An interview with Sally Forrest, Managing Director of SoulCentre Pte Ltd
By J.J. Lavigne
Tell us more
about SoulCentre Pte Ltd (SC)
Sally:
SoulCentre and SoulKids are the 2 brands of our company, and were established
in Singapore 10 years ago. Our company was founded by Vikas Malkani, a
best-selling author and teacher, and me, with the intention of bringing
inspirational life-skills training and effective personal development to adults
and children alike.
We currently have 4
academies in Singapore: Orchard, East Coast, Toa Payoh & our own Head Quarters
at SoulCentre Academy & SoulKids Academy in Sunshine Plaza. We are also
launching one more academy in the CBD this month.
We are delighted
that SoulCentre has been recognised as Asia’s premier centre for personal
development by press and media.
What is SoulKids?
Sally: SoulKids is a
unique training program that gives essential life skills for happiness and
success to children. It empowers them to grow into confident and well-rounded
adults.
At SoulKids we seek
to bring out the best in every child. We feel that current mainstream education
puts 20 to 30 children in a classroom with one teacher and expects all children
to be the same. Uniqueness is not developed.
Every child is expected to behave uniformly, while in reality, each and
every child is different and this uniqueness should be brought out.
SoulKids was
created after Vikas had worked with many adults helping them to enhance their
life. He soon realised that most of their issues stemmed from the mind-sets and
belief systems they had received when they were children themselves. He dedicated
himself to creating effective tools and techniques that children could adopt at
a young age, which would support them to create happy and successful lives as
they grew into adults. And thus SoulKids was born.
Is that one
of the elements that leads to the so called Mid-life crisis?
Sally: Yes, it could
be. When we live a life that’s not aligned to our strengths, not in tune with
our inner passions and potential, it creates a chronic sense of stress and
unhappiness.
At SoulCentre, we work
with numerous clients who wish to enhance their life; to make it more
successful, more fulfilling, more productive. With society and lifestyle the
way it has become, many wake up each morning feeling stressed, unhappy, chasing
unfulfilling career paths, raising children, and juggling multiple roles. And
their inner passions and real potential is put on hold in the meantime.
We work with them
to help them understand and appreciate the fact that in life, we always have a
choice. We help them to identify their strengths, discover their passions and
also show them an effective method of turning their passions into a successful
and fulfilling life.
How did you
get into the personal development and life-skills business?
Sally: I come from a
small village in UK. From childhood I understood that to progress in life I had
to work hard and get good grades at school and University.
I graduated as a
pharmacist, and started my career as a manager with Boots pharmaceuticals. To
be a manager in Boots, one needed a Pharmacy degree, and that became my goal. I also went on and completed an MBA. My focus
was about growing myself and being promoted into more senior roles. Eventually I
was transferred to Asia to open retail stores for Boots in Thailand. This was
the first expansion out of the UK for Boots.
My mind-set started
to shift whilst in Asia and I realised that the externals of life are simply
not enough for happiness and inner contentment.
After 3 successful years
in Thailand, Boots asked me to return to the UK to be part of downsizing the
corporate head office. This was a big wake-up call for me as I witnessed people
who had given their entire life to the company suddenly made redundant. So, after
18 years of senior management roles in Boots, I decided to quit as my heart was
no longer in their role.
I decided to return
to Asia as I had a dream to open an orphanage in Chiangmai, which I
accomplished along with a missionary friend and his wife. During this time I also
started to see and meet people with completely different perspectives on life
and this took me on a journey of self-development and inner discovery. I also made
a trip to India to understand the mind and this is where I met Vikas.
Why do you
call your company SoulCentre?
Sally: The word ‘Soul’ stands
for ones greatest potential. It’s a word that defines the highest part within
you; your highest abilities, your greatest growth.
And this is what
our company helps individuals to achieve - it helps every child and adult to
bring out their greatest potential and make it real in their life. Happiness
and success follows naturally.
We do this through
proprietary training programs that we have developed and copyrighted. Our brand
names are trademarked and protected internationally and our licensed trainers
conduct our unique programs for children and adults around the world.
So how did
you decide to grow the business?
Sally: Our growth was essentially
organic. We initially started to teach our programs to children and received
very positive feedback. Then parents noticed such a huge positive difference in
their children that they too wanted to learn how to teach & inspire others.
So we started to teach adults the same skills.
Singapore is a
great base for our business as so many nationalities live here – and as a
result, we have now taught people from over 35 different countries.
Over time as people
moved back to their own countries, we also started to get requests to grant
licenses to teach our proprietary programs there.
So both Vikas and I
decided to train ourselves, and become CFE’s so we could understand how best to
support our future licensees, and grow the business professionally through
licensing/franchise models.
Since then our
expansion has been very positive and our training programs are now reaching adults
and children in UK, USA, Indonesia, Malaysia and Australia. We are also in
talks to expand into Thailand and Vietnam.
We have also
expanded with more Academies locally in Singapore.
How do you
replicate, and is replication difficult without the right people?
Sally: As I mentioned
our growth has been essentially organic, so most of our licensees are people
who have trained with us earlier, and know the brand well. They have benefited
from our training programs and have seen the results in their own life. And now
they want to become part of our growing brand.
If licensees are
totally new to the brand, we offer a very comprehensive training program with
both Vikas & myself to cover all aspects of the brand and its values.
In addition we have
recorded many training sessions, so licensees can constantly be refreshed and
updated, no matter where they are in the world.
All our training programs
are evaluated through feedback mechanisms, so again it allows us to maintain
quality.
We have also invested
in Intellectual Property and protected both brands SoulCentre and SoulKids in
over 30 countries.
We also produce our
own books, many of which have become international best-sellers, and again
these support the learning for all students.
We believe in high
quality of training, and high level of support, for all our licensees. With
this to guide us, replication and growth is smoother.
Who are your
clients?
Sally: The majority ofthe people who come for our training programs are adults, or their children.
Our clients are from all walks of life – we have CEOs, business professionals, princesses,
house wives ….even Hollywood stars. They all come to learn how to discover
their potential and live life in a happier and more rewarding way. We work with
children to help them to do so also.
Do most parents
want their kids to be doctors or lawyers?
Sally: Parents are
conditioned by their own upbringing and their own belief systems.
In today’s age,
there is so much change and influence from technology and social media that
children are thinking very differently to the old “norms”.
Parents need to see
the strengths of their children and to encourage them to follow these, as this
is where both happiness and success will lie for them.
The attention span of
a child is decreasing in today’s world, however once a child finds their
passion then they will give it 100% commitment.
This is the secret
of life – to find what makes you wake up each morning feeling inspired, and then
to follow this, get excellent at it, and make a career doing what you love!
Thanks Sally,
and we wish all the best for SoulCentre & SoulKids.
To find out more about one of our SoulKids® programs, becoming a
SoulKids® Mentor or our SoulKids® license opportunity’s, please
contact:
Sally Forrest
Mobile: (65) 9875 2372
Email: info@soulcentre.org
Website: www.soulcentre.org
