Kathy Wells-McNeil: young entrepreneur of the year.

Kathy Wells-McNeil always knew she would run her own business one day.

When the 33-year-old Sudbury woman was a young girl, she remembers seeing closed businesses while riding the bus and wondering what caused them to go down and what new businesses could take their place.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

"I guess I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit," she laughs.

Many years later, with a growing medium-sized private home-care business under her belt, the ambitious young woman sees prophecy in her experience on the bus as a young girl.

In 1995 she opened her business, Total Nursing Care, after completing her nursing education at Cambrian College in Sudbury. The driving force behind the business, she says, was the provision of private nursing care for patients where "public funding ended."

Her business focuses on providing nursing, personal support, homemaking and physiotherapy assistance to patients in their homes. She now has a staff of over 60 registered nurses, RPNs (registered nursing practitioners) and personal support workers.

In late 2003 she expanded to North Bay, hiring a manager who works out of a satellite office.

Even before establishing her business, Wells-McNeil could not be held back. Despite not being certified officially as a nurse, she managed to still be entrepreneurial. Before even graduating out of school, she already provided private, personal support care to physically disabled and challenged patients through Kathy's Home Care, a venture she founded in 1994.

Wells-McNeil says that a major reason for founding the company was a chance to run a business and stay at home.

Having grown up in Sudbury, her roots ran deep in the rock-hard earth. She refused to believe that being a successful nurse in Sudbury was an oxymoron. Most of her graduating class at nursing school went off to the United States for greener pastures and more lucrative nursing jobs, she recalls. After speaking with clients through her first business, Wells-McNeil realized that there was a need for private home care in Sudbury during the 1990s.

"There were nine nursing companies back then. Now, there are three," she says. The fierce competition allowed her to find her own niche.

Locating that niche market, however, is what has allowed her to succeed. Her commitment to providing precise, detailed care plans for her patients is what makes her stand out, she says.

"Rather than sitting in front of a computer and producing a generic care plan for a patient based on, for example, the recommended plan for a total hip replacement, we provide a meticulous and very attentive plan," Wells-McNeil says.

She also prides herself on taking on "the difficult cases that others don't take." She recalls taking on a patient who had gone through 10 different care providers within a five-year period. The extensive care the patient required also demanded a lot on Wells-McNeil, who made five two-hour visits every week to their home.

Taking quality and precision seriously is only part of her successful venture, says Wells-McNeil.

As a private nursing operation, she finds that she refers many of her patients to public care first. Community Care Access Centres, or CCACs, provide a lot of the work she does.

Although publicly funded, there are limits to what they can do and for how long.

Wells-McNeil says her first line of business with any prospective client is providing them with as much information on what they can do without her service. Although it sounds counter-productive on the surface, she says the kind gesture is usually remembered and yields her business in the future. Those same patients who need 20 hours of care a week, receive 10 at a local CCAC and will often go to her for the other 10 because they remember who provided the advice to go there in the first place.

Beyond finding her place in the market, she also credits her success to sound business advice she received while working at a clothing store in high school. She remembers listening to the manager talk about the business. Through this, she learned quickly from the successful clothing retailer what made a business boom and what made it go bust.

"I don't like to learn from my own mistakes. I learn from other people's mistakes," she says.

Her business strategies have yielded her results, she contends. With sales of well over $1 million, the business is in a good position. Her achievements have also not gone unnoticed.

In 2000, she received recognition through the Sudbury Business and Professional Women's Club with a Women Entrepreneurs Award and a Start up Award.

In 2003, she was the recipient of the Cambrian College Alumni Award for 2002-2003 for her excellence as a Cambrian student and founder of a successful business. A $1000 scholarship was also set up in her name.

Her budding reputation in the Sudbury region was also noted at the federal level in the late 1990s when Wells-McNeil was approached by Paul Hellyer, the leader of the then newly-formed Canadian Action Party, to stand as the party's first candidate.

Not intending to win, she ran out of a desire to promote issues like health care and regional unemployment. She is most known for her famous retort to sitting MP Diane Marleau when, noting the government's abysmal record of job creation in Sudbury, in which she said, "I've hired 12 people. I've created more jobs than this government."

Wells-McNeil says she has had to turn down contracts because she believes taking too many jobs diminishes the quality of the care she is giving to existing patients.

While focusing on quality, she says she wants to expand into other fields, such as occupational nursing at local mines.

Now, five months into her pregnancy, she hopes she can find the time.

By Joseph Quesnel 

Northern Ontario Business