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How a Positive Mindset Can Help You Build a Business

From Rags To Riches Life is different for every person. Many people have been born in a “Golden Cradle”: big houses, luxury cars, full cupboards, the best schools, well-positioned, and so on. Meanwhile, others have had to face misfortune, homeless, watching life go by, hopeless, without any reason to fight. I happened to live part […]

The key to measuring success

Success is one of life’s greatest motivations. The more successful and accomplished we feel, the more we strive for it. But how successful you feel, and how long you retain the feeling, depends on how you measure it. My work helping business leaders achieve success faster and easier has shown that many adopt for their […]

What Does It Mean To Mentor? by Sharon Lechter

  It is often said that when people volunteer their time to help others, they get more out of it than the people they help. This is because the intrinsic rewards are so great that they vastly overshadow any sacrifices one makes in terms of time committed. The same, then, can also be said of […]

Machiavelli Vs The Dalai Lama: What Makes The Perfect Leader?

  Russell Ward is CEO of Silent Edge – a specialist in sales training and motivation asks What Makes the Perfect Leader?  It’s one of the oldest, most contentious questions around: what does it take to be the perfect leader? There are high-profile advocates for each side of the debate. In The Prince, Machiavelli suggested […]

Attraction or distraction and risk-taking by Jo Haigh (Finance Expert)

  What sort of risk-taker are you in business, and is now the right time to investigate? Business and finance expert Jo Haigh investigates.   When business is tough, as it is now for most people, the sound business advice is to go back to basics and keep your core business intact. Sage advice indeed but […]

How to pitch in eight easy steps – By Paul Boross

  ‘Pitch Doctor’ Paul Boross has instructed the likes of Richard Branson and Ainsley Harriot on the dark art of corporate communication. Here are his tips for ensuring your pitch hits the mark every time. Pitching is becoming increasingly important in almost everyone’s working life; whether it’s pitching to new clients, pitching for investment or […]

Book Extract: Think And Grow Rich – The Power Of Dreams – By Napoleon Hill

  The Best You Can Be looks at one of the great works of Personal Development, Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich – and the secret of a dream that is realised.   Napoleon Hill’s Think And Grow Rich is an absolute classic of Personal Development.  Hill spent 25 years speaking with the most successful people of […]

Advise Me by Jo Haigh, Finance Expert

  Jo Haigh, business and finance expert looks at the role of a lead advisor in Management Buy Out (MBO) and what she learned when she was also the client   I have bought and sold over 300 companies in my career, each one unique as you would expect. My job is that of lead […]

Weather The Storm: 6 Tips To Enable Smes To Flourish In Challenging Times

  Russell Ward is CEO of Silent Edge – a specialist in sales training and motivation gives 6 powerful tips on how to keep going in difficult times.   Even a cursory glance at the statistics would suggest that small and medium enterprises hold the key to guiding the UK out of recession. SMEs make […]

Deal chipping – hold your nerve – by Jo Haigh, Finance Expert

  Business and finance expert Jo Haigh describes what to do when someone tries to change the deal at the last moment. At a recent completion meeting in the early breaking dawn, as is often the case, the buyer announced just pre signing the long and drawn out sale and purchase agreement, that they wished […]

What’s so funny? by Paul Boross – The Pitch Doctor

  Paul Boross is The Pitch Doctor – and it’s his role to make sure that your presentations and pitches are world class. Here, he takes about the advantages and pitifalls of using jokes to make an impression.   I’ve been pitching within the TV and media business for 25 years, and one thing I’ve […]

Changing The Rules Of The Game To Become Extraordinary by Bernardo Moya

  With the Olympics about to come to London, Bernardo Moya discusses the skills it takes to get ahead – and how to develop the ability to face problems with fresh eyes. The video above is a great example of doing something other than what’s expected of you, and using your brains rather than following […]

Becoming Fully Response-able – by Brian Mayne

  Brian Mayne writes about how taking charge of your responses makes you response-able.   Our ability to choose our response is our greatest freedom. We are each able to think about our own thinking, define our own beliefs, create our own habits and, ultimately, shape our own life. Thought is always the first point […]

Ask yourself the easy question… by Peter Thomson

  Ask yourself the easy questions, you’ll have a hard life. Ask yourself the hard questions, you’ll have an easy life, says Peter Thompson.   Throughout every day you and I ask ourselves questions. The phrasing of those questions determines – how we spend our time, how we feel and the results we experience in […]

Chunk size and writing? – by John La Valle

  John La Valle, President of the Society for NLP discusses and demonstrates how paying attention to chunk size can really help your work to be more readable.   I continue to get requests to publish this one over again. I’m guessing that people like to distribute this one around their office!! So here it […]

Just how good are you at saying “Thank You” by Roger Harrop

  There is a Golden Rule of referrals that you ignore at your peril and it is, simply, this: If you are the referee you must always let the referrer know what happened as a result of the referral. So this is a stage on from just saying “thank you”; it’s also sharing what happened […]

How to establish credibility quickly in a new job by Paul Boross

City AM has just run an article helping readers to build credibility quickly when moving into a new job. My contribution to the article is on the importance of listening, and not just taking eveything on board that everyone says to you… “Paul Boross aka the Pitch Doctor, managing director of Blue Sky and author […]

4 Things To Do If Your Career Change Did Work Out by Natalie Ekberg

There are many of you out there who are contemplating a career change at this very moment. Then there are those of you who have been there, done it and…it didn’t work out. The process of career change is very complex and many different elements play a part in it. So, is there any wonder […]

Slow, slow, quick, quick slow – by Jo Haigh

  Why oh why does everything seem to take longer than we would like right now? Never have I known such procrastination in business. Everyone wants an instant response to their requirements, yet when it comes to making an actual decision it seems there is a different speedometer working. I have been thinking about why […]

Are you a Whinger or a Winner? by Roger Harrop

  There is no question – the prospects for the economies of the UK and the rest of Europe have not been good BUT many sectors have thrived throughout the last 3 years. You may have seen my (not exhaustive) list of 31 of these sectors and companies that I show in my workshops and […]

Doing It Right, Not First by Andrew Dumont

​ There’s a common misconception among first time entrepreneurs that the only way to win is to be the first. The first to attempt an idea, the first to enter a specific market. It’s something I’ve been meaning to touch on for some time, then this came across my feed. Elegantly said. Too many put […]

The Awesome Power of Focus by Mark Baker

  With all of the current uncertainty in this unprecedented situation that we find ourselves in, I thought it would be the right time to share some tools and ideas with you that are used and understood by the world’s most effective people. What I will share with you now is not about positive thinking or looking at […]

Thriving, not surviving by Mark Baker

How to thrive and not just survive in an economic downturn. Mark Baker provides some advice on thinking positively during tough times… Quite honestly you could be forgiven for thinking that we are on the verge of financial Armageddon considering the amount of doom and gloom that we seem to be bombarded with during every […]

Value Added – Tips for Selling a Business, by Jo Haigh

  When a property doesn’t sell, an estate agent worth their fee may recommend that some rectification or improvement work could improve the selling chances. For instance, just because you like deep purple walls, this doesn’t appeal to everyone. There’s nothing like a nice coat of magnolia to improve that first impression! Likewise adding a […]

The alchemy of a start up by Jo Haigh

  Alchemy; the ability to turn a base metal into gold. Is there such a chemical formula for a start-up business? Step 1 – Take two enthusiastic people. You need two minimum; an ideas person and an implementer. If you have both these skills then lucky you but if there are two or more of […]

Should I tell my staff? – by Jo Haigh

  This is a question I am frequently asked by a client who is looking to sell their business. Should I confide in my team and if so when and what will happen if the sale doesn’t go through? If I tell them they may run scared and look for another job and the value […]

Negotiation tips from the playground by Jo Haigh

  I have spent most of my professional life negotiating one thing or other, be it the purchase or acquisition of a company, or the terms around a new financial lending instrument. I have attended a number of high profile training classes in negotiation skills in my career and even taught the odd group of […]

Ten tips to sharpen your decision-making by Mike Clayton

Ten tips to sharpen your decision-making for more robust choices The test of a ‘good’ decision cannot be the outcome – we would never know if a decision is a good one until it were too late. And that could easily lead to decision-making paralysis. Instead, consider a decision to be good if the right […]

The ugly truth about job interviews, an interview with Paul Boross

The way you look can count more than your CV. As unemployment in the Eurozone hit 11.9 percent in January 2013, recruiters are making difficult decisions in an increasingly competitive employment market, and whether it is conscious or subconscious, appearances count. While qualifications and experience might look good on paper, factors like obesity, personal hygiene, tattoos and […]

First meetings: The Rules of a Good Match by Jo Haigh

  The first impression rules apply equally in business as in any personal situation. These first moments as we know can change the tone of a relationship, sometimes irrevocably. The happy thing is that it is entirely possible to learn the rules, leaving you only with the requirement to use them to your advantage. None […]

How To Create A Powerful Vision For Your Success by Joel Brown

Envision something you have always wanted to do. Go on, take your time. Let yourself go. Is it snowboarding in the Swiss Alps? Finishing your education? Making a million dollars? Starting your own business? Whatever it is, you can accomplish it, and this can be achieved by first envisioning your dream to be real.   […]

13 Harsh Reasons Why You Are Nowhere Near Success by Joel Brown

  Here are 13 harsh, yet truthful indicators as to why you are nowhere near success at this very point in time. You procrastinate Actions speak louder than words, the longer you leave something as just a thought someone else out there is taking action and achieving YOUR dreams, only problem with that is, you […]

Is your business your baby? by Jo Haigh

  My company is 25 years old next year, it’s no longer my baby it’s a grown up woman. I realise it’s been my child and has suffered with all the growing up pains of the real human children I have brought up. 25 years ago it needed constant attention and needed to be fed […]

Is Changing Your Career Really What You Want? By Natalie Ekberg

Recently I’ve been attending very specific coaching training. Naturally, part of the training was to practice our coaching skills. It was quite fascinating to watch, how each and every participant chose their career/business development as the main topic to be coached on.  So there we were, plodding along with the career and business goals for […]

Machiavelli vs The Dalai Lama: What Makes the Perfect Leader? by Russell Ward

Russell Ward is CEO of Silent Edge – a specialist in sales training and motivation asks What Makes the Perfect Leader? It’s one of the oldest, most contentious questions around: what does it take to be the perfect leader? There are high-profile advocates for each side of the debate. In The Prince, Machiavelli suggested that […]

Telephone Talk And Neuro-Linguistic Programming by Laura Spicer

Laura Spicer describes four ways of speaking that can really undermine your telephone manner. Is your telephone manner letting you down? Do you find that you don’t build the rapport with clients that others do, when you are working on the phone? Ever wondered why? It’s amazing how few people actually pay attention to what […]

Reading Body Language for Better Sales – by John Vincent

When you’re selling, the timing of when to close the deal can be everything. And it’s your understanding of your customer’s emotional state that is going to tell you when that close should happen. When you meet different customers, each will have their own emotional setting. So, when they come in to see you, or […]