother is left feeling unable to cope. “It’s normal,” says Pinky.

But it’s the last ten years that have really established Pinky, both financially and in a business sense. Although she was a published author, had received stacks of publicity and created parenting videos, it was when she created Boobie Bikkies that things really took off. Now, as the CEO of Boobie Foods, and turning over seven figures, Pinky’s foray into products has changed her life and will be an inspiration for any woman who wants to expand. It’s never too late.

Susan Morrice – Geologist and the founder of an oil company, Belize Natural Energy (BNE)

Susan is the founder of an energy company in Belize. Her story is amazing! As an Irish woman, and a geologist, she explains how she just ‘knew’ there was oil under the surface, even though all the big oil companies had drilled 50 wells with no success. And she struck oil on her first go!

Susan explains how she persevered when others had given up, her great partner and inspiration, Mike Usher and how going to Educo changed the course of her life for the better. Her company is now the biggest revenue generator in Belize and they have created a model that benefits the people of Belize, her employees, her investors and mother nature. We’d call that a win-win-win-win and so does Susan.