The owners of fifty Australian businesses share their stories of true grit and determination, long hours and lonely nights, in a new book titled 50 Unsung Business Heroes.
Of the fifty stories, twenty-seven have migrant backgrounds, a topical insight given Australia’s current immigration and refugee issues.
Every story is inspiring and fascinating, including interviews with three Parramatta-based business founders.
Michael Dakhoul always wanted to be a movie director but now finds himself directing even larger and more complex projects, as a quantity surveyor and construction consultant. In fact, that’s his businesses name: Construction Consultants, and he takes great pride in the work he and his team does.
Like Michael, Gus Fares came to Australia as a young man escaping the war torn Middle East. He tells how his first office was bombed, which probably made him eve more acutely aware of the beauty he sees in building design and construction work. Gus employs 6 staff and trains them himself.
CEO and founder Gerard Malouf founded his compensation law firm in Parramatta over 20 years ago, and he now employs over a hundred staff across 20 offices. In his story, he tells about when, at age 8, his father cried and said to him to simply do the best he possibly could in life. That memory has stayed with Gerard and had a huge impact on how he runs his business.
Other stories in the book feature an ex-Croatian soldier who had to sell his son’s toys to pay for groceries, a teenager who slept rough on the streets, and now employs over a hundred staff, and another who started from her kitchen table, and now runs ten offices across six countries.
Small business is the backbone of the economy, and between them these fifty SMEs alone are responsible for 1,000 employees. With a combined turnover in excess of $400 million, they pay millions in taxes.
Unsung Business Heroes is a concept created by Charles Fairlie, who was unemployed himself when he took on the task of recording these stories.
Inspired by his father, a yacht-builder, Charles found the most inspiring stories were often the ones that didn’t make the front page, but rather the quiet achievers who didn’t see themselves as special.
Writing the book’s foreword, Kate Carnell, Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman said, “These stories are sure to inspire and empower potential business owners, those with great ideas, wanting to test the water – and others striving to build on what they have already created.”
Release ends
Kate Carnell spoke at the book launch event.
For individual interviews with any of the book’s 50 subjects, contact series creator and publisher:
Charles Fairlie – 0434 524 466 – Email: charles@purposepublishing.com.au