A day in the life of Gheorg founder Dr Louise Metcalf

Wondering what it takes to be a female founder of an EdTech startup?

Below, Gheorg founder Dr Louise Metcalf shares a typical day in her life.

Find out what she does each hour, the projects she juggles, and how she commits to spending time with her family everyday.

A day in the life of Dr Louise Metcalf:

  • 6am: Wake up, quick check of the phone for any urgent issues or cases that may have arisen overnight. It’s rare for me to have one as I don’t work in acute care these days, but it’s a hard habit to drop and it does sometimes happen. I deal with any urgent matters first. Then it’s breakfast and a good chat with my partner and now 5 year old as we all get ready for school and work. Family is my highest value so I always start my day with some real presence and mindfulness with them.

  • 8am: School drop off. We like to walk slowly and go over important issues like whether Spiderman could beat Thanos and whether Peppa Pig’s Dad is a good driver considering where he parks the car (Mums and Dad’s of Peppa fans will be nodding about this one!)

  • 8:30am: Phone and email again. Quick train to the city. I also review my plan for the day (which I make the night before), my plan is flexible as sometimes you do get some interesting last minute requests over email. I also prioritise drafting any writing that I might need to do, today it was the shareholder report for Gheorg’s investors.

  • 10:00am: Usually a supervision session with an early career psychologist, we have so few psychologists that I make it a regular part of my week to support the next generation of psychologists. I have some amazing students at the moment. If it’s not a day for supervision I go for a run.

  • 11:00am: Usually I have sessions with my patients. We have a very wide variety of people who come into the clinic, it is a very interesting place. I did my sessions all via zoom during most of 2020 which was not as much fun without my excellent colleagues, but it worked and that’s what counts!

  • 12:00 midday: Lunch is usually me scoffing my plant-based meal (I use a service to make life easier for me) while I am making a tea, and grab a protein ball, then I am back into sessions. I also tend to multitask between sessions - writing notes and letters for the last person I saw, reviewing notes for the next person and doing brief phone calls and emails for Gheorg! There’s a lot to be across! 

  • 3:00pm: This is when I tend to shift into full on Gheorg mode. I like to catch up with a team member. Today it was my school's team leader who is running some great Gheorg “Hope Ninja” workshops for a school in WA next week. She is super excited about them and so am I! The kids in rural areas tend to fear snakes and spiders and have great stories to tell of them!

  • 4:00pm: I tend to focus on business development, usually setting up meetings for the next day (all zoom now!), or chatting to my guru of marketing who helps me line up podcasts and chats with potential partners. We have two of those meetings next week which is great.

  • 5:00pm: Back in to sessions! Or if it’s my day to pick up our 5 year old, off I go to do the school pick up and get covered in cracker crumbs (his favourite snack). Then dinner is cooked and we have a sit down meal and another big chat about the day (did his friend mean it when he pushed him etc), followed up with bath time and a toy battle in the suds. 

  • 7:00pm: Depending on the day, this could be the time for the Gheorg team meeting. Our team is growing now so it’s hard to fit everything in, but we try hard to never go over the hour. If it is not a Gheorg meeting night I do story time and a cuddle of course!

  • 8:00pm: Accelerator time! I’ve been a part of a few accelerator programs and while most of the Australian accelerators run during the day, but the one I am doing at the moment is run from Singapore so it starts at 8pm and sometimes doesn’t finish till midnight. It’s a great experience though, I am loving it, despite the tired mornings!

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