YT10 | This entrepreneur reveals how to build a creative business focused on women’s empowerment

Meet Shalima, an incorrigible optimist and out-and-out people’s person! She’s the founder & CEO of the Dream Catchers agency, film producer, actor and model, writer and podcastor. In this conversation, she opens up about a childhood spent in 8 different schools, building a creative business in an underserved niche as well as her advice to women trying to make a living from creative endeavours.

Discussion Topics: This entrepreneur reveals how to build a creative business focused on women’s empowerment

• Introduction
• Finding a niche
• Taking charge of your career
• Making money in creative fields
• Bringing out the best in people
• Going to 8 different schools
• You can’t pour from an empty cup
• Don’t Indian women want careers?
• Feelings about Singapore
• Nobody will come to save you

Transcript: This entrepreneur reveals how to build a creative business focused on women’s empowerment

Yana Fry: Welcome to another episode of YanaTV and today our guest is Shalima Motial, who is the founder and CEO of Dreamcatchers events, theatre, and production company, who are doing amazing things in a very different way. Shalima. Thank you for joining us today.

Shalima: Thank you for having me over. Such a pleasure.

Yana Fry: I know. Dreamcatcher is such a lovely name and I remember you and I just recently were having coffee together and talking about it and you were sharing with me the mission and what makes it so different from other theatre and production companies. So please tell us.

What is different about Dream Catchers?

Shalima: It’s a 12 and a half year old company. It started off as a talent showcase company and then moved to an online talent showcase company because I realised Singapore didn’t have platforms for performing arts. In school and colleges, people get an opportunity to get on stage, singing, dancing, acting, whatever it is, right?

But as adults, when we are in corporate life or homemakers, there isn’t any platform, and that’s how Dreamcatchers started. I wanted to catch the dreams of performing artists.

And along the way it became an events company. How it’s different in niches we tap into the market, which is untapped. There are a lot of companies doing similar kinds of events, whereas Dreamcatchers does events that are very different.

For example, something like a Runway Mom. It’s a platform for women. To walk the fashion ramp irrespective of their age, height, size, nationality, and with their loved ones, the USP is it’s non competitive, so the atmosphere around is so positive, encouraging, and it helps women get out of their houses, do something unique, do something different, and in a way, I feel that empowered women empower women.

So I wanted to create that for them and by God’s grace, we’ve had seven successful seasons. Then we also have platforms like Superstar Singapore. Which is for performing arts across age groups and across platforms.

So usually there is either for singers or for dancers, either for adults or for children, whereas we’ve created a platform which is across age groups and across platforms.

And, that is again performing arts, but in a different segment and category. And then we moved on to the theatre. And that was again different because we catered.

Yana Fry: Because you are very multifaceted, clearly, that’s why.

Shalima: Thank you for that. Again, there was either Hindi theatre or English theatre, only for adults, only for children.

So we created a platform which was for…Children. Age groups from 8 to 80. So we had Timeless Tales. I had it with another partner of mine and we did two successful seasons of that. People loved coming to watch the theatre with families.

Three generations coming to watch the theatre together. That again is a niche market that we created. And then COVID hit, right? And it’s not in my DNA to sit and do nothing.

So I became a film producer. And I started producing short films. I started writing those scripts at home. By God’s grace, I have a very talented family. I have two daughters who are singers, songwriters, and musicians.

My husband’s a fabulous singer, director, and songwriter. And this is his passion. So he has a corporate job, but we all got together and produced films at home. And then I started sending them out because I believe that through films you reach out to a much wider audience, right? So then there has to be a strong message in it for everyone.

So we tackled domestic violence and mental health awareness and I sent it out for film festivals and was very well received.

So as an artist and a producer, It’s a big pat on the back if you’re entering something new and it’s well received by people, right? So that again was a niche. So after producing some good 10-12 films Short films, and acting in other production houses as an actor.

I was like, dream big since we are called Dreamcatchers. And that’s when the biggest project of my life called Dominoes, which is a full-length feature film. It’s a two-hour long film and it had 90 plus people as a part of the team. One year of shoot process and editing and a lot of hard work, a lot of learning processes came about.

So we had Domino’s showcase to some 700 people at its opening night. And that was this year, early this year so that again, I don’t know any other producer here in Singapore who’s done a full-length feature film. I know of a lot of producers and production houses that have done, I’m talking of Indian origin now that have done short films, so to go out there and Dream big and make that happen.

It’s God’s grace and the support of a lot of talented people. So if I were to do it all on my own, it would be absolutely impossible. Another strength of mine I feel is getting people together.

A huge team came about and we put this product out for the whole of Singapore and soon enough for the whole world to see.

Yana Fry: I’m looking forward to it. I know again when we had our coffee, we talked about the movie and I told you I’m looking forward to seeing this. It’s also interesting stories of four women that intertwined with those strong, deep social messages. So I’m really excited.

Shalima: So the underlying theme is women’s empowerment. And it is a story of four women, as you correctly said. Each woman’s life has a domino effect on the other. And that’s how the name dominoes came about.

Yana Fry: And I love when you talk about women empowerment, this is like a topic of itself. And to me, you’re one of those women who walk the talk. So let’s talk about this a little bit. So when you look around, and you work with many women because many women come to your project? So what do you see? What kind of state of women are right now?

What is the state of women right now?

Shalima: So there’s a mixed bag, right? Some of them are achievers that I interact with. Some of them want to achieve a lot. Some of them are sceptical right now. They have ideas, they have dreams, and they’re waiting. And that’s the message I want to give out to women, that Each one of us is born with a purpose.

Each one of us eventually figures out that purpose in life, right? Go out there and make it happen. There is never going to be a time that is going to be perfect. There are never going to be enough funds for it. There are never going to be perfect circumstances for your dreams. So just launch and that’s what I did with Domino’s. I wasn’t waiting for the right funding, or the right actors, it just came about, once you start something, my husband often jokes about it, that you jump first and then build a parachute.

So by God’s grace, it works out, and I always feel that if you have your heart in the right place. Right people will associate with you. People will come from different angles to help you.

Sometimes women feel that, oh, we need to do it all ourselves. No, just go out and ask for help. You will be surprised at the number of people that are out there ready to help.

Yana Fry: What is the best way to ask for help? So how do you do that?

Shalima: The best way to do it is, you know, that even for my projects when I reach out to people or sponsors, You just go directly, don’t go in a roundabout fashion. I am doing this, this is something that I’m excited about, and this is in it for you, and this is what is in it for me. And once the cards are so clearly out on the table that this is how you are going to benefit, and this is how I’m going to benefit, and this is the size of the project, let’s make it big together. Absolute honesty, and transparency, are what I’ve always worked with.

Yana Fry: So what I noticed very often with women, so especially creative women in creative professions tend to be not very good when it comes to how do you actually make money with that. So when we tell women, go ahead, follow their dreams, quit the job they hate, and do something meaningful. My question is what about money?

Making money in the creative field

Shalima: That’s a very good question. So I have struggled with that too, being an entrepreneur for so long. In the initial years, it was just investment, nothing coming in.

So that’s another thing. Whatever idea you’re coming out with, be flexible with it. It is like water that flows in different directions, when put in a glass it takes that shape, and put in a river it flows like that.

So don’t be too married to the idea you start out with if it’s not making money. And the other thing I come back to is help. So if you’re very creative, but don’t have business skills like you were saying, then take help. Hire a team, or collaborate.

Get a partner who is in the business area. But having said that, partner with the right mindset of people. You have to be smart about who you partner with, and then if you’re creative and the other person gets in their marketing skills, fabulous!

Or it could be the other way around as well. You’re a people person, you’re very good at going and meeting, and I’ve seen a lot of women.

They have their strength in that. Then you partner with someone who is creative and has products or ideas or services to sell and partner and collaborate and make it a nice place to hang out together. And grow as well.

Yana Fry: I love how you said that your partner is the right person. I was just speaking recently to a friend and the topic was, so how do you motivate a team if it’s not motivated?

And then we were laughing and saying, hire people who are motivated, work with people who share your values, who are as driven as you are. Otherwise, if you constantly have to utilise your own energy to bring the project forward, it’s a burnout. It is very difficult.

Shalima: I say that because I’m reading a book by Shiv Khera and this is exactly the chapter I read last night.

So they’re these two friends and they were in the forces together at the same service time and paid everything. 30 years later they retire and one of them has gone and become CEO of a company and the other guy comes to him for a job. And then he’s sitting and he’s Oh my God.

So we started out at the same pay. We started out in the same forces. And 30 years later, you’re the CEO and I’m working for you. What’s different?

So he says, Oh, you remember 30 years ago, both of us had finished a late night shift and we walked back home two miles and when we reached I suddenly realised that we left the light and fan on back at the office.

And I said, let’s go switch that off. And you were like, ah, forget it. Who’s going to walk back two miles to switch off a fan to switch off a light. We are not even paying for it. The government is paying for it. I’m not going back. He said, I was the one who went back and switched off that light and fan.

So it’s a small example that shows that you have to have a very different mindset, a very different attitude, and work ethic. So when you see someone who has that kind of attitude, work ethic, mindset, that is someone you need in your team.

And, touch wood, I’ve been fortunate enough to get fabulous people in my team. Event after event. At the end of the day, it’s all your baby, right? You are responsible. But if you have a team that can manage, and, you can say, okay, I’ll leave this part to you, and that part to you, and be rest assured that it will be taken care of. That’s a fabulous place to be in, and I’ve been there many times.

Yana Fry: And I know that also from a leadership point of view, that’s a big question. How do you bring out the best in your people and how do you make sure that they go away an extra mile?

How can a leader bring out the best from people?

Shalima: Yana, I love the questions you’re asking. So I think my leadership style is different in the sense that it’s a bit of survival.

I have seen people who are leaders. Who then talks like bosses all the time, Do this for me. Do that for me. And look down on the people they’re working with. That’s not motivating for people you’re working with, right? So if you have the attitude that what can I do for you that will make this work easier for you or fun for you So for me always in all my projects, you’ll see there’ll be a lot of social media posts.

We’re making boomerangs. Doing slow mo’s. We’re making reels. So for me, it is a three legged stool. We have a three legged

Yana Fry: We do actually, yes. 

Shalima: So this means that you have been contributing. You have to have fun and you have to learn in the process. You know, for dominoes. Nobody came trained. We all learned at the job and it’s a full featured movie. Yes, it’s a full feature film and I was a producer, come actor, come taking care of other production aspects. So it was like different hats I was wearing, right? Learning is very important. And then, equally important is having fun.

Which we all did. so I would announce, pack up! And then nobody leaves and they’re all looking at me like, what?

Let’s make a deal before we go, So we would all dance and go out and all that. And then you look forward to coming for the shoot again that day.

If there’s tension, there’s someone acting very bossy, you don’t want to come back to work and that’s not the environment I personally like to work in. So it’s been a lot of fun working on every project with every team member that’s been a part.

Yana Fry: Little bit about your story. I know that you were born in India. Yes. Where exactly?

Shalima’s personal story

Shalima: So my dad is in the Indian Air Force. I was born in Jorhat, a place I’ve never visited again. I don’t know how it looks because I was just a year old when I moved out and so I’ve done 13 years of schooling in eight different schools

Yana Fry:. Oh my god! That’s quite why I guess you’re so good with different people. And so adaptable also,

Shalima: I think yes, when you don’t have a choice, in Friends, you’re posted here, you’re there for two years, and then you move out before you’re feeling settled. then you move out again in a year or three years. That adaptability comes. That becomes part and parcel of your personality.

Yana Fry: So what was the best memory when you were growing up and moving schools?

Shalima: So I was telling this to my daughter the other day. I said, the best part of moving from place to place was I could be a new me.

I could be the best version of myself and then better version and better each time I moved. Because, there are always things in people that we like and we admire and sometimes it becomes difficult to adapt it there and then. Because you feel like, oh, am I copying this person? But when you move to a new place, you can happily adapt to that. And inculcate all the good things you find in everyone.

So that’s been part of moving places. You get to be a new Shalima!

Yana Fry: What was the hardest part?

Shalima: Hardest part was again, adjusting, finding your feet in every school, every place you’re there, and not all camps had kids my age.

So those times were hard, and I especially felt that when I would visit my cousins. And they were born and brought up in one place. So they had a nice rocking circle of friends.

And they have been together from kindergarten to twelfth. And you don’t have that growing up because you’ve moved so often. These days you can still keep in touch. There’s WhatsApp, there’s FaceTime. That time there wasn’t.

If you’d a letter to a friend, it will reach you in three weeks. By that time, that news is stale, right?

Yana Fry: Yes exactly. And just listening to you, I’m realising over and over again, that just your very diverse upbringing and that you moved around so much created this personality when you can do many things pretty much at the same time. Not everyone can do that. Usually people who spend more time in one environment and grow up, they become more focused on one or two things maximum. And they go maybe deeper and longer, but that’s what it is. So it’s also an interesting skill when you can juggle.

So many, very deep creative projects, which is saying just a wonderful skill to have.

And so that brings us then, but we talk again about just women empowerment and leadership. Now that you’re in Singapore, you are now doing your business for 12, 13 years. What would you like to tell women? If there were a message.

Shalima: So the message would be self love. Which is so overrated these days, but also very misunderstood, I feel. So when we talk about self love, the first thing to note is, self love is not selfish. When you’re taking care of yourself mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, and you’re whole and complete in yourself, that’s when you can give back to society, your family, your work, which many women don’t give attention to.

You can’t pour from an empty cup. So once your cup is full and brimming, that’s when you give back to society, right? So that is very important.

Homemakers take themselves for granted. They come last, even as corporate professionals, women feel that guilt of not being able to spend enough with the family.

So they are also not taking care of their mental, physical, emotional, spiritual needs. That I feel as women, we need to prioritise and put on top.

Give yourself importance. Once you’re complete and full of yourself, it is so easy to then spread out your sunshine, your love, your creativity, whatever it is that you want to do.

Yana Fry: I love that. I feel like I want to ask a tricky question. you’re from India, so you’re born there, you grew up there. So my curiosity, is there something you think about Indian women, which is more like a cliché opinion, which is not true, actually. Like something that the world thinks, but in reality it is not there.

Shalima: There’s a myth that women are not that motivated or career oriented in India.

So that myth definitely I’d like to break. They are homemakers, fabulous because they want to be, not because they have to be. So there is a difference between wanting something and having to do it because there’s no choice. So when women are homemakers out of choice, phenomenal.

That’s the most difficult job to do, right? But if they want, they can work and be equally successful in any and every field they want to be in.

And that’s the myth that I want to break here, that Indian women are excited about being in the workforce and when they are in the workforce, they excel like no one’s business. So don’t think that Indian women are equal to homemakers and that they’re not passionate or interested in working outside of the house.

Yana Fry: That’s actually, very true. I have seen quite a few who are very successful and very motivated and you really don’t want to stand in their way. So yes, I, I second that, you know, bursting the myth. Maybe just a few final questions for our interview today. Singapore, like you spend so many years here. How do you feel living in Singapore?

Shalima: Oh, I absolutely love it.

Yana Fry: What do you love about it?

Shalima:  The security aspect, It’s corruption free, safety, bringing up my girls here. It was like a dream, right?

I’ve yet to see another country in the world that’s as safe, secure, corrupt, free, and like a melting pot, that it encourages diversity, which is phenomenal.

And as an entrepreneur also, when I launched 12 and a half years back, it was so welcoming of it.

Everyone, right from, say, a radio coverage to a media cup TV coverage to a press coverage. I got that time for my first event. Nobody knew Shalima Motyal, nobody knew Dreamcatchers, and yet the whole society came forward to help.

I did a sold out show. My first show was a sold out show. It was Love to Dance. It was, again, a platform for performing artists and dancers. And they were all women above the age of 30. For me, Singapore’s been such a big blessing. And that feeling growing up that I missed out on, being born and brought up in a place, I felt that in Singapore, because I’ve been here 20 and a half years now.

Yeah, that’s a long time.

Yana Fry: And if it would, if you would choose one thing that you feel Singapore can improve, what would that be?

Shalima: Nothing. Nothing. I love it the way it is. Yeah, absolutely. I’m a Singaporean. I’m a proud Singaporean.

Yana Fry: Yeah same here, right? High five to the Singaporeans!

And if there is maybe like a final message that you would like to share with us today, perhaps with the younger generation, if we are talking, maybe younger women who are just pursuing their careers would you say?

Shalima: So to them I would say that, maybe you’ve decided on some path and initially you were confident that this is what I want to do, but eventually if you feel, oh no, I’m not enjoying myself so much. Life is short. Leave, start something different.

You will be successful if passionate about it, and you want that change so bad, you will make the second option work. So don’t ever feel stuck in life. You gotta keep moving. End goal is happiness. Today if we eat, we do shopping, we go watch a film, the end goal is always happiness, right?

So for bigger things in life, also the end goal is happiness. So why be in a career, a job, a profession, being even an entrepreneur? If you start out with something and you’re not happy, change, change today. Don’t wait for anyone to come save you. You have to save and save yourself.

Yana Fry: Thank you so much for joining us here today. And it was Shalima Motial on YanaTV. And we have been talking about women empowerment and leadership and your life journey and lessons and messages for women, how you can catch your dreams. And do stay connected with us, share in the comments, what are your dreams?

Perhaps there is something we can help you to realise when we state it out loud into the universe, you never know who is going to support you. So I am looking forward to reading your comments with your dreams and seeing you next time with another guest.