Diane Sears offers her clients more than 20 years of experience in writing, editing, marketing and career development. She is the author of Tapping Your Inner Entrepreneur: Making the Move from Employee to Business Owner, a book published in 2005 by the National Association of Women Business Owners and called “the business owner’s career bible” by Essence magazine in June 2006. She is also founder and publisher of What If: Dream, Dare, Do, an online magazine launching in 2009.

As an editor and consultant, she has worked with clients all over North America and Europe to help them become authors of nonfiction books about topics including business, entrepreneurship, human resources, self-improvement, history, science, memoirs and health. She has been quoted in published materials including the book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Publishing Magazines and regularly appears as a panelist, speaker or trainer at business events.

As a writer, she has interviewed and profiled experts in workplace and work/life arenas including human resources, professional coaching, outplacement, leadership, entrepreneurship, profitability, diversity and sustainability. This exposure has given her rare insight into the minds of today’s business leaders.

A career journalist, Diane has written monthly columns and articles since 2003 for business magazine Florida Trend and its sister publications Florida Small Business and Business Florida. She is an occasional contributor to other publications, including UF Today, an alumni magazine of her alma mater, the University of Florida; AP Matters, published by International Accounts Payable Professionals; Internal Auditor, published by The Institute of Internal Auditors; and First Monday, published by the Orlando Regional Chamber of Commerce and the Central Florida Partnership.

Before becoming an entrepreneur, she worked as founding editor-in-chief of Venture Woman, a national magazine dedicated to women business owners, and as marketing director for DigitalOwl, a company that developed copyright-protection software for the publishing industry. She previously served as an editor and the Workplace reporter at The Orlando Sentinel newspaper and as assistant metro editor at Florida Today newspaper in Melbourne, Florida.

Diane was 2007-08 Economic Development Forum Chair for the National Association of Women Business Owners and was a co-founder and co-chair of Go for the Greens 2008, an economic development conference for women entrepreneurs. In 2004-05, she was president of the NAWBO Orlando Chapter, which she currently serves as 2007-09 chair of The Beacon Awards: Celebrating Diversity in Greater Orlando’s Workforce, an event she co-founded. She was named National Member of the Year by NAWBO in 2006 for her work in mentoring women and building community relationships.
 
Diane serves on advisory boards for the Athena PowerLink program, the Disney Entrepreneur Center, and the annual Women’s History Month event for the Orange County Regional History Center. She is a past advisory board member of the Mayor Richard T. Crotty Women’s Leadership Summit, the Minority/Women’s Business Enterprise Alliance (The Alliance), Leadership Orlando and the YaYa Network, all in Orlando. She is a graduate of Leadership Orlando Class 70 and a member of The Cheese Club of Grater Orlando.

Diane considers herself fortunate for having had a career goal early in life. She’s known for encouraging people to follow their own career dreams and pursue what they enjoy. “My personal goal is to help people find and fulfill their calling in life,” Diane says. “When you’re doing what you love, it doesn’t feel like work.”