At a recent awards dinner Dr Mike Lynch spoke about the difficulties in investing in new businesses and supporting innovative and growing companies. Since his departure from Autonomy he has created a…
Is being an entrepreneur a good thing?
I have always considered what I do, in terms of starting and running a business, as the role of a businessman and not one of an entrepreneur. My view has always been…
Unions out of touch with reality
Having grown up in the eighties the impact of unions and their significance has only reduced as I have grown older and today that has been reinforced as we see situations like…
Payment terms start to slide
I wrote back in October 2008 about larger companies bullying small businesses with ridiculous payment terms and contracts. Well it seems the practice is alive and well with the likes of Marks…
Waitrose work hard to lose customers
I have written before about the power of a brand and the loyalty it can create, but this too can go against the business. Customer care, quality of product and reliability are…
Should a leader be a visionary?
With news that Steve Ballmer is going to step down as CEO of Microsoft and shares in the business jumping at the prospect, it got me thinking as to who makes a…
What is an award worth?
As the holiday period draws to a close there seems to be a plethora of award entry forms hitting my desk. It seems to be the time of year when award ceremonies…
Recognition time
It seems to be that in the run up to the summer quite a lot of organisations are holding their award ceremonies, and this year Fluidata and I have been the beneficiaries.…
Time for a holiday
Interesting comment pieces in the news over the past few days over the criticism of our Prime Minister going on holiday so soon after the horrific attack on the soldier in Woolwich.…
Daylight robbery
With the recent announcement that Cyprus will soon have to steal money from peoples savings in order to qualify for a bailout (€17bn compared to Spain’s €400bn) to support their banks I…
Proof that not all old technology is dead
News that China is investing heavily in the use of thorium in a next generation of nuclear power stations should not come as much as a surprise. The technology will provide clean,…
More risk and more money is required
With the government today announcing some amendments to their Start-up Loans scheme it got me wondering how actually useful these types of schemes are. I can completely appreciate where the government are…
Train hard, fight easy
With Christmas nearly upon us plans in the office have turned away from eating lots and relaxing to our next Tough Mudder challenge in May. Tough Mudder is the 12 mile obstacle…
Tax avoidance or the problem with a global economy?
I have been quite interested over the past few weeks on the on-going press interest into multinationals that have been trading in the UK and dodging UK tax payments. Well that is…
Is the High Street dead?
With news last week that Comet has had to call in the administrators and the week before that over 30 stores a day on the high street are closing their doors the…