Success Story Azra Kertmelioglu Executive Director of Azra Private Kindergartens
Success Story: Azra Kertmelioğlu, Executive Director
of Azra Private Kindergartens
Executive Director of Azra
Private Kindergartens and a founding member of EO Turkey, Azra Kertmelioğlu is
an entrepreneur who has found her passion and decided to settle down in
education sector. Here is her entrepreneurship story:
“My story is a different one.
It is about how you may not find your true calling right away, but you should
never stop seeking it. Once you find it, you will understand that you are in
the right place. Let’s start J
Azra Private Kindergartens is
our family business, which was founded by my mother in 1977. When I decided to
take over the execution chair, it was 2006. Before that, I studied tourism
management, marketing management and applied psychology, chronologically at
Ankara, Amsterdam and Istanbul. Then, I worked in various departments in Marcus Evans, Panel Elektro and Samsung Electronics
for 6 years.
When I first thought about
taking over the management of my mother’s kindergarten, I was not sure if I was
fitting to the job and if it was my passion. Looking back to my education and
my professional life, I was able to see that anything that I have learnt about
communication and human behaviors could be integrated to kindergarten
management, and my experience both in Turkey and Amsterdam made me gain a very
broad vision. But as I was not an educator, I still had to learn many things.
The more I was involved in
the process, the more I could enjoy it. Now looking back to the last 11 years,
I am proud to say that it was the right decision. Because I work with children,
not any day is similar to each other. It is a long road of discovering new ways
of communication with children every day and creating new ways to improve their
education. Besides, taking the responsibility of the children requires huge
experience, patience and very good management skills. Today, with all these
assets, we are celebrating our 44th anniversary. We are bringing the
latest approaches in the world to Turkey, and trying to implement the best of
them in Azra. We never stop to chase the improvement opportunities. This is a
very variant, very challenging job which gives me a big satisfaction.”
