Joyce Lovse, Aquinas alumna and owner of AngelCare Home Care, believes that the key to success is to discover what you love doing and pursue it, go after your dreams and eventually money will follow. She is able to give this advice based on her own experience.

Lovse graduated from Aquinas in 1994 with a Bachelor of Arts in communication. “I was an ‘older’ or non-traditional student,” said Lovse. “I commuted to campus and took both day and evening classes. The upper level communication classes and a stats class helped me to realize that I could do anything if I set my mind to it.”

From this philosophy that she learned at Aquinas, Lovse has built a successful business. Lovse worked in the private duty home care industry for a few years but decided that she wanted to be more personally involved in that line of work. “I was a family care giver for my mom and later my uncle and I always had a predilection for the elderly. So, the path to my career in home care just felt like a natural progression of my life experiences and circumstances,” said Lovse.

With her love for and dedication to helping the elderly, Lovse opened AngelCare Home Care in 2000. “Our mission is to provide affordable and reliable in-home care services, utilizing an individualized plan of care that contributes to the quality of life for our elders and home bound clients, while ensuring safety and providing peace of mind,” said Lovse.

Lovse is grateful for her experience at Aquinas and the motivation it gave her to become a successful businesswoman. She said that in some ways Aquinas gave her the opportunity to believe in herself.

This year, Lovse won a Grand Rapids Business Journal Top Women Owned Business Award. Lovse notes that this award was not simply an individual success for her but it was more a celebration of the whole AngelCare team. She gives all of the credit to her staff. Lovse said, “This award made me proud of my great employees and humbled to know that every AngelCare member helped to create this success.”

On top of being president and owner of AngelCare, Lovse believes in supporting fellow women. She has a passion for mentoring women and helping them become successful in their ventures. “I totally believe in empowering women in the workplace,” said Lovse. “In March of 2010, AngelCare Home Care received The Pillar Award from the Women’s Resource Center and their sponsor, Huntington Bank. We were honored for our Car Loan Repair Program and for our Mentoring Program. In many ways, this has been our most meaningful award because our programs truly have empowered women. Also, we proved that you don’t have to be a Fortune 500 company to be innovative and impactful.”

Being a successful businesswoman herself, Lovse has advice for women who would also like to follow their dreams and take the next steps in opening up their own business. “I have now run a successful company for 13 years, my advice for women who would like to open their own business is this. Do what you love and the money will follow. Do the right thing. Believe in yourself and network, network, network. Get a Mentor, be a Mentor.” That is certainly how Lovse has conducted her life, believing that anything is possible and doing things based on what she loves, not what will make the most money.

Lovse believes that the most important thing one can do is to take the time to help others. She said, “Looking back, I’d have to say that business challenges come and go but at the end of the day if you know you contributed to people, you made a difference in their lives, there is great satisfaction in that.”