Here is a recording of a recent talk given by Andy Leach, CEO of the £185 North West Fund at a recent Techcelerate event in Manchester.

This venture capital fund is currently the largest in the UK and is intended to provide essential funding for over 700 North West businesses over the next 5 years.

Listen here to Andy Leach, CEO of the £185m North West Fund talking about the launch of this venture funding

What are your thoughts on how well you think this vital fund has been promoted, how accessible this fund appears and whether you think this fund will prove to be the important source of funding that the North West needs?

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Subscribe by clicking on the Subscribe to Podcast icon in the side bar or subscribe via iTunes. This is the best way to listen as it will ensure that all future episodes are delivered directly to you as new episodes are released.

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It is with great pleasure that I introduce Andrew Thorp as our guest on this week’s Business N2K podcast. Andrew is a business speaker and trainer focusing primarily on effective communication skills within business.

Andrew recently launched SpeakEasy within the North West and it is proving hugely popular amongst the local business community.  SpeakEasy is a forum for business leaders and owners to get together in a supportive and informal environment to practise delivering their business message and obtain valuable feedback in the process. I was lucky enough to attend a recent SpeakEasy event in Manchester to experience the benefits first-hand – it was a great and enlightening experience.

In this conversation, Andrew shares some tips and learning points on effectively communicating your business benefits and message including:

• the art of influencing and making an impact
• the importance of engaging listeners with your passion for your business proposition
• how to effectively use humour
• implementing changing ‘status’ to add impact and influence
• incorporating the 3 circles of influence
• introducing the Magic of 3
• essential tips for using slides (or the dreaded PowerPoint)

It is said that a US survey identified public speaking as the No.1 Fear held by people (death was ranked as a lowly second!). Yet with practise and perseverance in an encouraging atmosphere like SpeakEasy, many more business people should be able to tackle this vitally important (life as well as) business skill with confidence.

How you can listen to the BusinessN2K podcast:

1. Subscribe by clicking on the Subscribe to Podcast icon in the side bar or subscribe via iTunes. This is the best way to listen as it will ensure that all future episodes are delivered directly to you as new episodes are released, or
2. Click on the Blubrry player below to listen now:

Please leave your comments, feedback and suggestions for future shows in the comments section below.

Credits: Thanks to Andrew Thorp for this week’s show + music used in the BusinessN2K podcast is by Viba – In the Orchard lies a Secret – available as a free download and is released under a Creative Commons Licence

I am delighted to introduce Manchester-based entrepreneur, Lisa Tse of The Sweet Mandarin, as an inspirational guest for this week’s BusinessN2K podcast.

Lisa is famed more recently for her appearance on Gordon Ramsey‘s The F-Word, in which her family-run restaurant Sweet Mandarin won the prestigious Best Local Chinese Restaurant in the UK. Aside from the wonderful cooking, Lisa and her sisters have broken new ground in mixing new marketing techniques to help build a traditional yet thriving business. Her forward thinking approach to business and creativity has led to her role as an alumni of Manchester Metropolitan University Business School and she is in high demand to speak at business conferences throughout the North West and beyond.

I first ‘met’ Lisa on Twitter after being bowled over by how much she ‘gets’ social media – TweetUps and all! Her business has continued to thrive as they have steadily built their community of enthusiastic customers. Lisa has a refreshing outlook on business, having worked as a financier in London (a ‘corporate job’) and made the leap to running her own entrepreneurial business. She is focused on making every experience the best for her customers in order to build the restaurant and leave a legacy – rather than focusing on building a chain of restaurants which could result in growth for growth’s sake.

In this conversation we cover:

• What inspired Lisa to make the leap from the safety of a corporate job to running her own business with her sisters
• How she has embraced social media such as Twitter to help build her business
• The importance of staying close to your roots and understanding what contributes to your success
• Being open to new ideas and suggestions from customers to create new services
• The value of looking after your customers and how they can turn into some of your best marketeers
• Innovative ways of taking customer orders!
• Staying focused on what you are good at and not getting distracted by new trends etc
• Finding new ways to connect with your customers
• (unfortunately we ran out of time to discuss their Sweet Mandarin book !)

The Sweet Mandarin represents a new breed of entrepreneurial business that is closely intertwined with its customers. Lisa and her sisters are the ‘face’ of the business and they actively engage with their customers and the wider Manchester business community. They manage to mix more traditional and established business (restaurateurs) with new (social media, community engaged, transparent, forward thinking).

I firmly believe that we can all learn as businesses from Lisa, her sisters and Sweet Mandarin.

How you can listen to BusinessN2K:

1. Subscribe by clicking on the Subscribe to Podcast icon in the side bar or subscribe via iTunes. This is the best way to listen as it will ensure that all future episodes are delivered directly to you as new episodes are released, or
2. Click on the Blubrry player below to listen now:

Please leave your comments, feedback and suggestions for future shows in the comments section below.

Credits: Thanks to Lisa Tse for this week’s show + music used in the BusinessN2K podcast is by Viba – In the Orchard lies a Secret – available as a free download and is released under a Creative Commons Licence

I’m delighted to kick off our podcast series with a fascinating chat with Ian Sanders of The Ian Sanders Company on his latest book Juggle! Rethink Work, Reclaim your Life

Ian Sanders is an entrepreneur, ideas guy, marketing bloke, business potentialiser, unplan evangelist, specialist in creative industries and author!

You can either listen to the podcast from your computer now or you can subscribe to listen to this and future episodes on your ipod, smart phone or mp3 player at your convenience – all for free.

In our 20 minute chat, topics covered with Ian include:

• Ian’s life as a Juggler
• introducing ‘plurality’ into our work and lives
• avoiding being defined by our job title
• how employees can also embrace the Juggle lifestyle to be more entrepreneurial
• how the introduction of a reduced (often 4 day) work week during the recession could benefit both employers and employees over the longer term
• rethinking the notion of retirement by reframing work
• challenge of ‘switching off’ given the ‘always on’ 24 hr nature of technology tools
• key lessons from Kevin Roberts (global CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi) on balancing work and life
• importance of being passionate about what you do – “play where you play best”
• effectively managing your 24 hours per day

You can find this book at Amazon and you can find more from Ian Sanders at his website, plus regular updates on Ian’s latest thinking on his blog and on Twitter.

How you can listen to BusinessN2K:

1. Subscribe by clicking on the Subscribe to Podcast icon in the side bar or subscribe via iTunes. This is the best way to listen as it will ensure that all future episodes are delivered directly to you as new episodes are released, or
2. Click on the Blubrry player below to listen now:

Please leave your comments, feedback and suggestions for future shows in the comments section below.

Credits: Thanks to Ian Sanders for this week’s show + music used in the BusinessN2K podcast is by Viba – In the Orchard lies a Secret – available as a free download and is released under a Creative Commons Licence