The Larsen Group

Circles of Change:  Conversations with Dr. Zara Larsen

 on Change Leadership and Career Fulfillment

February 18, 2009

“Searching for Diamonds in the Rough:  New Directions through New Ideas”

Guest: Abbott Taylor

Anchoring Points:  

1. As an aspiring musician and university-trained in physics, philosophy and fine arts, my wife and I headed to California from the East Coast in a remodeled bread truck.  We landed instead in Tucson and I answered an ad for a goldsmith’s apprentice.

2. Abbott Taylor Jewelers is a custom design jewelry store, representing my 35 year focus of creating original pieces of art via experimentation with craftsmen techniques, designs inspired by diverse sources – music, poetry, dance, art, architecture and nature.

3. As an artist, I initially went kicking and screaming to avoid the role of computers, fearing my work would become mechanized and I would be put in a box that I couldn’t break out of.  I have found that my mind could design spectacular things that my fingers weren’t small enough to make, and the computer has allowed me an entirely new direction.  It has lit a new fire under me, taking me places I wouldn’t have known to or hope to get to.

4. With the help of my highly qualified and experienced staff, several of whom have been with me from 8 to 20 years, I am all about growing and changing the business right now – new approaches to take the place of what was walking in the door before – eCommerce market extension, rings for the Tucson Police Department, and “Gem Tasting Parties” where a small group meets with an internationally known gem cutter, Roger Dery, to hold 150 stones from every color of the rainbow.

5. Every customer interaction is a new experience, with new ideas and surprises with each outcome.  I love to hold the box open for the first time and it’s electric for them to experience 2D to 3D –more than they expected.

6. We manufacture all of our jewelry with “green, recycled gold,” not harming the environment via toxins used to amalgamate new gold from the dirt taken from mines.  We are equally discreet in purchasing all diamonds from conflict-free countries certified by the US Government’s Kimberly Process.

7. My song writing and circle of music friends have always been a big part of my life.  Every Monday for seven years I have been playing with a lifelong friend, resulting in a new CD, my therapy – “A Year of Mondays”.  I do not have do it to make a living, I do it because I HAVE to do it and I love it – and look forward to where it’s taking me now. It’s part of the beginning of a new and even better stage of my life.