Enterprise UK Blog

‘IF WE CAN, YOU CAN’ Challenge launches for 2010

Today marks the launch of the third ‘If we can, you can’ Challenge, a region-wide competition set to re-ignite and celebrate North East England’s entrepreneurial spirit.

The  Challenge calls upon any individual who is thinking of starting a business, running their own business or looking to grow their existing enterprise to enter the Challenge and log on to tell their story – adding to a growing online community of entrepreneurs, each at different stages of their journey. The campaign is built on the Entrepreneurs’ Forum’s well established principles of peer-to-peer support, where personal stories and guidance from experienced current business owners help nurture budding and existing entrepreneurs.

The lovely folks at Adnams Brewery have come on board to help potential entrepreneurs spark their ideas!

As part of a series of free events run by Enterprise UK, The King’s Head in Woodbridge and The Butt and Oyster at Pin Mill are both hosting events, aimed at people who want to start their own business and turning their dreams into a reality.

Speaking at the events will be local business duo Paddy Bishopp and Scott Russell (of Paddy and Scotts coffee).

Those attending the events will also:

• hear how entrepreneurs from Suffolk started their own business.

Over 500 delegates attended 2 events being run simultaneously in York yesterday aimed at inspiring exisiting and budding entrepreneurs in the creative and cutlrual sector. York St John University triumphed with key note speaker Wayne Hemingway who recounted his enterprise journey from market stall to B&Q’s best selling shed via the fashion label Red or Dead. He urged delegates to leave the world a better place than they found it and suggested that the role of the creative mind is to make lives better. Creative entrepreneurs shared their knowledge of a wide range of topics including intellectual property and networking. Meanwhile at The Hospitium students were accessing support from EUK, Business Link and others and being learning about creative businesses ranging from magic to graphic design. I was privileged to be asked to round the day off by congratulating all the organisers and partcipants and suggesting that York should be an entrant to the Enterprising Britain competition this year.

If you had the backing of a leading enterprise charity, four major business organisations and a highly successful entrepreneur, what ideas would you put forward to make the UK a world leader in enterprise?

Enterprise UK, its Chair Peter Jones, the Institute of Directors, the British Chambers of Commerce, the Confederation of British Industry, and the Federation of Small Businesses are launching a collaborative manifesto for entrepreneurship. It is an online space where entrepreneurs from any industry sector, geographical region or stage of business development can submit and rate innovative and practical enterprise policy ideas.

This afternoon Enterprise UK Yorkshire & Humber held an Enterprising Places Network Event as part of the North Yorkshire Enterprise Cafe organised by NYBEP. Hosted in the rural setting of Sandburn Hall in Flaxton on the outskirts of York.

With threats of snow and bad weather conditions we were very impressed with such a great turn out of attendees. In the grand but foggy surroundings, we were seated on round tables and treated to a delicious warm buffet lunch.

The event brought together a wide range of enterprising case studies with an educational theme hearing from…

Enterprise with a social conscience was the focus of this event, with key speakers addressing both the purpose and benefits of setting up a social enterprise and instilling a social conscience in big organisations.

The two key speakers addressed different aspects of social enterprise. Robert Ashton, entrepreneur, business author and social activist, presented a motivating speech highlighting the shortcoming’s of today’s ‘for profit’ business models create real, immediate opportunities for social enterprise. His speech including ten top tips for setting up a social enterprise, with amusing and inspirations anecdotes about the many people Robert has worked with over the years.

Three of our Enterprise UK Ambassadors have had their entrepreneurial talent recognised and rewarded at the third annual Northwest Women in Business Awards.

Best Young Entrepreneur WINNER – Anna Heyes

Best Young Entrepreneur RUNNER UP – Lucy Byrne

Best Start Up Business RUNNER UP – Vicky Corcoran

Congratulations to all of you!

For more details about this years awards go to www.nwda.co.uk/news–events/press-releases/201001/women-in-business-awards.aspx

A new batch of statistics were released by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor last week that together gave a fairly comprehensive view of the current state of global enterprise.

The headline figure - showing that fewer people in the UK had expressed an interest in starting and investing in a new business in the past year - was ostensibly discouraging. 

A closer look, however, revealed that Britain’s commitment to entrepreneurialism withstood the challenges of the recession as well as, if not better, than many of her competitors. For example, although Britain saw a six per cent decline in new start ups in 2009, this compared favourably with a decline in Germany of nine per cent, and a decline in the United States of 24 per cent.

It was great to see so many representatives from across Yorkshire and Humber at the launch of our region’s Enterprising Places Network (EPN).

Scarborough, home of the 2009 Enterprising Europe competition, played host to the proceedings which took place at the inaugural Woodend Creative Workspace.

Partners certainly welcomed details of Scarborough’s own enterprise journey, which was shared by speakers Andrew Clay, Director of Woodend Creative Workspace; Adrian Riley from Electric Angel and Nick Taylor, Urban Renaissance Manager.

Exposure is good. Not the sort that gets you arrested, but the sort that encourages others to take their dreams and turn them into a labour of love: something sustainable and enriching. In other words, to be enterprising.

Our latte-sipping, long-word using, thinking-cap wearing policy boffins have established that exposure to entrepreneurial behaviour is strongly related to an individual’s desire to start a business. Any initiative that can spark enterprise in others is, to use the contemporary parlance, totally awesome.

Last night I spoke to one of my friends, a recent graduate, who has been unemployed for a number of months – a situation I remember well after leaving University, unlike my contemporaries, without a job in the city lined up. We chatted about the sense of worthlessness, the fear and panic that at not having money coming in, and the difficulty in knowing who to turn to. Whatever the latest stats on youth unemployment (out next month) are – they won’t show the real effect that this these problems are having.

Last Thursday saw the launch event of the South West Enterprising Places Network (EPN) in Plymouth. The event was hosted by our partner organisation Enterprise Plymouth and took place in the finery of the University of Plymouth’s Rolle Building, part of its brand new, space age campus. Our thanks to them for giving us and our delegates such as a warm and enthusiastic reception.

Nominations for the Queen’s Award for Enterprise Promotion 2010 have now opened.  Lord Mandelson suggests that ‘recipients of The Queen’s Award for Enterprise Promotion (QAEP) are outstanding individuals who are inspiring tomorrow’s entrepreneurs and giving them the skills and attitudes they need to succeed’ and that ‘they hold the key to unlocking Britain’s entrepreneurial talents and they deserve all the praise and thanks we can give them.’

Last year’s winners of the Award included Make Your Mark Ambassador Jamie Murray-Wells and longstanding MYM friend Charles Cracknell, as well as others including lecturers, teachers and practitioners. If you feel that someone deserves recognition for their role in promoting enterprising skills and attitudes then nominate them now!