Last Tuesday the futuristic NESTA offices played host to the Make Your Mark with a Tenner Awards Ceremony. In attendance were the cream of the enterprise crop: entrepreneurs, teachers and decision makers. They were there to hear what Britains youngest entrepreneurial talent had achieved with their Tenners. The judges had whittled down the initial 16,000 participants to 8 Winning and 4 Highly Commended entries.
The young entrepreneurs were there early and armed with cameras to interview the other guests. They were also prepped for their gruelling Boardroom session with Peter Jones. In the NESTA boardroom they faced the dragon, who was mightily impressed with their ideas. Meanwhile the other guests were enjoying their mango and lemongrass smoothies, mini fish & chips and Thai noodle boxes all courtesy of caterers Simply Gourmet.
When reading The Times this afternoon I came across this blog which brought a wee smile to my usually curmudgeon-y face. It’s an archive list of hints and tips on keeping calm during the war and though some of the information isn’t very relevant (who has a charwoman nowadays?) some of the advice still seems to resonate in these changing times. Have a read….
“First and foremost, keep your heads. Be calm. Go about your ordinary business quietly and soberly. Do not indulge in excitement or foolish demonstrations.”
It seems to me that when the going gets tough, the tough get giving. Buried amongst all the reports of crashes, crunches and free-falling markets, there are stories about people working harder than ever to support others.
Take, for example, the news that one in eight donors have actually increased their giving to charity during the recession. Or that YouthNet has seen its number of volunteers double in the past year.
Week 4 - Top “Online Marketing” Tips from PureOnlineGenius.com
Most small businesses owners wear many hats. It’s not unusual for the entrepreneur to be in charge of sales, marketing, business development, operations, taking out the rubbish and filling up the water cooler!
Many rightly believe they don’t have the time it takes to do justice to their online marketing.
So boys and girls, here’s a list of free (or virtually free) time saving tools which do a lot of heavy lifting for ya! Uploading to Multiple Video Sites www.tubemogul.com
www.videopostrobot.com www.videouploadpro.com
www.vidmetrix.com
In a previous post I mentioned the Special Recognition GWIIN Organisation Award that Make Your Mark will recieve from GWIIN for all our hard work with women’s enterprise. Now hot off the video camera I give you an exclusive interview with Bola Olabisi, Managing Director of GWIN, commenting on the awards:
aww thanks .. .makes us feel all warm and fuzzy inside!
If you’re around Oxford on 9-10th May then drop into the Oxford Social Enterprise Forum’s (OxSEF) latest event: A New Form of Capitalism.
It has a start studded line-up and includes a series of keynote speeches and panel debates, combined with a variety of workshops and informal discussions, as well as a live artist performance and documentary film screening.
Topics of discussion include: whether the recession offers a new way of doing, whether we should leave it to the market to save the environment and how social change can be measured.
What do you get when you cross a walking stick and a sat nav? According to melissa Stacey from Calderdale College you develop a walking stick that incorporates a satellite navigation system, providing additional guidance and support.
Melissa’s ‘Walky Talky’ was the winning idea from our recent competition at the Enterprise Show in Leeds, which was organised by Business Link Yorkshire, where over seventy students took part in our inspired enterprise activity - Ideas Generator!
Our pioneering Head of Women’s Enterprise has been shortlisted for the First Women Awards in the public service category. The First Women Awards recognize women who are trailblazers and pioneers in business and women whose achievements and individual actions have helped and are helping to remove barriers and open up opportunities for others to follow.
It is certainly an honour to be recognised along with some of the most pioneering women in British business and public life today (including Freesat managing director, Emma Scott, the “first woman of free TV, Chief Constable and Julie Spence, president of the Association for Women in policing).
GWIIN (Global Women Inventor and Innovators Network) recognises the good work that organisations are doing for the benefit of many women inventors and innovators. As a result, this year they are selecting a few organisations and presenting them with the GWIIN Organisation ‘Special Recognition’ Award. Make Your Mark will receive one of these along with 10 other companies from all over the globe! MYM receives this award for the invaluable support and assistance that we provide many exceptionally creative and innovative women.
A pat on the back for the Make Your Mark Campaign team & Spark: The National Women’s Enterprise Ambassador Network!!!
If you consider yourself a retail queen, get your entries in for the fantastic Specsavers Everywoman in Retail Awards! Supported by us, Everywoman (the UK’s leading provider of training and resources for women in business) and Specsavers, the awards aim to highlight the contributions women make in their field.
The awards, now in it’s second year, hopes to encourage more women to pursue a career in the retail sector and winners will benefit from gaining support and recognition from those in the world of industry, government and media. For more information check out our website and make sure you get your entries in by Tuesday 2 June!
So after the dust has settled on the budget, was it all you hope it would be? And as some newspapers have been wondering, does a 50% tax rate on higher earners really affect enterprise and hard work?
Here at Make Your Mark we love the web, so every month we gather to celebrate all things digital and social media-y, and welcome a marvellous guest speaker to Make Your Mark towers.
The next social media afternoon is tomorrow and we are being joined by social reporting supremo David Wilcox who will give us an insight into how social reporting can be used around events, how it can impact membership organisations and any other hot topics.
The months of March and April have seen some of our ambassadors take part in Media Training and Public Speaking and Presentation courses which have proven to be a great success and very worthwhile.
Here’s what some of our Advanced Public Speaking stars from yesterday had to say:
Well we think it is if you have a strong idea, but don’t take our word for it. Mark Dixon, founder of Regus office spaces, tells Working Lunch he’s noticed a lot of start-ups appearing during the recession.
A strange day today - with the good news including that Jamie Murray-Wells has been awarded the Queen’s Award for Enterprise and at 26 is the youngest ever recipient. Jamie is a great example of someone who saw a gap in the market and made his idea happen, entering an established high street market with big players who weren’t too pleased with his business model which took business away from them!
Recent Comments