Enterprise UK Blog

Yesterday, I wrote a blog. The mother of all blogs. Internet connection went down, and the blog was left a note floating in cyber-space. So now I post my much anticipated (!) blog:

Well, i’m sitting here next to a very inspirational women. Sarah, the founder of Pai Skincare. She’s been running her organic skincare company for two years – and having used her fabulous lipbalm for a while now, I can honestly say they’re great products! – and is here today to hear from some great speakers debate the questions on all our lips…

In today’s economic climate, can entrepreneurs change the world?

It’s a rather apt question, seeing as though this is the week that over 75 countries try their darnedest to unleash people’s ideas for social and environmental change. I’ve been listening to some rather interesting comments from Peter Jones, Lord Mandelson, Richard Lambert, James Kaan and Jane Townsend amongst others. Oh yes, it was a true montage of the most successful business people from across the UK, and we even had a video message from THE entrepreneur himself Mr Branson.

Yet it was definitely the messages from entrepreneurs in India and Ghana that truly resonated with the audience. That’s what we want to see in Global Entrepreneurship Week… entrepreneurs from across the sea! We can learn so much from seeing and hearing how entrepreneurs in other countries operate, with a lot less than us! Sometimes us Brits can become complacent and lazy – not all of us granted – but people in India, Africa, China… work so hard! Hmmm, maybe it should be compulsory for schools, colleges, unis and workplaces to watch a video from a different entrepreneur each week. And I bet we’d never run out of entrepreneurs!

Best quote of the day hands down from Richard Lambert: “Entrepreneurs are by nature a little crazy…they’re eternal optimists and will get on with it one way or another.” And I know we can definitely learn a hell of a lot from all of them.

Other best quote of the day from Tim Schmidt: “We need to look at how communities can work together rather than just looking at growth.” Good point to make seeing as though all the previous speakers had just been rattling on about growth.

Oh yeh, and the Prime Minister had some interesting things to say too. But you can check that out at: www.enterpriseweek.org.uk/debate.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 18th, 2008 at 6:11 pm and is filed under Entrepreneurship, Global Entrepreneurship Week, Social enterprise, The Debate. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.