There’s a Business in Everyone: StartUp Britain’s Enterprise Calendar sets the tone for 2012
Friday, January 27, 2012 at 12:10PM StartUp Britain have started the year as they mean to go on. On Thursday 16th of January StartUp Britain and their friends took over The Department of Business, Innovation and Skills to announce the arrival of the Enterprise Calendar.
The Enterprise Calendar wants to become the go-to online place for startups and entrepreneurs who want to learn, collaborate and connect. The calendar lists a huge amount of events from all over the country. These events, workshops and advice-nights are hosted by all sorts of organisations and groups. The calendar is currently listed as a top story on the Bis.Gov website.
Here at Club Workspace, we are delighted to be one of the first-ever listed hosts. The presence of both Business Books and Beers and Mike Buckworth’s Legal Workshop means that both Club venues - at Clerkenwell and Leathermarket - are featured on the calendar.
However, the Enterprise Calendar launch event was more than just the premiere of a fancy diary.
With the ‘#StartUp2012’ hashtag going viral on Twitter, and the ‘There’s a Business in Everyone’ campaign banner greeting the guests, Thursday’s event was pitched as a masterclass in entrepreneurship. It did not disappoint.
Opening the Event... The Right Honourable Mark Prisk MP
It must be said that Michael Hayman and Oli Barrett did a great job of MC-ing the entire event. The afternoon’s festivities lasted from 13:00-16:00, and the Michael and Oli dream-team were able and energetic hosts. The Bruce and Tess of the Startup Britain team, if you will.
It was Mark Prisk, the Minister for Business and Enterprise, who started the event in earnest. Mark commended the collected audience for ‘not only wanting to be part of the Entrepreneurship scene, but wanting to add it.’
Mr. Prisk discussed how he was impressed by those organisations who focus on youth enterprise. The Honourable Member believes that it is very important that ‘young people realise that they have a choice (after school), it’s not uni or nothing.’ A sentiment we echo at Workspace Group. Last summer out Inspiresme Week event gave young adults the chance to experience entrepreneurial life on the front-line.
The 60 Second Introduction
Next up for Mr. Prisk was the ‘60 Second Introduction’ session.
A selection of organisations were given the opportunity to introduce themselves to the minister in under a minute. As Nicholas Parsons wasn’t in the chair, they were allowed to hesitate, deviate and repeat.
VM Pioneers, Nokia’s Bridge Programme, the Gazelle Group, the White Horse Group, Scottish Enterprise, Gripple, the YES Network, Young Enterprise, My Kinda Crowd, Pants to Povery and the New Entrepreneurs Foundation all took the opportunity precis their goals and objectives to Mr. Prisk.
Mini Enterprise
One of the day’s quirkier sessions was the Mini competition. Audience members were encouraged to put their business cards into buckets. From these buckets two cards were drawn. These lucky entrepreneurs received a short mentoring session from either Doug Richard or Will King as they were driven around London together in this Mini, which is emblazoned with the StartUp Britain insignia. Small Car, Big City provided the rolling-stock.
Rachel Bridge also graced the stage. The Sunday Times’ Enterprise Editor spoke about her own startup: ‘Entrepreneur Things’. The business, which she referred to as her ‘case study’, is her ‘proof’ that you can start a business with zero capital.
Another three sessions gave some oxygen to Entrepreneurship Events that will take place in 2012.
Club Workspace and Workspace Group are very familiar with Global Entrepreneurship Week. The aforementioned ‘InspiresmeWeek project deliberately coincided with 2011’s GEW. Other events spoken about included Sheffield’s MADE Festival and Liverpool’s Global Entrepreneurship Congress. Brendan Moffett’s description of MADE is too good to leave out: ‘it’s the urban Glastonbury of business.’
Young Entrepreneurs and the Five Minute MBA
Another session allowed four proven young entrepreneurs to share their stories. Jasmine Eilfield, a current student at the Peter Jones Enterprise Academy, told of the hesitant nature of her school teachers and her hopes for the Teen Success Show. Chris Dodson spoke about Shell Livewire, Zoe Jackson shared her ‘#blondtrepreneur’ tales and Junior Ogunyemi plugged his new book, ‘How to be a Student Entrepreneur’.
The ‘Five Minute MBA’ followed soonafter. Entrepreneurs from the floor fired their problems at a panel of experts. This panel consisted of Doug Richards, Will King, Pernille Bruun-Jensen and Bob Forsyth.
Some of the advice that arose from this session was quite enlightening. Pernille reminded entrepreneurs of the importance of having a good team behind them. Richards commented that every company needs three people: someone to sell, someone to count and someone to deliver. Will King told startups to set themselves a goal. His was to get his product in Harrods, what’s yours?
Lord Young and An Olympic Gold Medalist
When Lord Young, the Prime Minister’s Advisor on Enterprise took to the stage he elevated the rhetoric to the rarified level of über-experienced charm.
Lord Young, who has a few ‘downturns’ under his belt, said that ‘it is infinitely easier to start a new business when the market is at the bottom.’ Lord Young also commented that the banks’ widespread reluctance to lend money has opened up innovate funding channels: The Lord was impressed with crowdfunding and business angels.
To round off the event, after the crowd had learnt about StartUp Local and Tech City’s interesting StartUp Games, a surprise guest was announced.
Duncan Goodhew, the winner of the gold medal for 100 metre breast stroke in 1980, leapt to the stage to give a speech that would bring the event to a close. Duncan’s eminence and grace in the water is indisputable and widely-known, however his prowess as a speaker was an absolute delight. Of course, nobody doubted that Duncan had a story to tell, but he shared his tales with an honesty and precision that had the audience enthralled. To put things in perspective, Duncan pulled his gold medal from his pocket. In this day of business, we all clapped eyes on something that money cannot buy.
Thank you to StartUp Britain for organising the event, and to the Department of Business Innovation and Skills for letting us in.
club workspace 
Reader Comments (3)
It was a great launch. Although the above reference to White Horse Group, should actually be White Horse Capital (www.whitehorsecapital.co.uk) and its training, mentoring and seed investment programme for early stage entrepreneurs, the Accelerator Academy (www.AcceleratorAcademy.com). Thanks!
Ooops, thanks for the link advice ^^ I hope everyone enjoys the read!
Ooops, thanks for the link advice ^^ I hope everyone enjoys the read!