YI GUO, CEO of Hinsdale-based Petal Station (formerly Bouq Box), was born and raised in Tianjin, China before life took her across the globe. She has travelled and lived across many countries including the United Kingdom, Azerbaijan, Australia, and to now the United States. Before starting her floral business, she worked at various energy companies, focusing on merger and acquisitions, helping her gain leadership skill that translate to work today. When she’s not honing her creative talents at Petal Station, she spends time with her two wonderful girls and new puppy, QQ.

What are the hardest lessons you have learned as an entrepreneur?

Learning to adapt and being able to make hundreds (if not thousands) of decisions is the hardest lesson I’ve learned as an entrepreneur.

What are your greatest wins?

My best win is obviously my two wonderful girls. No matter how exhausted I am after a whole day of work, my energy immediately comes back seeing my girls greeting me and hugging me. My second-best win is probably when I cold called the CEO at my first company around 10 years ago. That cold call resulted in me moving to the United States and building my career.

What is your best networking advice?

Be persistent and disciplined. Learn to make it a habitual process to reach out to people on a daily basis. Also, be authentic and be playing forward.

What advice would you give to future Power Women?

Success is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perseverance. I genuinely believe that you should do what you love because success requires hard work, so you might as well spend the hard work doing something you wholeheartedly enjoy.

For more information, visit petalstation.com.