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Your
EnterQuest Bulletin - Issue 451
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Thought
for the week: "Facts are the enemy of truth."
Miguel Cervantes |
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In
this week's issue:
Nightmares
and sugar-coated enterprise
Earlier
this week David Cameron announced the launch of the latest government-backed
campaign to encourage business start up and enterprise in the UK.
Business
In You is a Department for Business website which attempts
to bring together into one place the current range of government-backed
support available for new business start ups. This currently comprises
Start Up Britain, links to various parts of the national Business
Link website, the Mentorsme website, a range of small business case
studies, and links to a variety of campaign partners such as the
CBI, BBA, FSB, IOD, BCC and other usual suspects.
The
campaign's strapline is:
There
is a business in everyone, what is the business in you?
The
campaign's purpose is described on the website as:
Government,
the StartUp Britain campaign and other partners are working together
to support new business startups and growth. Between us, we've got
all the advice, inspiration and practical help you need to turn
a dream into a working, profitable business.
Also
published this week is the latest SME
Pulse report from Aviva, which reveals that one in four
small business owners are planning to get out of business and back
into employment. The report also reveals that one third of small
business owners have lost their enthusiasm and drive, half are saying
that they have taken less money out of their enterprise for personal
use in the last two years, and a similar number are saying they
have found business too tough in the last year.
Two
important factors are at play here which require some deliberation.
Currently
large numbers of business owners are finding trading conditions
very tough with many looking to get out of business and return to
employment, while many others are scaling down their enterprise
and seeking part-time work to supplement their income.
At
the same time Government are encouraging more people to start up
in business - especially the growing number of unemployed, out-on-a-limb
students and other economically vulnerable groups - and in this
latest campaign are saying that 'there is a business in everyone'.
This
is a mistake.
It
is entirely wrong to say that there is a business in everyone.
To
illustrate this point it may be useful to split this down into three
types of individual who might start a business:
1)
Those people who definitely have a business in them, but due to
personal or other circumstances have not yet considered or attempted
to start up.
2)
Those people who potentially have a business in them, but
lack certain experience, acumen or confidence.
3)
Those people who have no business in them at all, and should be
kept away from business altogether.
In
the real world of enterprise - not the sugar-coated, Government/Start
Up Britain world of enterprise - there will be individuals from
each of these three categories who will attempt to go into business.
It
is vital that any business support provision recognises which category
each potential individual business start up falls into.
The
first group - those who definitely have a business in them - typically
need the least business support or advice. In fact some need no
support at all, or are entrepreneurial enough to find or acquire
what they need using their own initiative and endeavour, without
any intervention. Failure rates are lowest in this group, but the
key point is that they tend to seek out their own support rather
than there being any need for support providers to seek them out.
The
second group are more difficult to support and fall into a variety
of sub-categories. Many are from a profession or trade, or have
a technical/professional qualification and consider self employment/going
it alone, but they vary considerably in terms of their business
acumen and ability to be enterprising. Many others have enterprising
characteristics, but lack the right idea, or have the idea but little
evidence of a market which will demand it. This group is high maintenance
in terms of their support needs, as failure rates are higher, but
risks of failure can be reduced if the right support is available and if it understands their needs and reflects what they are
lacking.
Those
individuals in the third group are every business support professional's
nightmare.
This
group includes those who are illiterate, innumerate, financially
inept, indisciplined and dishonest, along with those inflexible,
uncoachable, apathetic know-alls who possess as much entrepreneurial
nous as the average plank of wood.
In
general, they should not be encouraged into enterprise at all. The
Government encouraging the 'business in you' in many ways is doing
little more than encouraging the equivalent of an unwanted pregnancy.
The inevitable result for this group is a very high rate of pre-start
abortions, start ups that never trade beyond their first day, and
early stage mortalities which happen in a matter of months, if not
weeks. They do not require support or advice to start up in business
- they need support that will encourage them to do something else.
In
summary, the Business In You campaign is not only naive, it is misleading
and misses the target on three fronts:
1)
Starting up in business is not for everyone, in fact it is only
for the minority of people. However, that minority of people do
need to be encouraged and provided with appropriate, tailored support,
which will help them to get started and hopefully, for some of them,
result in them employing other people and staying in business long
term. Who is the Business In You campaign aimed at?
2)
This new campaign claims it will help business owners to grow their
enterprise. However, it has been widely researched and recognised
that the majority of small/micro-business owners never have any
aspiration or intention of growing. Developing an enterprise for
the majority of owner-managers involves them striving to become
more profitable, more efficient and being able to gradually scale
down the time they have to spend running their business. Or as revealed
in the Aviva report, easing back and getting a job to supplement
their income because the business doesn't earn enough to pay the
bills. This is probably the reality for over half of the UK's current
base of small business owners.
3)
The campaign does not provide all the advice, inspiration and
practical help you need as it claims - in fact it does not even
scratch the surface. It is misleading for the Government to make
such a statement while there is so much more support available,
much of it free or subsidised around the country, and completely
independent from any involvement with the public sector. But worse
than this, there is a considerable amount of excellent support for
enterprise missing from this campaign which is paid for out
of the public purse. And it is not even listed on the Business Link
website, not even on their own radar.
This
blanket policy of 'dumbing down' business support which encourages
enterprise-for-all will not benefit the economy in the long term.
And it demonstrates our policy makers' superficial, blinkered understanding
of enterprise and the fact that it is only a capable, ambitious,
appropriately supported minority, who have sufficient acumen to
make it a success in business or self employment.
The
others either need more intensive intervention to help make their
start up happen, or encouragement to do something else.
To
comment on this article please
click here to have your say.
Each
week we provide you with summaries of some popular or emerging business
ideas in the UK and elsewhere around the world.
Explore
your Twitter network
Mentionmap is a web application that creates a
spider chart of tweets, hashtags and conversations of a
particular user and how they link to other users. It is a useful
way of finding relevant people to follow and the app is free.
Website
analysis tool
Quarkbase is an online
tool that analyses the quality of websites in terms of traffic,
similar sites, social comments, and social popularity. It is a useful
tool for analysing a business website or competitor and the tool
is free.
Free
link checker
The
Link Checker from W3C is a free
tool that checks for problems with links, anchors and referenced
objects in a web page or whole website.
Social
media dictionary
This
article from Hubspot Blog provides a glossary
of 120 key terms in social media marketing with definitions
and explanations of how they should be used.
Here's
our weekly look at some unusual, daft and often ridiculous business
ideas, products and news.
Also
from EnterQuest's publisher |
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The
UK Small Business Marketing Bible contains hundreds
of tips and tactics for boosting your sales using proven marketing
strategies that work no matter what product or service you
sell. |
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