A journalistic-style feature story written for Narrative Nonfiction, a course in Algonquin College’s Professional Writing Program.

Picture a successful businessperson. Is it someone like Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street, or Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network? Businesspeople must be ambitious and confident (if a little cocky) if they want success. Naturally, a cutthroat business environment produces such people like Jordan Belfort and Mark Zuckerberg.

Successful businesspeople are, however, largely Jordan Belforts and Mark Zuckerbergs: white men. A 2023 study from Statistics Canada says that only 20% of business owners are non-white men, and only 18% of businesses are women-owned. Even if these minorities are accomplished, they still earn less than their white and/or male counterparts. The road to success should be one anyone can travel, regardless of gender or race. Speedbumps based on identity should be dug up and thrown away.

People of colour have a markedly harder time achieving success. Prejudices can interfere with building a clientele, for example. Nafis Chowdhury, a real estate agent and team lead in Ottawa, Canada, explains instances where his race hinders him. “I’ve had people say we don’t want to work with people like you.” Said with a straight face, casual racism is so normalized that Chowdhury hardly has an emotional reaction, even chummily putting air quotes around “people like you.” Hailing from Bangladesh, many an opportunity has passed Chowdhury by because of intolerance.

Although women of colour are familiar with prejudices such as those Chowdhury has experienced, being a woman of any race has additional hurdles to clear. In 2023, the Canadian Federation for Independent Businesses identified several specialized issues women face in the business world. Over half of women business owners have trouble accessing financing and sometimes get outright rejected from government support programs with no explanations. Regrettably, this is among the normalized issues such as pay gaps. Rachel Herrndorf, a real estate agent in Ottawa, Canada, spoke about her experiences as a woman in real estate. Herrndorf started out in commercial real estate, but says “it’s an old, white boys club.” The undeniable gender favouritism in the industry was her main reason for switching over to residential real estate.

For Herrndorf, success didn’t look like staying in commercial real estate, anyway. Women and people of colour must shape their own success, away from their white and male counterparts. Take it from Errol Pierre in his 2022 book, The Way Up: Climbing the Corporate Mountain as a Professional of Color: if you are a person of colour, you cannot breach the business world in the same way a white person does. “We must discuss and define success. Success can mean many things to many different people.”

Chowdhury, when prompted on what success looks like for him, speaks candidly about how he grew up low-income. Poverty affected his outlook on success. He wanted to drive the newest sports cars and have multiple million-dollar homes. Now, having achieved that, he looks for more. “It’s only one portion of success. I don’t care about the money anymore… how many people can I help?” As a father of two, quality time with his family is more important to him than ever before.

Herrndorf has a similar outlook on success. She muses about her beginnings, stating that $250,000 a year was her first lofty goal. She just wanted to live comfortably and on her own terms. But after 41 deals in her first year, when most agents would be lucky to seal five, she was completely burnt out. “I’ve realized money isn’t everything and… time is the most important commodity.” Herrndorf emphasises time being important to her work-life balance. Things like open-minded clients and well-maintained properties allow her to effectively use her time. She isn’t spending time convincing clients or debating listing agents. This allows for freedom in her lifestyle.

Carl Sandburg says time is the coin of your life. Chowdhury and Herrndorf respect that prioritizing their time is vital to success. How can one savour their own success if they are dragged down by it? Minorities especially must respect their time if they want achievement. Data from the 2016 and 2021 censuses found that people of colour who are more educated than their white counterparts are more likely to have lower salaries. So as a minority, time isn’t respected as a currency of one’s life—that isn’t fair.

So how can minorities be successful when so much is stacked against them? People can deny sales based on race as Chowdhury has dealt with. Or an entire industry like commercial real estate can be wholly unavailable strictly based on gender, as Herrndorf dealt with at the beginning of her career. But as Pierre says in his book, success must be defined by the person experiencing it. Minorities must shape their own path for achievement. While it’s an extra task on the to-do list that their white and male counterparts don’t have, overcoming specific struggles and finding support along the way can be its own form of success.

Chowdhury, who is now the team lead of his own real estate group, finds fulfillment from his team thriving. With his team being almost exclusively Bengali people, he focuses on “feeding his culture and helping his people grow.”

For Herrndorf, she plans to head a networking group for real estate in the new year, which she expects many women will flock to. For success, she says, “surround yourself with the right people. And networking is everything.”

Successful businesspeople do not have to look or emulate the Belforts and Zuckerbergs of the industries. Women and people of colour wield a special superpower in the business world: overcoming struggle. While they shouldn’t have to in the first place, people such as Chowdhury and Herrndorf are proof that the cages surrounding their identity don’t stop them from achieving their version of success. Ambition and confidence are scary traits to embody when things bigger than oneself are at play, but the business world needs fewer Belforts and Zuckerbergs and more Chowdhurys and Herrndorfs.