Sales meeting in the toilet (2005)

I am a dad of three children, Molly 7, Millie 6 and Henry who will be 2 shortly. I am on my third relationship and have experienced my fair share of adversity in my life. My family are very close and like any close family we spend a lot of time in each other’s houses.

My mum and dad, although semi retired now, were successful business people and worked in the retail fashion trade and without their support, guidance and the occasional kick up the butt, I would be lost. The integrity that they both possess is very difficult to find these days, especially in our modern generation.

Since a young lad I have been highly motivated and possess high levels of energy. I would and have worked all the hours around the clock and travelled great distances to go to work and earn a pound note.

I enjoy motivating others and love getting up on stage, speaking to an audience and doing some really crazy inspirational moves to get people to move out of their comfort zones.

I have run my own businesses and worked for other companies but one constant remains and that is – I want to be the best at what I do! During my business and personal career I have succeed and failed in equal proportion.

I was working in 2004 for a small advertising directory sales company and we had just 35 staff when I joined. I grew the staff headcount to over 250 people employed on a full and part time basis. The energy and sexiness within the outbound call centre environment that I created was truly awesome and on a good day, sales and motivational was unrivalled.

Sales on one particular day were way were way off what they should have been and my staffs were sluggish, not performing and KPI’s were way in the red zone. Even my managers were downbeat and were not inspiring their teams and I was starting to lose my patience.

I was watching the floor, which was an 8000 sq ft open planned call centre and waited for someone to take action. No action came and as a result I went to the front of the floor and told everyone to finish their calls, put their phones down and join me at the front of the floor.

I always held two meetings every day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon after lunch. I was always well prepared and inspired my teams using a mixture of personal and business related topics and information.

People always used to say to me that my meetings were awesome and that I pushed people way beyond their own personal expectations for what they could achieve in sales and indeed their lives.

I have always believed that motivating and teaching people is a two way game. I always say “You hold onto one end of the rope and I will hold the other. As long as you hold on, ill hold on but if you let go then so will I”.

Inspiring people is an art and they have to love you, trust you and fear you all at the same time.

So, I am at the front of the floor and I now have 140 staff, 6 sales directors, 8 sales managers, an operations support team, IT team and the CEO looking on. I could see by the looks on their faces that they knew a crap storm was coming and there was an eerie silence as they waited to hear the inevitable.

The meeting that I was about to give them was by no means going to be my usual motivational and inspirational ye ha lets go type of address. This was going to be far from inspirational, but little did I know!

“OK team, sales are down, calls are down, profit for the day is down and not one of you, including my senior team have stood up and made any positive changes that could influence a turnaround for the day’s sales – Why? You have all the tools and personal and business reasons to achieve your daily goals. Yu have the ability and coupled with the superb product that we have you should be smashing the days sales out of the ball park – Why is it that we are having this crap day?”

Not one answer came from my entire team. They knew better and they also knew that in this team we fight, we fight for every inch and we stay on top of our game regardless of what challenges we face. That knew that with excellent performance come great benefits, commission rewards and other team and company incentives and recognition. On the contrary, poor performance comes with one almighty kick up the arse.

“OK then, if you guys are happy with such a crap performance then we are going to hold this meeting in the toilet, which is where the crap goes”.

With that I marched over 150 people into the men’s toilets and packed them in every piece of space that I could find. Some were standing on the toilets, others in the sinks, some were on other peoples shoulders and we were packed to the rafters. I forced and pushed every one into this toilet until the doors were bursting with people.

Whilst in the toilets I explained in no uncertain terms that we do not accept any kind of poor performance and that when things are not going to plan that you stop, adjust, evaluate, change and move forward. I cannot put the exact words in this book that I used but let’s say the use of my vocabulary was colourful.

Inside the room it was hot, stuffy and people were feeling uncomfortable being in the toilet, but they soon got the point. My HR Director was spitting kittens about my methods and I would not recommend using the toilet as meeting point for anyone in today’s tough employment law society.

The bottom line was this:-

I – My managers realised that they needed to see things before they happen as prevention is better than cure.

2 – Not everybody is motivated all of the time but if you can motivate and keep your top performers motivated then the rest will follow.

3- If you do not perform when I am around then the shit is going to hit the fan and literally, it did.

4 – You can bring some humour into your everyday business life and people will never forget these moments.

The outcome of the afternoon kick up the arse toilet session was that the team flew out of the toilets and went on to smash their daily target to pieces. Now I do not know whether it was because they did not want to go back into the hot sweaty toilet again for another spank or because they were actually inspired by my meeting. Either way, it got the job done and that’s the kind of unconventional guy I am.

Best Wishes for 2012

A great year ahead!

Regards Brad

Getting a million pounds Investment and loosing everything!

Its 6.30am in the morning, the month is January, and the year is 1994. The birds are tweeting; the sun is rising. I am 24 years of age and have been working night and day for nearly three years building my promotional clothing business. I am on the way to my office, situated above my mum’s shop in Epping Essex. Today is the day that is going to change my life forever. I am going to sign a contract today that will secure me over £2 million pounds worth of imported clothing from Indonesia. The problem is that I do not have one single penny to put down as collateral.

Last night I was working on a fast food stall and Wembley Arena earning extra money selling hotdogs to support my business. On the way home at 2am D:ream were playing on the radio “Things can only get better”.

I had worked on the stock market as a blue button when I was 16. The stock market crashed a year later and I lost my job. I bought my first market stall business when I was 18 years of age costing me £15,000. I also bought my first house when I was 18 and interest rates increased sharply to 15%, resulting in losing my £34,000 life savings that I had invested. I went bankrupt when I was 21 and thought my world was at an end. I clawed back from bankruptcy and started my promotional business when I was 21. I had already experienced major adversity and I was still only a baby.

 

I arrive at my office in Epping at 7am to prepare for my biggest ever business deal, one that would set me on the road to entrepreneurial stardom. A Korean gentleman called Mr Kim was arriving at 11am to see my business in action. He had been sent by his company, The Kolon Corporation, a multi-billion dollar organisation to open export channels in Europe and I was his one of his UK supply options.

The other two companies who wanted this contract were already turning over millions of pounds, had an established client base and had sound financial backing. Not only that, they had showrooms and warehousing in the clothing wholesale capital of London, Commercial Road E1.

My company was turning over just £250,000 a year. I had little stock and few customers. My first floor office was 300 sq ft with a few racks of stock. I had no office furniture and only two spare chairs, one of which had a broken leg and paint all over it.

I knew that I had to impress Mr Kim and I also knew that if I secured the deal it would mean that I could take my company to a multi million pound turnover business, pretty much over night. In business belief is everything and if you are prepared to do what your competitors do not have the imagination or balls to do then you will win.

I called in four friends dressed in smart suits and sat them at desks and placed phones on the desks that were not connected to any phone lines. I told them that when Mr Kim arrives that they should be on the phones closing deals and mentioning high profile companies. I also asked my family to call and place orders at a precise time and not to stop until we called to say that Mr Kim had left.

It’s 10.45am and Mr Kim had arrived early. My palms were sweaty, my heart was beating and my legs started to shake. I had to calm myself down and prepare for the pitch of the century. The boys were ready, the order pads were out, phones were in their ears ready to take orders and my family were ready to call in 5 minutes to place orders…… Ok action stations here we go!

I greeted Mr Kim downstairs, shook his hand and walked him up the stairs to my office. The only two incoming phones lines I had were ringing off the hook. The sales guys were on the phones that were not plugged into anything pitching customers and taking orders. My family were playing their part in helping me secure the deal.

Mr Kim questioned me for almost two hours nonstop. The sales guys kept taking order and my family as requested kept ringing in. After about an hour someone took an order from my family, later I found out it was dad. The order was for 6000 jackets and I can remember saying to myself “calm down family”, that is an order for £120,000 and if they keep placing silly order like that, it’s going to blow my deal out of the water.

Mr Kim had questioned me about sales, marketing, manufacturing, ranges and design styles, colours and size ordering breakdowns. We had discussed import and export duty, ports of origin and ports of destination. In fact we had covered everything from fabric and the mills that would be making it to container sizes, shipping and warehousing costs.

I understood it all and had been studying about manufacturing for a long time and besides, both of my parents had inducted me into the world of fashion from about 10 years of age – Thank you mum and dad!

Mr Kim knew that I was buying jackets from a Company in London called The Cobles Company ran by a Jewish man called Lawrence Cohen. Mr Kim also knew that Mr Cohen was spending a good few million dollars in Indonesia producing the jackets. What I did not know is that Mr Kim knew his exact import numbers and had the use of the factory two streets away producing the same goods and he had his eyes set of Western Stardom and needed me to make his dream a reality.

Another 30 minutes went buy and I held my nerve and made Mr Kim believe that I did not need his imports. I finally shook hands and Mr Kim left the building.

What I had achieved in the last two and a half hours was this:- I secured over £2 million pounds of imported goods ordered and ready to be delivered in ninety days to my 20,000 sq ft warehouse. The beauty of the deal was this. I did not have to lay out a single penny security. I had just placed an order for £2 million pounds without a single penny deposit. To this day I have not heard of a deal being done like that by a guy of 24 years of age.

I had no warehouse, no customers, no distribution and no way of even financing the deal I had just signed. I had just ninety days to prepare to take a business from turning over £250k a year to a £3 million a year business.

I did just that and by 1996 I was supplying Walt Disney, Coca Cola, Wembley Stadium, Capital Radio, The Spice Girls and had supplied products to just every brand that you could imagine from food to drinks, pop and rock groups, formula one racing teams and SkyBSB. I built a blue chip client network that was the envy of the promotional clothing world. I was turning over £3.3 million pounds a year, had been approached by Dunn and Bradstreet for outstanding growth as well as Sir Richard Branson’s Fast track 100.

It all seemed to be going so well until the Far East Crashed in 1998 costing me over half a million pounds and everything that I had built over a 5 year period.

When you lose everything it hurts, but the extraordinary people get back up, learning from their experiences to go on and achieve greater things and that’s why – Everyday People Achieve Extraordinary Things.

 

Best Wishes

Bradley Chapman

Bradley Chapman launches online business coaching and mentoring program

I received so many responses last week from business owners and entrepreneurs who asked for my help with their businesses. I was inspired by the sheer amount of people who will not give up the fight to make their businesses a success and the diversity of different business offerings. I received emails and calls from such a large range of business sectors that it has inspired me to offer online coaching to a larger audience at a more affordable price.

Not everybody can afford my personal mentoring fees and I want to be able to pass on my experience to you. As a result, I have decided to launch a remote cost effective business coaching and mentoring service to assist business owners where budgets may be tight.

My new coaching service costs only £25 per month and you can subscribe and unsubscribe when you like. Over the coming months I am going to deliver a series of secured access, live and recorded webcasts, newsletters and emails that will my pass my knowledge and passion on to YOU!

I will also provide you with my mobile number so that we can chat when you need to speak to me. It may well be that you need motivation or you may need my advice or just a bouncing board to help you make a decision.

If you are serious about your business and wish to succeed then subscribe to my new service and be prepared to have your mind opened up to a whole new world of opportunity. I will deliver my skill knowledge and attitude directly to you. You will be then be able to put them into action immediately delivering positive changes for your business.

What you will get for your money:-

• A weekly live webcast that all coaching subscribers can join in and ask questions which I will answer. Each week we will cover a new topic from social media to business angel investment. The webcasts will be recorded and can be viewed at a later date if you miss the live version.
• A weekly dedicated mentoring newsletter that delivers topical business support and mentoring advice direct to your inbox.
• Weekly updates of recommended suppliers and contacts that will help you move your business forward as well as free business solutions that you can use to your benefit.
• All monthly subscribers will be listed with links in my personal blog to promote their company and website.
• Free unlimited business articles can be added to my networks business articles sections giving you valuable back links to your website.
• Every subscriber will qualify for their own entrepreneur interview which will be placed on the Raw Business website Interviews Section
• You will receive my mobile number for motivational chats, business advice and general support as and when required.
• You can put forward specific requests to me for webcast topics that will help your business now and in the future.

Subscribe Now to my coaching website

Areas we will be covering over the coming weeks:-

Social Media – How to use it to your advantage
Recruiting staff – What to look for and what to avoid
Business Planning – How to avoid the cash flow trap
Websites – Building costs effective web solutions
Brand Development – Creating a brand that is remembered
Outsourcing – Keeping costs low
Purchasing – How to reduce your costs and keep your profits high
Motivation – How to find it, keep it and use a positive flow for your business
Finances – Finding the right business angel and or investor
Cash Flow Management – Can factoring help your business
E-marketing – Create regular newsletters to build your database
CRM systems – Are you using the right one to grow your business
Telecoms – Phone systems, virtual and geographic numbers
Other Areas that we will be covering Include:-
Sales and Sales operations
Sales/ Telesales Training
Sales Manager Training
Full KPI review
Incentives/ Commission Structures
Full Media pack design and distribution
Review employment contracts/ co protection
Full product review and overhaul
Look at existing and new routes to market via in house/field operatives
Establish and consolidate your client base
Outsourced sales option

Marketing Mix
Assess Brand Strengths and weaknesses
Bring the company in line with all social media marketing
Evaluate website – key words and SEO, CPC Data collection and control for marketing purposes
Look at ways of promoting your brand via my network and published magazines

Operations
Bring the company and team together to improve work rates and work ethics
Asses all areas looking at time/ costs and managing effectively
Weekly/ monthly heads of dept meetings to review current situ and implemented changes
Evaluate all purchasing costs

I look forward to you joining my coaching sessions. Over the coming weeks I intend to connect my personal subscribers allowing them to network extensively with each other creating an inner circle of personally mentored business owners and entrepreneurs.

“One of my biggest successes was taking a company from £75k revenue per month to over £1.4 a month million a month within six months. I have over 20 years of direct business experience covering UK and overseas markets. I have direct high growth business experience that I am now offering to you”

Regards and Best Wishes
Bradley Chapman

For all enquiries please email mentor@rawbusiness.com

Bradley Chapman live and unleashed at Kent2020 Vision

Bradley’s Blog

Raw Business Magazine

Raw Business TV

Subscribe now to my exclusive online coaching and business mentoring service:

Bradley Chapman speaking at the Pre Conference Event for Kent 2020 Show

It is my great pleasure to announce that I will be speaking at the pre conference event for the Kent 2020 show in Kent, 29th March, on how to maximise your potential at trade shows. The event is going to be a blast and I am so wired at the moment that this session is going to raise the roof. Please find the details below and if you could attend, the Team at Best Business Events and myself would be pleased to see you there – If you would like to register at Raw Business please visit www.rawbusiness.com

Kent 2020 – Pre-Conference Event 29/03/2011 08:30

REGISTER NOW- Registration is free for this event

Description

Join in the largest networking event in the county where you will hear from a top business speaker on maximising the opportunities of Kent 2020. You will have yet another opportunity of meeting up with exhibitors along with registered delegates. A golden opportunity of promoting your business to hundreds.

FREE and exclusively for all registered delegates and exhibitors at Kent 2020 ‘11

Business Networking and Motivation
It will change your life

Maximise the opportunities of Kent 2020 using the power of business networking. A golden opportunity of promoting your business to hundreds – the largest networking event in the South East.

Presented by Bradley Chapman

	Bradley is engaging, passionate, insightful and a humorous speaker who brings businesses together with one goal in mind – to make them all successful at business.  He has over 20 years of business, business management and entrepreneurial business experience trading both in the UK and internationally for clients including Walt Disney, Wembley Stadium and Coca Cola. If I knew what I know now about the power of business networking I would have started years ago. I never dreamed that I would meet people like David and Jacqueline Gold, Charlie Mullins and Richard Fraleigh. The contacts that I now have means that I know just about everybody for everything. Everybody should network – it is now the essential business survival tool. ‘Bradley has great and personal insight into business and a wealth of anecdotes having interviewed many of our top business leaders’ Phil Hall, MD PHA Media Former Editor of The News of the World
	Just some of what Bradley will cover  • Belief is everything – How’s your Marmite? • Moving out of your comfort zones to discover the new you • What will networking do for your business? • Finding the motivation from within • The one penny motivation answer

Event Type:		Kent Event
When:		29/03/2011 08:30 to 10:30
Register:		29/03/2011 08:00
Venue:		Ramada Maidstone
Cost:		No charge

Bradley Chapman is the founder of www.rawbusiness.com – The Entrepreneur Network

Business Networking and Motivation – It will change your life?

It is my great pleasure to be speaking at this weeks Best for Business event in Kent. I love inspiring people and I am going to raise the roof on this one leaving all the attendees with a feeling of “I can do anything” when I come off of the stage. www.rawbusiness.com

Title: Business Networking and Motivation – It will change your life?
Presentation Time 40 minutes

http://www.bestbusinessevents.co.uk/ClientApps/Silverbear.Web.EDMS/public/default.aspx?tabid=36&id=42&orgId=1&guid=a7209313-5837-4cd7-a2a3-6c87bcce48e2

1. Who is Bradley Chapman?
2. Belief is everything – Hows your Marmite?
3. Moving out of your comfort zones to discover the new you
4. What will networking do for your business?
5. Finding the motivation from within
6. The one penny motivation answer
7. Q+A

Description

Kent Business Networking Forum – Membership is FREE

FOUR EVENTS IN ONE

• EXHIBIT FREE your goods and services – bring your stand, leaflets, pull-ups etc, no space restriction
• Network – Meet a minimum of 70 NEW BUSINESS CONTACTS
• Guest Speaker BRADLEY CHAPMAN who is determined and passionate with his unique style of motivating and inspiring businesses to prosper – not to be missed
• Plus from 10.45 am – 11.45 am FREE OPTIONAL SESSION on ‘How to spend less on Marketing’
The more business people you meet the more successful you can make your business, so maximise on every opportunity and be part of the Kent Business Networking Forum (Membership is FREE).

From the moment you arrive until the time you leave, you will be meeting new business contacts and with a little help from us you will be amazed at how successful you can be.

• A great way to meet new leads, clients and customers
• Provide opportunities to promote your services/products
• Enable you to meet owners/decision makers from many businesses
• Allow you to share and gain knowledge, expertise and contacts
• Opportunity to exchange ideas and experiences with others

NEW

Genuine offer for anyone who employs staff but time is running out. Stay on for our marketing session and it is very likely that you are eligible to attend at no cost to yourself a fully funded half-day Executive Masterclass on how to improve your marketing but spend less money.

On this intensive Executive Masterclass we only book on four attendees so you will receive maximum attention tailored to your business. This is really a unique opportunity to vastly improve your marketing.

Don’t miss out, book your places NOW

PERSONAL RECOMMENDATIONS

“Bradley is engaging, passionate, insightful and a humorous speaker. He has great and personal insight into business and wealth of anecdotes having interviewed many of our top businesses leaders”
Phil Hall – MD PHA Media, Former Editor of The News of The World

“Motivation plays an important part in any business owners career and if you are struggling to find yours, hear Bradley and he will fill you with energy that you can turn into bolts of lighting to positively impact your business”
Charlie Mullins -MD Pimlico Plumbers, Prince’s Trust, Enterprise Fellow

Guest Speaker: Bradley Chapman

Bradley Chapman believes that “Everything is Possible” if you have the right mindset and motivation to support your dream, goals and vision. He has faced and overcome major adversity in both his personal life and the various businesses that he has owned, managed and built during his career. He believes that everyday people can achieve extraordinary things.

MASTER YOUR DESTINY

Manifesting wealth and abundance should be easy.  However too often people are full of fear and anxiety and if you’re constantly worried about how things will turn out you are closing off the ways that money and abundance can actually come to you.

You shouldn’t have to struggle to make money or attract wealth.  Having more money makes your life easier and allows you to do many of the things you want.  But if you don’t have the wealth you want, if you’re not making the kind of money you want, if you’re not manifesting  wealth and abundance then you’re simply not sending out the right messages to have more of what you want.

Those messages are your thoughts and beliefs.  And whatever thoughts and beliefs you have about money and manifesting wealth will become a part of your life.

Unfortunately most people don’t believe they can make the kind of money they want and they don’t believe that they can be wealthy.

Why does this happen?

Well at some point in your life you developed a negative thinking pattern, This pattern was planted in your subconscious mind when you were younger and in all probability you’re not even aware of it.  You just know that you believe more in lack than you do in abundance.  That no matter how hard you try you just can’t ‘get ahead’.  That you don’t deserve it, you’re not worthy of it, that you have to struggle to succeed – and so you never achieve.

What’s happening is that your subconscious is creating your life based on those thoughts and beliefs.   You’re putting out the wrong signals.

Your subconscious simply follows your beliefs.  Negative or limiting beliefs about money have no purpose… they don’t let you get ahead or live the life you want and they certainly won’t let you become wealthy.

Those who succeed and enjoy their lives control their fear, they eliminate anxiety and panic by changing their focus and by thinking of how things will or can work out.   They have a belief in themselves and what they are worthy of.

If you’re crippled with fear it’s because you’re thinking of how things won’t work out or what could go wrong.

You don’t have enough information to be confident so your mind immediately focuses on what could go wrong.  No wonder you get scared.   Anybody would be crippled with fear if they focused on what could go wrong all the time.

So what do you do?

Change your thoughts.  Start thinking about how things could work out.  Push your mind to do things differently.  As your mind goes into a negative tailspin you feel trapped, you’re worried, uncertain, then the panic takes over, the fear cripples you and the anxiety overwhelms you. And if those worries are down to money – not having enough, not earning enough, not enough customers, whatever it might be, the more you think like that the worse it will become.

It’s not a way to live.

So what can you do?

Focus on what you want.  Think of how you would like things to turn out and fill your mind with thoughts of success.  If you stray, if your mind comes back and give you negative junk that leads to fear and anxiety change those thoughts.

Your subconscious mind will then pick up on these new thoughts and allow you to overcome the fear…  eliminate the anxiety and get rid of the panic attacks.

You need to eliminate and change any negative beliefs about money even if times are tough or if there’s a recession.

The truth is that in a recession people still make money.
People still find jobs in recessions.
Businesses do grow.
New businesses form during tough times.

Keep Changing those negative thoughts and limiting beliefs. Get rid of them.

How?

I help people change their negative thoughts and limiting beliefs with tapping, NLP and hypnotherapy.

When you have a thought that supports you those beliefs change .  It really is that simple

Getting rid of those negative beliefs once and for all, empowering yourself with positive powerful thoughts, doing this on a daily basis (the way you do when you worry !) going over and over things is THE ONLY WAY to bring changes in your life; bring you the life you want rather than what you’re struggling with.

Focus on what you want.  Feed your mind positive thoughts and create positive beliefs about making and building wealth quickly and easily

Negative self-beliefs thwart your self-image and cloud and shroud the light within.  You cannot live like that – You need to let your happy loving nature shine; let it out and be free.

In doing so you will find your life will change in all areas, and you will begin to manifest all your dreams with ease and start experiencing more of the love, happiness and successes you desire and deserve.

The truth is, you always deserve, whether you believe it or not, so you may as well believe it! Because…

The more you believe you deserve it all, the more you will receive

I can help you change those beliefs; I can help you move on, improve your life, make more money, give you confidence and self belief which will in turn bring you a brighter future.

Remember what you think about today becomes true for you tomorrow.

Get rid of those limiting beliefs before they cause more damage to your life.

CHANGE THE LIFE YOU HAVE FOR THE ONE YOU DESERVE

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skype: thewarenesszone

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Author: Adrienne Marks
Category: Business Coaching

Bradley Chapman delivers – Seizing the Day – Motivational webcast

Bradley Chapman - Entrepreneur

Good morning everybody

I felt totally compelled to record a live webcast this morning as i feel so alive with enthusiasm and energy. I wanted to share my thoughts with you on how you can seize the day. I love being an entrepreneur and more importantly i love helping business owners grow and develop their businesses.

If you do one thing today before you start work or you need extra motivation during your day then watch this webcast and i guarantee it will inspire you and help you deliver amazing results today.

Wake up and Seize the Day – with Bradley Chapman

You can view the video in the viewer below but i strongly recommend you click the link and watch it in the full video platform, which displays the powerpoint presentation slides.

View the full webcast platform here

www.rawbusiness.com
www.bradleychapman.com

www.rawbusinessmagazine.com
www.numbersourcer.com

An Entrepreneur called Icarus – Wings of steel not wax!

It’s been a while since I last wrote an entry on my blog and I apologise to all my readers, members and followers of my blog. Many of you have read my blog with interest over the last year or so and many of you have either come close to what I have experienced or have been directly affected by bankruptcy or administration of your businesses, while some of you have yet to embark of the wonderful journey of being an entrepreneur.

Either way we all dream of success and understand the challenges that we face in trying to make our dreams a reality. With 2.5 million people currently unemployed in this country and business failures at an all time high you sometimes wonder what our government is doing to bring positive change to aid the financial recovery of our great nation.

 Running the country is of course a business in itself and with the grips of recession starting to get behind us – are we really doing enough to support UK business owners and entrepreneurs, or can we do more?

We can criticise someone else’s decisions but it is only when we truly hold the wheel of the ship ourselves do we really understand what stormy seas can do to a man.

This is where a battle is either won or lost and strength is even grown or torn apart and relationships are either forged or ruined forever. It takes a greater strength than many could imagine or endure to navigate the perilous and unforgiving journey of running a business, especially if you have been or are building a business during a recession.

I name this entry on my blog “An Entrepreneur called Icarus” for a reason. We all know who Icarus was and of course his father Daedalus – Here is a recap:-

Icarus’ father, Daedalus, a talented and remarkable Athenian craftsman, attempted to escape from his exile in the place of Crete, where he and his son were imprisoned at the hands of King Minos, the king for whom he had built the Labyrinth to imprison the Minotaur (half man, half bull). Daedalus, the superior craftsman, was exiled because he gave Minos’ daughter, Ariadne, a clew of string in order to help Theseus, the enemy of Minos, survive the Labyrinth and defeat the Minotaur. Daedalus fashioned two pairs of wings out of wax and feathers for himself and his son. Before they took off from the island, Daedalus warned his son not to fly too close to the sun, nor too close to the sea.

 Overcome by the giddiness that flying lent him, Icarus soared through the sky curiously, but in the process he came too close to the sun, which melted the wax. Icarus kept flapping his wings but soon realized that he had no feathers left and that he was only flapping his bare arms. And so, Icarus fell into the sea in the area which bears his name, the Icarian Sea near Icaria, an island southwest of Samos.

The morale of the story here is this – When you start your business ensure that you can get the best solicitor and accountant that you can and ensure beyond a doubt that you have formed your new company correctly and you have all the correct statutory documents filled because if you do not then surely you will melt your wings and fall into the sea.

In 2009 it is expected that the number of business that failed will have doubled on last years figures. Could any of these businesses have been saved or is the simple truth that many of the business owners made decisions which resulted in their demise?

Whatever your point of view I believe that information, knowledge and support holds the key to preserving so many businesses now and perhaps may have prevented some of the business failures we have seen in the past – But who can provide this information and should the source provider be government run or should it be conducted in the private sector?

It is true that entrepreneurs combined with their courage and risk taking as well as their innovation skills and abilities play a major part pushing countries out of recession. Entrepreneurs create jobs, jobs create wealth and wealth is what recovers any country from recession – well that’s what I think at least.

Well back to the story of Icarus and his burnt wings! Well of course that’s me.

I had a dream in 2007 that I was destined to create an information, knowledge and support facility to help entrepreneurs and business owners increase their chances of success, decrease business failures and even help reduce the UK’s all time high unemployment levels of 2.5 million people.

Now lets get this into perspective if were to get all the UK’s unemployed people and put them into Wembley Stadium then we would need to fill it and empty it nearly 30 times to speak to them all. Add to the pot the 10,000 people who went bankrupt in 2007 plus the astronomical figures for 2008 and 2009 for both insolvencies and business administration and you have nearly the same amount of people as the population of Wales, Astounding isn’t it!

So why is it that entrepreneurs who risk everything to try and help increase business success rates at a great cost to themselves personally are sometimes so misunderstood?

There is a massive gap between the government supporting businesses from startup through seed stage and indeed growth and development. Of course there are business incubators and there are courses and mentors and if you look hard enough you may secure funding, investments and grants for your businesses – but what if the entrepreneurs that start these businesses are doing so without a high enough level of commercial acumen and business experience that is required in order to survive and grow? Well you get what we have now….

When will it change, when will the government realise that actually in order to increase business success rates that it is indeed entrepreneurs that are needed to teach aspiring entrepreneurs!

Give me 100 unemployed people from the DWP who have spirit, desire and will work relentlessly to build their businesses. FROM THE GOVERMENT I ask you to offer them funding so that they can survive and support their families financially and as long as they are not quitters, I will make winners out of them and even if some of their businesses do not survive, the process they will have opened up so many doors that they will surely not need DWP support even again – They will be innovated, motivated and will go on to teach their learning’s.

I have made my mistakes and I am sure I will make plenty more to come, but I always get back up even when I feel that I can’t walk or take no more. If the government will not answer then how about a TV production company, are you up for it and would you like to talk to me – I believe it and I know that I could do it.

You see we are not looking at the wider picture and it is costing our country million of pounds and it’s this.

TOGETHER WE ARE STRONGER

TOGETHER WE ARE WISER

TOGETHER WE ARE A TEAM

TOGETHER WE WILL GET THIS COUNTRY BACK ON TRACK

Dreams to Reality

Bradley Chapman Founder

Million Impossible
Raw Business Magazine
Entrepreneur School

Anne Milton MP to open Entrepreneur School Guildford 29th October 2009

I am pleased to announce that Anne Milton MP is to open Entrepreneur School Guildford.

Entrepreneur School – Guildford
Launches on Thursday 29th October and then every other Thursday at the same venue
Location: The University of Surrey
Tickets: On Sale NOW : http://esguildford.eventbrite.com

We now have a further 8 Entrepreneur Schools to go live during October and November 2009. |For further information about Entrepreneur School please click here

Million Impossible – The Entrepreneur Network

www.annemilton.com

Why does Bradley Chapman think that he can help Increase the chances of Entrepreneur success rates?

Bradley Chapman came up with the idea of creating a UK and potentially a World leading Entrepreneur based support business back in 2007 after he had been through some major personal adversity after breaking up with the mother of his two children. Bradley had been involved in a wide range of businesses and had worked 6-7 days a week for most of his working career but found himself not being able to find one place that he could go to that would provide him with a cradle to the grave entrepreneur support network to help improve his chances of business success. He found that there were singular specific facilities available on the market but not one all encompassing entrepreneur based support service.

Million Impossible’s online network was born during November 2007 with zero members – but Bradley had a big dream that one day the company would become a world leading Entrepreneur Authority. Million Impossible have now progressed the business and offer both online networking (Million Impossible) , face to face networking (Entrepreneur School) and publish a business Magazine called (Raw Business Magazine) which features high profile Entrepreneurs like Rachel Elnaugh, Duncan Banatynne, Doug Richard and Max Clifford – The journey Is far from complete!

With the launch of Entrepreneur School Chelmsford in June 2008 and with 10,000 registered online members the business now has 10 ES school areas planned to go live during October and November 2009 with UK wide coverage planned by the end of 2010. Each school is run by an ES leader, who is also a Million Impossible online networking member. Attendance levels range from 15-30 people per event (held every two weeks) . As the exposure grows and the word spreads so will our attendance levels….

But that is not the final picture!

The company plans to open 3 regional Entrepreneur training centres during 2010 – one in the north, one in the midlands and one in the south. The residential training centres will be called “Entrepreneur School”. The schools will be syllabus lead with experienced and established entrepreneurs teaching aspiring entrepreneurs how to start up their business (safely). There will be a second tier syllabus for companies established under 2 years and a third tier master class for established business.

The Overall Aim!

To provide start up business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs with comprehensive start up knowledge using an initial training course. Upon leaving the course they gain automatic membership to an online network of 10,000 online contacts (continually growing) to do business and network with. The third benefit is Entrepreneur School local events which provides the Entrepreneurs with face to face networking opportunities – In fact everything that a business would need to start, grow and succeed!

Indeed cradle to the grave… or as Bradley suggests “Dreams to Reality”

YouTube VideosBradley speaking at the British Library “Inspiring Entrepreneurs”
Million Impossible at the “Business Startups Show”
“Entrepreneur School launch”

Million Impossible is currently building a new GLOBAL business networking website which is due to go live during Jan/ Feb 2010!