Bobbie Racette, founder and CEO of a virtual assistance company Virtual Gurusshe didn’t at all times have a clear sense of how her story would unfold. She didn’t necessarily anticipate the chapter on becoming an entrepreneur – but it turned out to be one of the most significant.
Image Source: Courtesy of Virtual Guru. Bobbie Racette.
Before starting the company, Racette says she had no guidance and “was one of those people who went from job to job looking for different things to do.” In 2015, Racette was working as a safety technician in the oil and gas industry in Calgary when layoffs occurred – she lost her job and had difficulty finding one other position.
“Nobody would hire me.”
“I couldn’t get a job no matter how many resumes I sent out,” Racette recalled. “Interviews after interviews after interviews. And no one wanted to hire me.” Racette lived in a conservative neighborhood and says her identity as a queer, indigenous woman with tattoos may have hindered her exploration.
Eventually, after being bombarded with posts about the freelance economy, she decided to try it out for herself: she created an Upwork profile offering her services as a virtual assistant. That was difficult too. Most of her competitors were in other countries, so she needed to bid as little as $2 to secure a job on the platform. Racette knew there needed to be a higher way.
So, although she knew “nothing about running a business,” Racette decided to start out her own. It got down to build a gig work platform that will connect virtual assistants with firms needing help with a range of tasks from accounting to customer support, and it officially launched in 2016.
Racette’s long-term goal was to supply high-quality work-from-home opportunities to others in marginalized and underserved communities.
“My north star is working with indigenous people.”
In the early days of Virtual Gurus as a one-man show, the market need for the platform was clear: Racette launched with just $300 in the bank and brought in $300,000 in revenue in its first 12 months.
By the second 12 months, Racette still hadn’t hired her first worker, and although she was still earning money, she was working “around the clock.” She had to lift funds and assemble a team.
Only 170 investors said “no” to Virtual Guru before Racette heard the first “yes”, but the company secured CAD Series A round of $8.4 million and since then, the company’s valuation has exceeded $50 million. Racette’s first hire was a single stay-at-home mom, and by 2020, her team had grown to over 40 people. Today, Virtual Gurus has provided work to over 2,000 people in Canada and the U.S. – and that number continues to grow.
“My north star is working with indigenous people,” Racette says. “We are working to reach out to Indigenous communities and are looking to partner with employment centers so that we can attract Indigenous people to those employment centers that are in the community [and] keep them in their real communities. Because this is very important.”
Racette notes that Virtual Gurus are providing computers and training to indigenous people and are forming a latest partnership to empower and employ roughly 5,000 indigenous employees by the end of 2026.
“Who I am now as a leader is tenfold different.”
Like most latest entrepreneurs, Racette faced many challenges along the way, including developing Virtual Guru technology as the company grew. However, in line with Racette, one of the most significant obstacles turned out to be learning how you can be an effective leader of her team. “Leadership is extremely difficult if you’ve never really learned it,” he says.
Determined to be the leader her company needed, Racette enrolled in leadership courses at Harvard University and committed to improving every day.
“Who I am now as a leader is ten times different from who I was two years ago,” Racette says. However, he also acknowledges that leaders have a responsibility to develop every day and encourage the next generation of excellent leaders.
“There are no limits – nothing stops you.”
Racette also believes that business leaders have a responsibility to share their stories so that young people can see positive examples that motivate them to pursue their very own goals. Racette says women in business, especially in tech, have been discouraged from sharing their stories for too long, and in her work as a mentor to young women, she goals to interrupt that cycle.
According to Racette, no one must be afraid of starting their very own business and living their very own story in it.
“At this point, people are going to use entrepreneurship more as medicine,” Racette says. “Because then it’s like, the sky’s the limit – there’s nothing stopping you. Nothing can stand in your way. Nothing can cause fear because you are living your own story.”