Welcome to My Net Worth, our regular column on the lives and motivations of our country’s top business, legal and political people in their own words.  

Carmen Vicelich is the founder of two globally successful businesses based in Auckland. Data Insight, launched in 2012, analyses a company’s data to yield personalised insights into consumer habits. Valocity Global, started a year later, tailors this approach specifically for the property and valuation market. Vicelich’s entrée into the property-information and analytics field came in 2002 when she landed an IT role at Quotable Value, which then became CoreLogic. Ten years later, and with four children under the age of nine, she gave up a highly paid senior corporate position and took the plunge into business ownership. Her companies’ later expansion into Australia was helped by a multimillion-dollar grant from Callaghan Innovation. With husband Antony Vicelich and the children, she lives on a lifestyle block at Waimauku, northwest of Auckland. 

I was born in South Africa. At that time, it wasn't very safe for children; it was politically unstable and there was a lot of violence. My parents moved me and my three younger siblings to New Zealand when I was 13. 

Leaving everything behind and starting again taught me resilience. Because we had no other family here and we didn't know anybody, we were, and still are, incredibly close.

I was very influenced by my parents. They instilled a lot of values in me. They often said, “Just make sure that you're happy because life's too short not to be. So if you choose to be a postman, riding a bicycle and enjoying the sunshine every day, then do that.” 

When I was young, I wanted to do criminal law. I used to go to the court in the school holidays, like a real geek. I got into law with provisional entry straight from sixth form. One of my teachers suggested I do a gap year. So I did an AFS exchange and went to Argentina. It really changed the way I thought about what was important. I also realised the bureaucracy that would come with law, so I totally changed what I wanted to do. (She studied sales and marketing instead.)

My best business advice is to make sure you have the best people around you. You do not know everything, and if you're just starting out, you need to get people who are smarter than you, or people who have the same passion. When you have the right people, magic just happens. 

My biggest lesson was from when I wanted to start my first business after leaving a large corporate, and they tried to stop me from starting it. They settled with me out of court. It was a real life lesson that you can do all the right things, but life isn't necessarily fair. Fortunately, I did prevail, but that took a lot longer than I thought, and I wasn't expecting to have to battle just to start. It taught me a lot and made me even more fierce and passionate.

I’m so proud of my four wonderful children; they give me so much joy and delight every day. That's what keeps me grounded and that's what makes me happy. Everything I do is for them. I'm very lucky to have an incredible husband, who's very patient allowing me to start two businesses, have four children, four ponies, two dogs, and two cats. I couldn't do what I do without his support.

Managing stress is about problem-solving for me. I’ll look at the worst case and work backwards so that I have a plan B, and a plan C, and then I'm fine. That gives me calmness.

Carmen Vicelich aged seven.

 

I've always exercised. It’s an important part of my life. I’m a novice horse rider, I do boxing with my brother, and we’ve got a home gym so I work out with the kids. I do believe in healthy body, healthy mind, and being kind to your body. 

I get my energy from my family and close friends. I love hosting, cooking and serving up a beautiful meal, really beautifully plated. 

I'm passionate about celebrating success. Our family makes a big deal of everything. Christmas, Easter and birthdays are huge. Celebrating the little things is really important, too – like having coffee with my husband. It’s important to create those moments. 

On a personal level, I want to be making sure that I'm using what I know to give back. I'm very passionate about the work I do on the Unicef New Zealand board. I want to make sure I'm not only commercially driven, but also making a difference socially.

I'm very energetic. I don't need a lot of sleep and I don't think that even when I was flying a lot for work, I ever got tired or jet-lagged, so I'm probably very high on life. Some of my friends call me the dancing queen, because I’m always first to up to dance. I'm always happy, I guess. 

I absolutely love shoes and clothes. I love heels. I love glam. I work really hard and I want to make sure I look the part. 

As told to Jacqui Loates-Haver.
This interview has been edited for clarity.