Prominent Jamaican Landmark Forum graduate Donna Duncan-Scott, who is the an executive and former CEO of Jamaica Money Market Brokers Ltd. (JMMB), the largest investment house in Jamaica, has been honored by the First Global Bank(one of six commercial banks operating in Jamaica) and Flair Magazine with their Woman of Vision Award. In an interview with the Jamaican Daily Gleaner newspaper, of which Flair Magazine is a part of, Duncan-Scott talks about the difference the Landmark Forum made in her life.

Here are excerpts from the story in the Daily Gleaner:

Donna’s Dream

By Nashauna Drummond, Lifestyle Coordinator

April 7, 2008 

Donna Duncan-Scott is one of five Jamaican women who will be receiving the First Global Bank/Flair Woman of Vision Award. Over the next few weeks Flair will highlight the Jamaican women who have made tremendous contributions to our country.

Her laughter frequently pierces the atmosphere as she rocks in her chair with vigorous head movements. She has a vibrant personality and we notice that the pattern on her skirt is in harmony with the accent wall in her office. Donna Duncan-Scott is relaxed, comfortable, and happy.

In her new role as executive director of culture and leadership development at Jamaica Money Market Brokers (JMBB), she passed of the reins of the company to her twin brother, Keith Duncan. This freed her up to spend the formative years of developemnt with her daughters, five and three years old. “I now only come in to JMMB three days week; I am more present with them.”

“At the CEO level, you are always thinking about the company. Now I don’t have to have the whole company on my head.”

It wasn’t a difficult decision to make, but adjusting was. “To see the company discussing something and making decisions without telling me was very hard and then I had to shape a new role.” She is now focused on sustaining a culture so that people are happy and clients get the best services.

A career in the financial world wasn’t always what Duncan-Scott had in mind. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, in Trinidad. “I went on a government scholarship as my parents couldn’t afford tuition on their own as it was five of us. Engineering attracted me because I could get a scholarship and I didn’t want to do medicine or teach.”

It was while at the university that she began the healing process after being sexually abused as a child. “I love telling people about it to let them know they can get over it. I was very, very reserved with very low self esteem I wasn’t happy.”

“It was then I began coming out of my shell; it was a very important experience. I began talking about what happened and to explore that part of me.”

At a Landmark Forum in 2001, Duncan-Scott completed the healing process. The Landmark Forum is an intense personal transformation seminar, during which participants are provided with the tools to live in a new vision for their lives. “A lightbulb went off and I saw that I was living in the belief that I was unworthy of having a healthy relationship,” she explained.

After the seminar, she broke away for the third time from a very unhealthy relationship she had been involved in for five years.

“I met my husband through friends who were trying to set us up but I kept telling them I was in a relationship and they kept saying ‘Yeah, one that isn’t good for you’. So ater the third breakup, I called him (Alwyn) up and said, ‘Let’s go have a drink”, and it was great. And then he tells me he had started dating someone three weeks agao. I said, ‘when you are ready, give me a call; this thing has potential.’ A few weeks later, he called and said, ‘I’m ready to face life.’ I didn’t know what that meant but I was ready too. We had common values and everything.”

With a very successful organization that now has associated companies in Trinidad and Tobago, St. Lucia, Barbados and The Dominican Republic, Duncan-Scott can now spread her wings.

“I would like to set up an organization focusing on helping Jamaica to let go of the limiting beliefs that we have.