Positive attitude helps prize winner seize opportunities

For Eva Ip, the best part about winning the Women of Influence 2009 Young Achiever of the Year award was that learning about it coincided with her son's first birthday.

'I'm honoured,' she said. 'And it made for a very special week, but it's for doing a job that I love and am passionate about, so it's very humbling, too.

'As women, we need to balance so many things: family, career, education and community issues, and a lot of talented women sacrifice career for family, or vice versa. It's very good that there is an award that recognises women in leadership. It shows people that women can succeed in combining and balancing the various sides of their lives.'

Eva is a highly regarded specialist professional with Ernst & Young in the field of transaction advice, performing financial assessments of mainland businesses for would-be purchasers and advising them on the value of their potential acquisitions.

Yet, when asked what it is about the job that inspires that passion in her, money isn't even mentioned. Her job requires her to travel to any part of the mainland or Taiwan, looking into any industry depending on what the client is interested in.

'The most interesting part is really to talk to the people and understand what drives them, and particularly from the entrepreneurial perspective to gain an insight into the passions that have motivated them to develop their businesses.'