What Mother's Day means to us...

It’s Mothering Sunday – a very special day to LCVA!

For many people, Mothering Sunday is a last-minute card, a bunch of flowers, and going round your mums for a Sunday dinner . Don’t worry – the day has crept up on us with minimum notice a couple of times over the years too!

But here at LCVA, Mother’s Day has a very special place at the heart of our business. Mother’s Day is about championing and celebrating different mothers all around the world and sharing the stories that have inspired us – so today we’ve decided to share our success story with you!

Today, we are a proud successful business with a range of clients who we do incredible work with – but it has taken a lot of hard work and effort to get to this stage. So, let’s go back to over a decade ago, well before Lora founded LCVA.

Lora was a teen mum who left school with very few qualifications but was determined to create a good life for her and her son. However, she found that for women like her, employment opportunities were extremely limited, even impossible at some times. She was told she was going to live on benefits and not make anything of her life at all

Lora began doing temporary work through an agency – but the hours and travel involved were inflexible and she found it difficult to balance this as a single parent. It became very apparent that most workplaces were not accommodating to single mothers. There was a lack of understanding, a constant feeling of being underestimated and overlooked.

In 2010, Lora decided to return to college and get more qualifications. After this, she went to university and achieve her degree – all whilst working to bring in money to support herself and her son. However, Lora faced another challenge to overcome when she was made redundant from her job of five years. She decided that it was time to start her own business.

Lora wanted to create something which meant something to her, and which would help other people in her position because she knew first-hand how hard it is. She wanted to change the perception that single motherhood prevented people from achieving their career goals. Her main priorities were flexibility and a friendly, accommodating work environment, ensuring she was able to be there for her son and create a business that her upheld her own values.

And so, Lora created LCVA Services! As many of you know, at the heart of LCVA is our staff. We are so proud to employ women from different backgrounds and stages of life who bring with them a wide range of expertise. We make sure to offer our staff flexibility and fulfilment and a job that prioritises a work-life balance – so that parents don’t miss any of those important childhood memories, but still feel valued at work. The main ethos of our business is promoting growth and development – both personally and professionally – and we are proud to achieve that every day at LCVA.

We decided this Mother’s Day was the perfect time to share this story to celebrate mothers who feel undervalued at work and let them know that we see and support you! We hope to continue expand LCVA and in doing so offer more opportunities and inspiration to other women across the UK.

So, there you have it! From a teen mother to the director of her own company, Lora has proved that if you believe in yourself enough you can achieve anything – and if something doesn’t work for you, take the initiative to change it!

If you want to learn more about Lora’s story, check out her interview with ITV News:

If you would like to find out more about LCVA and what we do, check out our website and socials!

Happy Mother’s Day everyone!