Drawing inspiration from her own divorce experience, Antonia Basile Wilson founded Allied Divorce Consultancy to help other women navigating a similar journey.
We love entrepreneurs and small business owners at Honeycombers, which is why we’ve created Launchpad, a comprehensive digital networking platform (with IRL benefits, too) that encourages connection, business support, and community. It is a privilege and pleasure to learn from so many talented and inspiring folks, so we’ve decided to share the love by interviewing some of the lovely Launchpad members. Looking for inspiration? Check out how Antonia Basile Wilson, Founder of Allied Divorce Consultancy, gets it done like a boss!
How I get it done: Antonia Basile Wilson
What is your backstory and why did you decide to launch your business?
Originally from New Zealand, I had a successful career as a chartered accountant before moving to Hong Kong with my family in 1999, where I became a trailing spouse and stay-at-home mum to our first child, followed by two more children. Unfortunately, after many years of living the expat life in Hong Kong, my 20-year marriage fell apart, then I went through a long and complicated divorce. During this time, I had to overcome many challenges, dealing with my divorce while looking after three children as a single parent.
When my divorce was over, I decided that I wanted to transform my traumatic experience into a positive and constructive learning process to help and protect other women going through separation or divorce. Using the lessons I’d learnt, the invaluable insights and knowledge gained from my divorce journey, and my experiences with Hong Kong legal and court systems, along with my financial and mediation background, I managed to start my unique divorce consulting business. My passion is to empower women facing separation or divorce, so they can move on to a brighter and more secure future for themselves and their loved ones.
What has been your biggest challenge so far and how did you overcome it?
When I started my business, I didn’t specify the type of clients that I wanted to work with. It took me some time to realise that I needed to be more targeted about who my niche market of people were and who I was most passionate about helping, so that I could concentrate my time and energy on them.
Consequently, I’m now more direct and upfront, indicating that the people I’m seeking to help and provide guidance to are women facing separation or divorce, who are struggling to move forward with it due to emotional and financial factors. Having gone through my personal divorce journey, I understand the many challenges that these women may face as they go through separation or divorce.
How do you keep stress levels low?
I manage to keep stress levels low by remaining as calm as possible, not reacting to things as soon as they happen, and by compartmentalising things that I need to get done in terms of their importance and the priority that they need to be accomplished.
How do you deal with self-doubt or criticism?
I deal with criticism either by viewing it, if possible, as constructive feedback to improve myself or my services. But then again, everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I’ve come to accept that I’ll never be able to please everybody!
How I get it done with Antonia Basile Wilson: Rapid fire
Favourite place(s) to work? Anywhere quiet with good natural light and where I can get good coffee!
Can you share a work mantra that you use? As an entrepreneur, a work mantra I like to practise is knowing and accepting that I can’t do everything in my business. It’s best to spend my time and energy on the areas I specialise in, while engaging with those who can aid me in tasks that I have no experience doing.
One thing you can keep talking about for hours? I could keep talking for hours on end about my three children. They’ve motivated me to make the changes I needed to make in my life and have kept me grounded on what’s important.
Your go-to self-care activity? I love going for foot massages to unwind and destress. I find them therapeutic and a worthwhile little luxury to spend on!
One piece of advice to your younger self? Things in life don’t always happen the way you plan them to. This doesn’t mean you’ve failed at something, as things happen for a reason. It’s important to be able to view these situations with a positive mindset, in terms of how you can grow and improve yourself and your life after going through them.
Find out more about Allied Divorce Consultancy and get in touch with Antonia Basile Wilson on LinkedIn.
Launchpad is a comprehensive digital networking platform (with IRL benefits, too) that encourages connection, business support, and community. It is designed to make the entrepreneurial journey not only easier, and more successful, but also a whole lot more fun. We offer almost daily activities for members to connect, along with weekly masterclasses, member networking roulette, small-business mentoring, and media profiles on Honeycombers. Check out our Instagram and join us!
