Mike Evers

After completing my masters in Public Administration, I served as a production worker for a Textile plant whose mission was to employ people who are blind by manufacturing products under Federal and military contracts. After working there for about a year, I soon realized that finding a management position with in the company was not going to happen because I was blind and had little work experience in spite of my education.
I looked for jobs outside the company but was unsuccessful until I got accepted in to a rigorous 2 year long executive training program with a firm in Washington D.C. This program provided participants with the work experience and formal training so that those who successfully completed the program would be able to land a management level position with one of the many organizations who employ people who are blind through commercial, military and Federal contracts. So I went through the program, completed it and landed a position as a project specialist with a firm in Raleigh NC.
I was happy to be in that job and I thought my wife and I would be all set. Little did I know, that my job was doomed before it even had a chance to get off the ground. Three months after I started, about 10 people got laid off and another 10 people got brought on from another company. Our firm was reorganizing because of the bad economy and it needed new blood to keep it alive.
Around 9 months after I was hired on, we were all brought into a meeting with the company president and senior management team and was told that the company was over $1 million behind a month and that everyone needed to take a 25% reduction in pay in order for everyone to keep their jobs and get the company back in the black. We were told it would be temporary but things were about to go from bad to worse.
About 11 months after I was hired, I was called into a meeting and told that my position was going to be eliminated. I was given a choice. Take a temporary lay-off and hope another opening would become available in 6 months, draw unemployment, move back in with some relative or take a production job at minimum wage.
I was devastated. I was so depressed that I didn’t want to get out of bed for almost a week. It took my wife, preacher and church friends to intervene and help me figure out what to do next. I eventually took the job at minimum wage and it wasn’t easy. I felt like a complete failure. I went from making a modest $40 thousand a year down to $7.25 an hour minimum wage. I felt like there was nothing left I could do until I found the Amway business opportunity.
So my wife and I took the plunge and decided to go into business for ourselves, become our own best customer, help others do the same and teach others how they can take control over their own financial futures instead of letting some boss do it for them. I finally had hope and a since of purpose again. It is great helping other people achieve their dreams, teaching them something great, there is simply no better career.
I use to think that going to school and getting an MBA was the only way I would become successful. Now I think that getting an MBA is an unnecessary waist of time and money. My only regret is that I wish I started this business much sooner.