Spring to Action Ltd

The Absent Talent

Business advisors are soon going to be an endangered species.  Currently, Business Link is the major employer, but with many an enterprise agency, social enterprise development company, quango and local government officer employed to support businesses there are a range of business advisors out there.

But from November or even earlier, many advisors will have lost their funding or been made redundant. Many will have to re-train or enter the private sector perhaps in a related but different career.

What worries me the most however, is where is the next generation of advisors coming from? The current entry routes vary, but commonly people enter the sector through becoming project officers, administrator, information and guidance staff or similar occupations.  As the coalition governments spending cuts hit these entry routes will drastically decline.  Who else would enter the fray?

My own view is that at some point government will realise (perhaps through a bump on the head or worse, a complete drop in entrepreneurial activity) that they need funded business support, in some cases.  My argument of course assumes this, it assumes that we need business advisors, coaches, mentors and the plethora of business support that’s out there. But I would say that wouldn’t I?  That argument is for another day.

Any thoughts?

Cameron's StartUp Britain: A Help or Hindrance?

David Cameron has announced the launch of StartUp Britain, a package of measures to encourage people in Britain to start up businesses.

The main focus of this package is support from 60 leading brands offering a range of freebies - from free access to hotdesking to 1 months free broadband. The sort of stuff you'd expect from major brands wanting to promote their products to small businesses. 

This will "drive growth by accelerating, inspiring and celebrating Britain's startup talent".

This strikes the chord of a government wanting to avoid spending money wherever possible.  The simple reality is that for startup businesses this will do very little.  Startup costs can be prohibitive, so I guess every little helps, but this really is a very little.

Research shows us that startups, especially those from regenerating communities, need face to face advice from people they can trust and who will challenge them to market research and test their idea.  I worry that we are setting up yet another generation of entrepreneurs to fail. 

Not only will this cost us all in the long run (think of all those suppliers who'll never get paid, all those people declared bankrupt, and the ever-increasing benefits queue) but we will damage individuals confidence which is easy to damage, hard to repair.  

This is short-term thinking, which will do little to impact the Growth agenda Cameron espouses.  Businesses need real people, with real skills and a real passion to help them.

Worrying.

Budget for Growth?

Yesterday George Osbourne and Co announced the budget for 2011.  There was a focus on talking up 'Made in Britain' and 'Manufatured in Britain' goods and services, which seems to follow a key trend already alive and well in some the major brands.

Business support was sadly but glaringly missing. For those of us working in business support and economic regeneration, its difficult to see how UK growth can improve when nationwide free (to the end user) business support is being removed from November 2011, and the majority of businesses will be reliant on a website for information and advice.  As fantastic as the Business Link website is, most businesses want face-to-face support where they can seek answers to their specific problem in their sector.  Will businesses start to pay for this support?

There were announcements of cuts in coroporation tax, business rate relief holiday for small businesses, £100million of funding for Science Parks and Apprenticeships.  This sounds like the return of the Future Jobs Fund by any other name, but surely welcome given the high rate of young people out of work.

A good start but for me, a case of must do better!

UK Unemployment Rises (Again)

So it's official, the Office of National Statistics tells us that UK employment has risen to 2.5 million, at the end of December 2010.  This equates to 7.9% unemployment.

As we all suspected, youth employment has been hit hardest and now one in five 16-25 year olds is out of work (20.5%).

Long term unemployment is also at a high, with 833,000 people now out of work for more than a year.

Families and individuals are facing a tough year, alongside public sector workers who may well be joining them in the queue.  Those with lower skills levels will find it hardest to get work, which leaves Leicester in a vulnerable position.  Not only does Leicester have a high number of public sector workers but we also suffer from a lack of skill levels, with many people travelling from the County in to the City to work adding to the difficulties of local people finding local work.

Focus for the new Local Enterprise Partnership is likely to focus on jobs, skills and enterprise to get more people working and earning, but the situation remains complex. Until we get more firms with higher growth prospects, employing more people, we're unlikely to encourage people to improve their skills to get those jobs. But until we have higher skills levels its unlikely people will start businesses in high growth sectors. 

Perhaps this is a great opportunity to create a complex, multi-faceted strategy to address this, with delivery bodies working on a larger project to address issues across the board? For too long we've all worked in silos, with the effects remaining minimal. We need a step change in the way Leicester views itself, it's skills, it's business. Short -term, small projects have short term, smaller impacts.  They are often cut short when just beginning to make in-roads.

What would you like to see happen to make real change in our business communities?

 

Vince Cable has just announced a network of 40,000 business mentors who will help businesses to start up and thrive.

Business and Enterprise Minister Mark Prisk said:

“In the current economic climate, it has never been more important to promote an enterprise culture in the UK, and mentors play a crucial role in advising, supporting and encouraging entrepreneurs and small businesses. This new mentoring network will be invaluable for businesses all over the country.”

Mentors can offer guidance, support and most of all the reasurrance of someone who has been in business before.  You can usually ask for someone who's run a similar business to yours before, someone who has expertise in an area of the business you're concerned about (e.g. marketing) or someone from a completely different sector.  Mentoring relationships can be short or longer term, depending on your needs.

You can also find your own mentor - perhaps someone who's inspired you and you look up to. It can be an informal mentoring relationship, perhaps where you share a cuppa once a while and use them an unofficial sounding board. Often people have lots of these relationships, but perhaps don't label it as mentoring. It's just a valid, either way. 

I know we at Spring are lucky enough to have lots of colleagues, partners and contacts who are kind enough to act as unoffical relationships and we try to learn as much as can from everyone we meet.

Who are your mentors and how do they help you?

One Size Fits All?

Wouldn't it be fantastic if every business just had a one stop shop for all their business needs? Everybody would have a clear point of contact and would know where to go for information.  What's more, it would be pretty straightforward for those organisations tasked with monitoring business support, because there would just be one contract to monitor.

Ah, but wait! We have Business Link. The brand tasked with supporting all businesses to grow / develop.  I say brand, because for those of you blissfully unaware of the intricacies of public policy, Business Link is  several organisations working under one banner.

My problem isn't that the brand, one with differing reputations in different areas of the country.  I'm more concerned with the customer/s.  Because every business has different needs, approaches and skills.  I'm concerned that this current government will be looking to cut business support further, reducing the number and size of organisations delivering support to just a small few.

I think this doesn't make sense.  Currently in Leicester alone there are at least five organisations offering contracted business support.  They all support slightly different segments of the market and it works pretty well.  Ok so it's a bit confusing.  And yes quality is an issue.  But believe me, the customer is confused by Business Link and quality can be an issue there too (ofcourse, not in Leicester).  Let's continue to make savings where we can, but keep the range of breadth of organisations who deliver quality support that businesses want, where they want it.

How would you propose that business support is delivered? What changes would you make to ensure you get the support you need, when and how you need it?  Or should we just chuck it all away and save the pennies & pounds for the NHS, education or frontline services?

How to increase profitablity by 20%

Did you know:

• For an average business disabled customers make up to 20% of the customer base and are worth up to £80bn per year
• There are 10.6 million disabled people in the UK, and this figure is set to grow with an ageing UK population
• Businesses who have focused on this customer base have experienced an expanding customer base, increase in sales / profitablity, and a competitive advantage

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills has just released it's report into inclusive and accessible business.

Every business is different, so the adaptations or changes each can make will vary but this report gives clear areas for improvement and short case studies from small businesses where a focus on the needs of disabled people has improved their business.

For some tips and advice download the DWP's better business checklist and see what changes your business can make to capture a possible extra 20% income - it could just be the difference between your business being profitable or not.

 

Regen Roundup

The Coalition government seem to be releasing news at a rate of knots we haven't seen for years.  To help you keep up, we've compiled a quick list of some of the most important items:

• The government has announced it's intention to start a Regional Growth Fund and seeks your views
• How would you like to see Skills policy in the future? BIS starts a consultation
• Local Enterprise Partnerships are moving forward - Mark Prisk met local government representatives and business leaders to hear their views
• Meanwhile, David Cameron begins to set out his vision for the Big Society, launching it in Liverpool

What do you think the Coalition government should so about it's growth fund, how should it focus limited resources yet improve skills for all and what do you think about the Big Society? Let us know.

How Do we Support High Growth Businesses?

Much has been made of late about where business support is heading, that is, should the government pay for it? The focus appears to be heading toward high growth businesses who apparently will be employing the masses of ex public sector workers who are likely to be laid off as a result of the cuts.

Sounds fair, doesn't it? Let's incentivise high growth businesses to employ lots of new staff, cutting the welfare budget and the public sector wage bill.  Win win, eh?

Little discussion or focus appears to have been made around how these high growth businesses will be found. How do we decide which businesses have the potential for high growth, and indeed which don't? What has worked either at home or abroad to 'make' these businesses dramatically improve their profits and employ more people (are the two always linked?).

There is another important question for me.  When we've helped these high growth businesses grow, and they are ticking along nicely, how do we assist the next generation of high growths? 

This is a discussion which will probably roll on, but it's important we start the debate anyway. And then let's continue the debate about how we should support all people, regardless of background, to start new businesses because that's a very important point. Something we at Spring are very concerned about.

Tomorrow is D Day for the Budget

Finally the day arrives when we all get to hear about where the budget cuts are falling and just how fast.  Is anyone else feeling a little nervous?

Already we've heard snippets of news, that Business Link's regional offices will be shut, that public sector pay and pensions will be frozen, that startup support will drastically change, and that local workspace capital developments have been stopped.

Indeed, when I wrote about this a few months ago, I asked what would you cut?

The question is developing as the days go past...now I would ask what would you cut and WHY? Let's face it, we can go ahead and cut everything that costs a significant amount of money, but we really need to ask ourselves what projects does this country need to prosper?

Which projects or developments will help us create jobs, build more prosperous communities and businesses, make the UK a better place to live and work in these tough economic times?

I just hope these aspects are being considered alongside the monetary aspects. Otherwise it really will be a return to the 80's of boom and bust.