Enterprise UK Blog

Does the Enterprise Village have a fertile garden?

1. Escape to the Garden of England

Having pulled myself from my desk, various meeting rooms and the ever present threat of a fatal email avalanche I made time to visit an Enterprise Learning Partnership (ELP) meeting at Fulston Manor School in Sittingbourne; hosted by the impressive Karen Fingland and Rebecca Dighton

No more ivory-tower pondering, time to see how teachers in Kent are nurturing budding entrepreneurs of the future. Is the enterprise spirit blossoming in the Garden of England?

2. A cry for ‘ELP

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

The newly formed Young Chamber of Barnsley College met with members of the Junior Chamber to develop their creative skills to come up with new ideas with the help of creative oates

JCI Barnsley and Barnsley College Young Chamber GEW meet-up

. The outcomes helped with business formation, business growth and how to write an essay on managing HR!

Anne Selwyn (Business Link) and Pat Carr (360 Degree People)

It was a great opportunity to hear from a range of inspirational women who shared their enterprise journey including the high’s and lows; a key theme was overcoming barriers to achieve success. I was particularly inspired after speaking to Sarah Wells of Elizabeth Wells Lingerie (soon to be a EUK Ambassador). Sarah was involved in an accident and suffered a severe injury to her back; gaining a full recovery she has the determination to overcome anything to achieve her goals. After starting her business less than two years ago Sarah is based on the most famous streets in Yorkshire – The Shambles in York.
We took part in a structured networking session where the room was buzzing with women providing advice, tips, new working relationships and business to business.

Toasting the launch of Global Entrepreneurship Week in Yorkshire and Humber

GEW was officially launched yesterday in Harrogate by the chair of Yorkshire Forward Terry Hodgkinson. Invited guests included representatives from key partners including Yorkshire Forward, UKTI, HMRC and EEY, overseas guests from Israel and Poland. Guests were inspired by Terry’s speech which provided an overiew of enterprise in the region and a forecast of the year to come and Jane Walton invited them to enjoy GEW events across the region as well as the Yorkshire Tapas being served.

The dark and blustery November weather could not dampen the spirits of 200 enthusiastic pupils at Malet Lambert School in Hull this morning. This was no usual morning as the Make Your Mark Challenge 2009 was launched and the secret brief was unveiled ‘Let local inspiration lead you to a ‘cool’ creation.

The school hall became alive with energy and innovative ideas. The pupils were eager to join their teams and return to class and start the challenge. All wearing green T- Shirts, the pupils were also keen to prove that they were far from ‘carbon copies’ and made their mark styling their clothing. The teams were supported throughout the day by an array of business volunteers from local and regional organisations including Enterprise UK Ambassadors Phil Benson and Gerard Jones.

The Yorkshire StepUP event ran for 2 days and involved 500 students from years 10 to 12 (drawn mainly from Calderdale and Kirklees schools).

The event was aimed at raising the aspirations of young people, particularly those who need motivating and re-engaging in school and college. Gerard Jones, Danny Matharu and Sabirul Islam supported the event.

Sabirul Islam motivates the students

Enterprise UK Ambassador Danny Matharu works with his team to complete the task

Enterprise UK Ambassador Gerard Jones shares his experience of volunteering to support the two days…

What a great start to our GEW build up – awarding the accolade ‘UK’s Most Enterprising Male’ to a student from the Yorkshire and Humber region.

Ben Campbell, from Birkdale School in Sheffield, won the title after his teacher, Kathy McKay, recognised his entrepreneurial qualities and put him forward for the Make Your Mark Club Enterprising Award.

Ben’s long list of enterprising achievements is staggering, especially when we consider he is just 12 years old!

Last night Make Your Mark Yorkshire and Humber attended a first birthday in business party hosted by Make Your Mark Ambassador Claire Cox of Bailey Hunter.

Jane Walton said: “We have worked alongside Claire since the launch of her business in 2008 and are so pleased to see that the business has grown from strength to strength – this success is certainly well deserved. It can be difficult to take that step into launching your own business but Claire is a great example of how things can, and do, work out. To be celebrating a year in business is a great achievement, particularly in the current climate and we wish Claire all the very best for the future.”

After four weeks of Make Your Mark Towers-based power ballads, tea rounds, and office colds, I finally got to attend my very first Make Your Mark event last night. Share and Spark, which took place at the snazzy Kings’ Cross venue The Hub, was conceived in collaboration with Christina Ioannidis from Aquitude with the intention of bringing together ambitious, creative-types from the worlds of enterprise and the corporate world to share ideas and best practice.

We talk a lot about the fantastic work that our Ambassador’s do to support us within the Yorkshire and Humber region.

So… never to miss out on an opportunity to network and meet socially we arranged an Ambassador evening to say a big thank you to all those who have helped us out over the years and to say ‘hello’ and ‘welcome’ to those who have recently joined the team.

The venue, the Orangery in Wakefield, was an ideal setting for the celebration and provided the perfect atmosphere allowing the team to talk about their successes and do what they do best – share their stories.

Networking, know how, balloons and business were the foundations to an enterprise session at Wakefield College last Friday.

A group of students, taking the IT Diploma at the College, came face-to-face with two Make Your Mark Ambassadors; Gerard Jones from Gerard School of Football and Lindsey Davies from Open Communications.

Both Ambassadors have used their passion to make a profit – sounds easy enough!

To get the session started the team used a networking game involving balloons. This gave the group a chance to get to know one another a little better – as a new class the students are only in their first week of College.

Global Entrepreneurship Week Yorkshire and Humber Meet Up

3.00 pm – 4.30 pm

Global Entrepreneurship Week (16th – 22nd November 2009) is a worldwide movement of entrepreneurial people with millions unleashing their ideas and turning them into reality.

After the great success of our first meet up in Leeds we are very excited to be hosting our second GEW meet up.

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!