ENTREPRENEURIAL spirit is being harnessed by the power of positive thinking - regardless of wealth, status or geography. JEZ DAVISON reports...
IT WAS time for the wannabes to join forces with the winners.
On a hot, hazy day in May, TV Dragon Richard Farleigh flew into the region to join a host of high-profile multi-millionaires and local rising stars hoping to take their business to new heights.
With spring optimism in the air, the sixth annual conference of the Entrepreneurs’ Forum felt like a different world from Planet Recession, with each entrepreneur having a colourful story to tell.
Positive thinking was the message of the day - and delegates weren’t prepared to let an economic tsunami get in the way of future growth plans.
Creative entrepreneur Mark Easby is confident his Stokesley-based Better Brand Agency will generate £1m in three years after establishing it in 2008.
But although he has built up a client portfolio of more than 20, he’s wary of expanding too quickly.
“Our biggest challenge is managing future growth. We’ve seen agencies that have grown too quickly and haven’t been able to maintain it.”
Even the most successful go-getters have been a victim of over-ambition.
Self-confessed “deal junkie” Richard Farleigh - who earned enough money to retire in his 30s - says most of his investments “haven’t worked out” due to a natural inclination “to do anything vaguely exciting”.
But he’s had notable successes, too; 17 of his 70-plus investments in SMEs have led to a listing on the stock exchange - raising capital for the firms and mega-bucks for Farleigh.
Local companies have taken heart from his story, which erodes the myth that millionaires don’t make mistakes.
Sarah Kadhim, of Stockton creative firm Back2Front Animation, says: “It’s good to know that even the most successful entrepreneurs have bad days.
“Sometimes you forget that they’re human.”
On this particular day they were close enough to shake her hand.
Inspired6 drew more than 200 delegates to the Gateshead Hilton Hotel and featured keynote speeches from Scottish Entrepreneur of the Year Martin Lightbody, Barclay’s Bank CEO John Varley and the man behind one of Britain’s fastest-growing companies, Matt Riley of Daisy Communications.
And a key message from all of them - even from the banker - was that judicious risk-taking is a necessary ingredient for success.
Mr Varley says: “Small businesses are the spinal cord of enterprise. There’s nothing more important than entrepreneurs continuing to take risks.”
It seems that self-starters in the region are following the advice.
Government figures for VAT registrations show a net increase of 2,075 businesses in the North-east - the highest of any region - while enterprising activity in the North-east has grown from 4.3% to 4.7% of the adult population.
Although this is still below the UK average of 5.6%, the gap between the North-east and London, considered the UK’s most entrepreneurial region, has been narrowed from 3.8% to 1.7%.
Creating this enterprise has come at a cost - about £16.3m of public money in the last three years. With this equating to roughly £16,000 per entrepreneur, the locals claim it’s been money well spent.
Matt Stirland, last year’s If We Can You Can winner, says: “I’m sure the region has seen a return on the investment. Personally I’ve benefited from public money (via Business Link).”
The former fireman from Guisborough who has pioneered Streetlife, which takes health and fitness training into schools, says “focusing on one idea and sticking with it” can reap higher rewards than “doing too much, too soon”.
He’s taken his own advice by postponing plans to build a chain of health clubs, instead “taking fitness into the place where school children spend half their lives”.
Clearly, the recession hasn’t floored the get up and go in this young entrepreneur.