Some of the UKs leading business leaders and opinion formers share their insight and ideas for growth
The highly-successful car scrappage scheme has now ended, prompting businesses around the UK to consider how they could implement a similar scheme to drive sales.
Marks & Spencer was the first company to jump on the scrappage scheme bandwagon and through a link-up with Oxfam manages to do its bit for charity at the same time.
The other day I saw some comments made by businesswoman and West Ham Vice-Chairman, Karren Brady, which could’ve come from my own mouth.
Have you ever had one of those tumbleweed moments in a presentation you’ve given when you’ve told a joke, and nobody laughed? Or have you been in the audience and shuffled uncomfortably, acutely embarrassed for the presenter who is desperately trying to recover the situation? In this article we take a look at how to avoid those situations.
l am going to discuss a topic that owners of rural businesses up and down the country will be familiar with. Wind turbines. – If you don’t live or work near a wind farm, you probably haven’t considered their impact beyond the benefit in terms of wind power being a renewable energy source!
So how much money has been invested within the television programme Dragons’ Den? Who has invested and which Dragon has been willing to take the biggest risks. The new infographic below answers all of these questions in a graphical easy-to-see way.
An interesting story has been published on the negotiations between one of the most successful candidates for investment to appear on Dragon’s Den and two of the Dragons, James Caan and Duncan Ballantyne, who together agreed to invest £80,000 in Sharon Wright’s business, Talpa Products. And she had only asked for £50,000!
When, some time after her session in the den, Sharon signed up to a contract with very onerous terms without reading the contract she had been given.
It struck me recently that some of the most watched TV programmes at the moment all have something in common.
I am thinking of shows like The Apprentice, The X Factor, Dragons’ Den, Gordon Ramsay’s Hell’s Kitchen, Mary Queen of Shops and The Hotel Inspector to name but a few.
They tell people the truth as they see it.
July marked 75 years since Penguin books began publishing stories. They became renowned for their originality and innovation, which got this Book Midwife thinking back to when she found out that certain publishers out there still think that some books don’t deserve to be written. But it just goes to show that every book deserves to be written and every book deserves to be read!
As the business world becomes increasingly fast paced, unrelenting and unforgiving, the solution to the myriad of problems that organisations face appears to become ever more complex.
There you go, what great news for a Friday morning! The people’s bank, RBS, the one which is 84% publicly owned, has just posted a half year profit of £1.1billion – that’s almost a billion quid we can cut off the deficit!
We all know the importance of having a strong brand in business, but, in this age of social media, where we expect personal interaction rather than corporate spiel, and especially for start-ups and SMEs, where there may only be a small number of people involved, the idea of a personal brand is becoming more and more important.
Hilary Briggs, London Chairman of the Academy of Chief Executives, talks about how in tough economic times lower sales trigger the need for cost reductions and why with a slimmed down workforce you can’t build your team the normal way.
Let me explain why cold calling is such a big issue for many…..and why vital first stages should be completed before a cold call is made….
In the Den, and broadcast last week, The Dragons were asked to invest in a product called Shopbox, which is a secure, temperature-controlled container for groceries that are ordered online, which then became the subject of a heated discussion on the subject of patents – and a very important lesson for anybody with an invention.
“Where exactly is the ‘middle of nowhere’ please?”
With the latest figures on graduate recruitment showing that vacancies have dropped by nearly 7% in the year up to June 2010 following a fall of 8.9% in 2009, businesses might be forgiven for thinking that the lucky few to succeed in gaining employment would turn up on the first day with a strong work ethic.
