Dear Sir: Regarding your article ‘What’s Wrong with the World?’ I am. Yours truly,” 

GK Chesterton (letter to The Times)

I knew that he was going to call me.  Following last week’s riots in London and across the UK, I had seen my friend Daniel Snell, founder of Arrival Education becoming increasingly wound up.  How can you watch parts of the city you live in being set on fire and ripped apart without feeling a sense of anger, confusion and frustration?  And if, like Daniel, you work closely with teenagers for a living, how can you not want to do something about it?

The call came on Monday.  By Tuesday we had a venue.  A big venue.  The Methodist Central Hall in Westminster.  It was the biggest venue we knew.  The idea was to offer a chance for people, especially young people to come together to say that the events of the past few days, whatever they were, were not in their name.  

Not In Our Name.  A name for the event.  An opportunity to bring together potentially hundreds of people to hear their views.  We could not do it alone.  Not without the support of almost a dozen organisations, each of which works year-round to support young people.  With the gathering scheduled for Friday lunchtime, we knew that we had to hold a planning meeting by Wednesday.  Those who could not make it wished us luck.  Everyone else turned up;

• London Youth
• Changemakers
• Magnificent Minds 
• MTV
•My Generation
• YouthNet
• V Inspired
• UK Youth
• Arrival Education 
• The Challenge
• Leap CC
• NCVYS

A simple site was created and the word began to spread.

On Wednesday afternoon the call came from Number 10.  Wishing us well with the event.  Then on Thursday another call.  Inviting members of the group to meet with the Prime Minister at 9am the following morning.

The day of the event arrived.  Sky, MTV and the BBC arrived.  Hundreds of people arrived.  Young people, old people.   Mothers, teachers and even preachers walked in. 

After some opening speeches, the floor was open.  People were given a minute to speak, uninterrupted.  Soon, a queue had formed.  Ten, then twenty, then fifty people in a row.  After a week of chaos and disorder it was moving to see people waiting calmly, in line.  Waiting to have their say.  To tell the room how they were feeling, what they wanted to say, and what they thought should be done.

Here are just some of the things captured by YH World;

“When I first heard about the riots I initially thought that this was eventually going to happen.”

“When you go home and your mum is on drugs and you don’t have anything to eat and you don’t have electricity…they have nothing and the people around them feel exactly like them.”

“They don’t see that they’re mashing up their community…they just see it as a way to get at the government.”

“People are trying to get back at the police because of the way we’re being treated. Everybody here’s been pissed off about the police at least once.”

“If I’m getting stopped and searched every day with no reason, just for once I’d want to give them a reason.”

“It’s so hard to get jobs. To stay in school is so hard and if you get kicked out of school then where do you go?”

“Before the riots David Cameron was never interested…only after the riots did he listen. And that’s not good enough.”

“Government should focus on what they can do for the youth rather than labelling the youth.”

“We need well trained police, not just thugs in uniforms. And the politicians need to come to the ends and come and talk to us.”

“The main part is getting the youth engaged…the boroughs should come together and offer opportunities.”

“We need to be given options. The chance to do music, the chance to do sport.”

“We need opportunities to express ourselves.”

“The community needs to say, you are still part of our community and we’re not trying to eliminate you.”

“It’s time that charities started working across boundaries.”

“Benefits is not enough to live on. We need to help people make money.”

“More mentors and role models going into the community and having face-to-face contact with young people out there.”

 A few days later, and almost everyone has a view on the causes of the London riots.  Others are suggesting solutions, and ways to ensure that they never happen again. 

Without sounding pessimistic, I am reminded of a saucepan which has boiled over, giving you a fright as it spits and steams onto the stove.  In London, the heat has been turned down.  But the pan is still bubbling, and anyone who thinks that the gas has been turned off may be in for a nasty surprise.

Some thoughts:

1)  There are some amazing organisations which are working on the ground and need more support, more funding, more attention.  Just see the list above for some examples.  They are a great place to start and to ignore them would be an opportunity wasted.

2)  To highlight two particular examples;  The work of Arrival Education and of Only Connect should be studied and scaled up.  One works with students, over several years.  The other with ex-offenders.  Both have inspired an affection, and I would say even a love amongst the people they work with. 

3)  David McQueen is one of the best speakers and facilitators I have ever seen.  In what could have been an extremely tense environment, he put people at ease, made them laugh and encouraged them to share their feelings.

4)  People seem to join gangs for a number of reasons.  I heard someone saying this week that these reasons might include respect, the desire to belong to something and because it gives them something to do.  It is therefore going to be incredibly difficult to replace this with any activity unless it also provides these things.  As a start, I would like to explore how sport and enterprise projects can become more accessible on a street level.  Clearly this is a considerably more easily said than done.

5) There is a worrying misunderstanding in Britain about the role of our Government.  Blaming litter on the council.  Blaming poor grades (where a students admits to no effort) on the teachers.  A reluctance to admit some shared responsibility for our success as a country.  In quiet times, it means we’re waiting for the wrong people to act.  In times of crisis, we blame the wrong people.  The phrase Big Society may rile people, however the underlying effort to shift how ‘Government’ is seen is more important than ever.

6)  We need far stronger bridges between business and schools.  Where there are bridges, we need more traffic flowing across them.  That means  more people taking the time to go into schools and talk about their careers, jobs and lives.  Without this simple bit of volunteering, things are going to get worse.  One speaker at the event talked about an idea for a youth club where you learn about careers.  The swell of support for that concept was practically palpable and almost saddening in its urgency.

Finally, and perhaps predictably, a way to simplify this…

Britain needs to be more connected.  Young people with old, neighbours with neighbours.  In the US, they have a Department of Corrections.  In Britain I would start a Department of Connections. 

Yes, it comes down to individuals making those links and introducing themselves to people they have never met before.  It is more urgent than that.  Without a larger scale effort in convening people, we are heading for years of incremental improvements rather than any bigger leaps. 

Britain needs its connectors more than ever.  If you are in the slightest bit inclined to bring a group of people together in the next few weeks, do it.  People will smirk at you and some will roll their eyes.  It doesn’t matter. 

There are too many disconnected people, especially those staring at a future without work, for it to stop us getting involved.

And here I am encouraging you, when I need to be searching a bit closer to home.

I knew that Daniel Snell was going to call me. 

So why didn’t I call him first?

 

Bristol. 

Home of the Clifton Suspension Bridge. 

Of Wallace and Gromit. 

Of Trunki.

For those of you not yet ‘in the know’, the latter is the producer of ‘luggage for little people’, creating ride-on bags for children all over the world.  Rejected by Dragons’ Den, the firm, founded by Rob Law, is close to selling its millionth unit.

 

Last Friday, I was the latest in a long line of admirers to get on the case…

Bristol is, undeniably, a great city.  When Jon Shaw of DocCom (the social network for Doctors) welcomed our group to his offices in SetSquared, he began not with his company credentials, but with his lifestyle.  A seven minute walk to work.  An equally short trip to the rolling countryside for runs and bike rides. Finally, a thriving nightlife for meeting the locals.  All of the above we were soon to explore.  Except for the bikes, which will have wait until next time. 

Last year, I instigated (note how I avoid the word ‘organised’…) a one-day trip to Brighton.  It was July, a quiet month, so the theory goes.  It was fun.  We met great companies.  I resolved to do it again.

Like so many ideas, this one relied on some like-minds rising to the challenge.  I could not have asked for better conspirators than the fine folk at Sift Media, the online publisher based in Bristol.  Together we plotted places to visit and companies to meet.  A barrage of emails later, a group of Londoners were hopping aboard the 10.45 from Paddington, with a quick chat to the BBC from the station.

After a hearty (note how I avoid the word ‘healthy’) lunch, we were off around the city, meeting companies from design agency Studio Diva to business management software company BrightPearl.  At Trunki HQ we were given a whistle-stop tour of the firm’s products and history and anyone not keen to take the stairs back to the lobby was encouraged to use the slide.  As you do.

After a final meeting at Sift HQ (hosted by founder Ben Heald), it was off to the Severn Shed, a local watering hold where a few dozen Bristol business-people joined us to meet, drink and get to know each other.  It was good to reunite with WebMission companies (including DocCom, Sift and The Filter) and to meet with local business owners and journalists.

Overall, I hope, some good connections made, and seeds sown.

I encourage all businesses to ‘get out more’.  What does it take? 

Well, first you need to pick your destination.  It helps to have a local partner (thank you Business Zone , especially Rita and Dan!). 

You’ll need a group of open-minded people to come on the advenuture with you.  For our Bristol trip, it helped that our group was diverse and included Adam King (of tailor King and Allen), Tom Boardman (of Firebox), Duncan Cheatle (of The Supper Club), Paulina Sygulska and Daniel Tenner (of GrantTree), Drew Ellis of LikeMinds and Stu Anderson of Shell Livewire. 

Tools like Eventbrite are great for keeping an eye on people and numbers. 

Finally, of course, you’ll need some helpful companies to host you and share their city. 

Yes, it helps to have someone who will offer to buy the first (in this case very large) round of drinks.  So thank you to Wayne Gibbins from Viadeo. 

Finally, whether you’re connecting Leeds with Birmingham, Edinburgh with Sheffield or London with Shanghai, you just have to put a date in the diary and get on with it!

Thank you to all of the people who made London to Bristol such an enjoyable day, full of new connections and positive conversations.  I’m looking forward to the reunion already!

I’ll leave the last word, to some of the companies who spent the day in Bristol;

“The most impressive thing about Bristol was not its relaxed, balanced feel, or even the strange mixture of big city feel with the closeness of a smaller city, but the surprising concentration of interesting and profitable startups who are, quietly, building another UK technology hub away from London.”  Daniel Tenner, GrantTree

“The recent trip to Bristol reminded me just how crucial it is for entrepreneurs to get out of the office and meet and talk to people beyond their usual arena. What a great day (and evening). A truly valuable and fun way to spend time. Equal doses of inspiration, insight and useful connections”  Duncan Cheatle, The Supper Club

“The day was fantastic. It was a fabulous chance not only just to see what Bristol has to offer in terms of some great entrepreneurs and disruptive businesses , but to network with some well known faces from London running some seriously innovative ventures. Everyone involved was there under the common theme of checking out what’s new, networking with like minded people and have a great time with great people whilst you are doing it- that is what being in business should be all about. If you see one of these missions coming up again, make sure you are first in the queue for a ticket!”  Stu Anderson, Shell Livewire

“LDN2BRS was a great opportunity to meet and network with companies both established and in the startup phase working at the digital coal face. Bristol is a clearly a centre of excellence and an important player in the British tech scene. It’s nice to see it’s not all centred around Silicon Roundabout in London and that innovation and opportunity is alive and ably represented in the south west by the companies we visited. I hope they all come and see us at Like Minds in October and see what’s happening further down the road in Exeter as well.”  Drew Ellis, Like Minds

“Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.”  John F. Kennedy

Some slightly mind-boggling numbers from Twitter;

I am currently following 2,335 people.  How?  That is a story for another post!

Today, I have 5,841 ‘followers’.

Here’s where it gets (vaguely) interesting.

Of the people I ‘follow’, quite a few are not following me back. 

1,079 of them, to be precise.

That’s 46%. 

That doesn’t sound good to me.  In fact it sounds pretty depressing.

Almost HALF of the people I’m following don’t follow me back.

Yes, to be fair, a large number of these are very ‘well known people’ and some of these follow very few people indeed.

Here’s another thing.

There are quite a few people who are following me, and yet I’m not following them back;

4,585 people, to be precise. 

How can that be possible?  It sounds pretty discourteous to me.

And how many missed opportunties, relationships, insights must that add up to?

So how many people am I currently enjoying a ‘mutual’ Twitter relationship with?

One where I follow them, and they follow me.

Quite a few;

1,256.

That sounds like more than enough to be getting on with…

But my mind keeps going back to the first numbers. 

Those 1,079 whose pearls of wisdom I so so enjoy.  What about them?

Those 4,585 who have to put up with my endless stream of nonsense.  What about them?

How can I filter through over forty five hundred people to connect with like minds and new people?

I need new techniques, new ways of navigating the high seas of information.

All tips welcome!

“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted”.  Albert Einstein

 

Numbers via  Friend or Follow

Photo via H is for Home

 

A vicar, a senior police officer and a polar explorer walk into a bar.  How did they get there? 

No, reader, this is not the opening line of a bad joke.  It is a question I have been pondering, which made me think about the British American Project.  Of all of the groups I have joined over the years, I would say that this one has led to some of the most interesting and unusual conversations and relationships.  Each year, up to 24 Americans and the same number of Brits are selected from a wide range of industries and backgrounds.  Hence, the policeman and vicar.  We meet at annual conferences (taking place on alternating sides of the pond) and at regular events.    But how, you may ask are these people selected?  The project lists a number of things which it looks for, including “an interest in the transatlantic dimension of the project” and in the “views of others”.  At the top of this list is another so-called ‘quality’; 

The ability to take risks with ideas.

“Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.”  

So said Samuel Johnson, who would have been appalled at the way in which so many projects are shot down before they have ever been given the chance to fly.  Every day I see people who seem to  think that the clever thing to do is to spot a flaw in a plan or project and condense that insight into a Tweet-sized bullet.  Not a fatal flaw, you understand.  Any flaw will do.  Any aspect which allows the sniper to appear smart or knowledgeable.   

I read recently about the latest CEO Summit, hosted by the Times.  What inspired me most were some of the ‘big ideas’ shared the guests.  From Lord Wolfson calling for a motorway between Oxford and Cambridge to the Chief Executive of Vodafone suggesting tax-breaks for students from science backgrounds.  They were taking risks with ideas.  They were prepared to take some flack, to explore new areas, to evolve their thinking. 

This is something which is badly lacking in politics.  The thought of the media and, let’s be honest, the public, lying in wait to tear apart an idea.  Because too often these things are framed (or interpreted) as perfectly formed project proposals, to ‘test the water’.  Politicans, like the rest of us, need spaces to think, to create and, yes, to dream.  I find the idea that this can only happen in secret pretty depressing.

What techniques have you found for enabling people to take risks with ideas? 

Is there an opportunity for anonymous forums, or is that a red herring? 

Don’t you sometimes want a space to test half-formed ideas and thoughts which you might not feel confident ‘standing by’ forever more, especially if you change your mind, then risk being forced to stand by an earlier version of your thinking. 

Perhaps we need to create spaces and times which make a deliberate attempt to call for ‘Outrageous Ideas’ which challenge the status quo.  “Paying kids to go to school”.  “Flipping a student loan into an enterprise loan”.  Ideas which everybody knows have set out to get people thinking and push the limits.

David Ogilvy said that “the best ideas come as jokes.  Make your thinking as funny as possible.” 

If you are interested in making things happen, you should be interested in ways to get people sharing their best ideas, in ways that mean they are not living with the ongoing paranoia of being quoted out of context, or shot down at stage one. 

In Ogilvy’s words, our thinking needs to be far funnier.  The consequences of keeping things buttoned-up are far from amusing.

 

Launching today, Mentorsme is an online gateway which will make it easier for British business owners to find a mentor.  It does this by acting as a directory of existing organisations, all over the UK.  In addition, it contains some general information by way of an introduction to mentoring.

Operated by the Business Finance Taskforce, set up by the British Bankers’ Association, I think that the site is a welcome addition and should be seen as a positive development.

Having attended a couple of meetings at the department of Business Innovation and Skills on the subject of mentoring, it is great to see the site launched.

In order to avoid being rude about something which may be about to be said, allow me to suggest answers to a couple of, sadly predictable, possible points about MentorsMe;

1)  Shouldn’t banks be lending money rather than worrying about mentoring?  As you may know, the UK’s four biggest banks have committed (via Project Merlin) to making £190bn of credit available to businesses this year, and £76bn of this is to smaller businesses.  Mentorsme is a practical step which helps business owners find the person they need to help them grow their business. 

There is a worrying misunderstanding in Britain (I think), around the role of banks in supporting very early stage companies with lending support.  Too often people mistake banks for investors, working themselves up into a state of high indignation when they are turned away. 

2)  Didn’t bankers get us into this mess?  This question has now become tedious, and not least because retail bankers have been (wrongly) branded alongside their more reckless colleagues.  It is only when you meet some of the staff of our biggest banks that you realise how much they care about their customers and how tough the last couple of years have been, as their reputation has been kicked by just about anyone looking for a quick bit of kudos.  I should declare here that my involvement with StartUp Britain has allowed me to spend time with employees of several banks,  and their support has been considerable.

3)  Over 200 of the mentors are going to be either current or former bank staff.  What do they know about running a business?  The short answer is quite a lot.  Again, this is a patronising question and one that is fairly typical of the lazy, stereotyped way in which ‘bankers’ are viewed in Britain. Yes, for many the ideal business mentor will be someone who has run a business of their own.  However, to dismiss the offer of time and energy from someone who may have seen literally hundreds of businesses is to miss a valuable opportunity.

I support Mentorsme because it starts by pointing the way to a host of existing organisations.  It also puts out a call to potential mentors, which I hope is answered.

The site will, I’m sure, grow and evolve over the coming months and years.  Great businesses and sites are not built in a day.  I know from personal experience that it is easy to knock things, and considerably tougher to offer something useful by way of contribution. 

“Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.” Samuel Johnson