In today’s post, we have Klaryce Lim and Tan Yuan Ming share their journey in birthing The TCM Folks.
Could you share more about your career path so far?
During our time as a BMS student, we often heard horror stories of seniors not being able to find a job in the TCM industry. Thus upon graduating, we were both glad to be able to secure a job quickly at PULSE TCM. As newbies with no experience, we were given the title of management trainees for the first 6 months. This is where we got exposed to the many different aspects of running a private clinic like operations, marketing, product development and of course honing our clinical skills.
After being in the clinic for around 3 years, we made the leap of faith to go out on our own with THE TCM FOLKS, in search of a new challenge and learning opportunities.
What is the main inspiration/background behind your choice of career?
THE TCM FOLKS is a fully mobile Traditional Chinese Medicine clinic that specializes in TCM house calls. We have seen a growing demand for remote and home-based services since the Covid-19 pandemic, which inspired us to start in this line of service. While starting a business at a young age might seem quite contrarian; especially for TCM, we feel that it actually makes the most sense to us.
Being young, we have less commitments, less liabilities and a longer runway to focus on what we want to achieve. Being able to pick up new skills relating to business is also quite useful and will hopefully open up more doors for us in the future.
What are some of the challenges you faced?
To put it bluntly, the one and only challenge that every business has is to make money. However, as a new kid on the block this is certainly not easy. As we’ve learnt from our previous boss, being able to create a successful TCM company doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to be a TCM physician. Running a business is completely different from seeing patients and we’ve really come to respect and admire many of our seniors who are currently doing well in this area.
Is there anything else you would like to share with fellow alumni who might be going through a similar situation?
Starting a business is pretty overwhelming especially when we tend to focus on those big goals that seem so far away. We found that taking things one day at a time, one project at a time helped us to stay focus and on track. It’s also important to remember that failures are simply opportunities to learn and grow, and to keep pushing forward no matter what obstacles come our way.
From PULSE Magazine 6th Edition
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