Liverpool

Is Greed Good?

Greed is good

Boris Johnson evoked memories of Gordon Gekko, the character from the iconic nineties movie ‘Wall Street’ in his address to the Centre for Policy Studies this week. Delivering the annual Margaret Thatcher lecture, the London mayor called for the Gordon Gekko’s of London to display their greed to promote economic growth.

Perhaps Boris has forgotten that in the award winning Oliver Stone film Gekko, who was superbly portrayed by Michael Douglas, ends up being prosecuted for fraud!

Nonetheless, the essence of Johnson’s assertion is that inequality is essential to fostering “the spirit of envy” and hailed greed as a “valuable spur to economic activity.”

If that is true then I’m afraid I find it more than a little depressing. If all that motivates people to work hard is personal gain and financial reward, then we as a nation are knackered.

At the Downtown Liverpool annual business conference last week, the keynote speaker was Andrew Rosenfeld.

Andrew sold his real estate business for £600m in 2004. He told delegates how he had built the business through blood, sweat and tears, and that he was immensely proud of the fact that his efforts had enabled him to provide financial wealth and security for him and his family.

Since 2004, Rosenfeld has led the most successful children’s charity appeal in the UK, working on the NSPCC’s Full Stop campaign and raising more than £200m. He has also started a telecoms business that donates a significant chunk of any profits made to not for profit organisations.

Rosenfeld is an entrepreneur through to his very finger tips. But is he greedy? I would suggest not, and having earned his fortune he has gone on to actively find ways of helping others.

It is this type of entrepreneurial spirit that we should be celebrating and encouraging. I don’t think the term ‘greed’  represents what drives most hard working business owners in this country – certainly not those who I have the privilege of knowing and working with.

Providing working opportunities and good careers for people; offering young people a chance in the workplace; contributing to the local economy; being a good role model for their peers and their children; building a business to be proud of and self esteem, all figure much higher on their agenda than ‘greed’.

Of course, we have to turn a profit. The bigger that profit the better. We all probably dream of selling a business for £600m one day. That is aspirational and ambitious rather than greedy in my opinion. But what drives you to get there should not be greed unless you are a bit of a tosser.

If he is to fulfil his ambition of being Prime Minister one day, Boris will need to tame his narrative.  Being the amusing oaf and entertaining London’s chattering classes with swipes at those with low IQ’s, whilst bigging up the unacceptable face of capitalism may win him plaudits from Right Wing Tory backwoodsmen and some in the South. But it is an approach that is likely to alienate many outside of the Southern belt, or put another way, the parts of the country that the Tories need to win over if they are to secure a parliamentary majority.

To use another famous Wall Street line, Johnson will fail to ‘bag the elephant’ if he can’t learn to temper his language and distinguish what he is saying from Thatcher’s assertion that ‘there is no such thing as society’.

Liverpool makes welcome return to MIPIM

MIPIM

After a two year absence Liverpool has decided to return to the Cannes property festival MIPIM next year and it is a move that further indicates the city’s ambition to maintain its push to develop a world class brand.

The decision has come about, partly, as a result of lobbying from the private sector. At Downtown’s ‘It’s Liverpool Business Conference’ in 2012 a number of delegates urged the mayor, Joe Anderson, to re engage with the MIPIM event, and Deloitte partner Sean Beech made the case for Liverpool’s presence here.

As well as MIPIM being a welcome addition to the range of platforms where brand Liverpool can be marketed and promoted on the international stage, the festival has been increasingly used in recent years by other English cities to collaborate and present joint initiatives.

Leeds, Birmingham and Manchester shared a platform at MIPIM in March, and I am sure that the core cities will find a number of issues to come together on and co-operate at the 2014 festival.

There will be the usual naysayers who protest that during a period of austerity, when local authorities have to find millions of pounds worth of cuts, investing in initiatives such as this, and even the forthcoming International Festival of Business which the city is hosting in the summer of next year, ought to be scrapped.

I would argue that because of the shrinkage of Liverpool’s public sector, funding for activities that will potentially lead to much needed private sector investment to fill that vacuum is justified more than ever before.

If we are to genuinely build a greater Liverpool, the city needs to be all over MIPIM and festival’s like it.

If you want to join the conversation about building a greater Liverpool CLICK HERE for details of Downtown’s 2013 ‘It’s Liverpool business conference’.  

Work Hard, but Play Hard too

Work Hard Play Hard Too

Over the past couple of months Downtown has hosted hugely successful business awards events in Manchester, Lancashire and Liverpool.

Every gala dinner has been a sell out. The response to the on line polls that we run were busier than ever. The winners and nominees were absolute quality.

In terms of the day to day stuff that Downtown does as an organisation, awards dinners may be seen as the fluffier end of the business – but they are no less important for that.

Throughout the year we work hard to provide B2B introductions that enable businesses to grow through sales and improving their connections across the business community. This work has led to literally hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of business being done across our network.

In addition, we provide the private sector with a genuinely independent voice on issues that matter to them, whether it is the way our city regions are governed, through to what type of business support initiatives ought to be offered.

On the strategic agenda we have discussed and debated governance structures, the UK’s future within the EU, transport and digital infrastructure, business finance, regeneration and HS2.

For business development purposes, our members have had the opportunity to hear from leading entrepreneurs and business gurus such as Deborah Leary, Andrew Rosenfeld, Michael Finnigan, Emma Jones, Ajaz Ahmed and Andy Bounds.

We have facilitated direct engagement with the public sector with key decision makers regularly addressing Downtown forums, with contributions from the city leaders and chief executives from Liverpool, Lancashire, Manchester and Leeds; plus regular meeting with government ministers and shadow ministers.

Indeed, through the course of the year, we have hosted over 120 events – and less than a dozen of them have been awards events, or indeed ‘sexy networking’.

But awards, sexy networking, playing hard and celebrating success are all as equally important as those more obviously serious elements of what we are about.

Because if you can’t let your hair down and have a good time; if you can’t say a big ‘well done’ to the business leaders and entrepreneurs who have kept going and excelled through the toughest recession we have known; and if we just did the lobbying, straight business deals and politics, Downtown would not include that vital ingredient that marks us out from the crowd – FUN.

Footnote: A great comment from leading entrepreneur Andrew Rosenfeld, who spoke at our Liverpool conference yesterday. In the UK we are too quick to write off those who fail in business. In the States, they see failure as part of the entrepreneurial journey. He’s not the first one to point this negative British attitude out, but he is the first one who has made the statement having sold a company for £600million!

Grow your business with BOOST

Boost Business Lancashire

Whatever you thought about the now defunct Business Link, and let’s be honest its performance was hit and miss at best, the fact is that at least it offered an impartial ‘one stop shop’ as a sign posting agency for business support.

The coalition government scrapped Business Link, along with Regional Development Agencies three years ago, and ever since there has been a general concern about the lack of focus as far as business support programmes in the North West is concerned.

Indeed, one of the more regular conversations I have with Downtown members is around their confusion about the myriad of business support projects, initiatives, funding and agencies that have sprung up over the past twenty four months.

The absence of an organisation that can offer you genuine impartial support and guidance on what is out there and what will suit your business best has been sorely missing – until now.

The Lancashire Local Enterprise Partnership has launched an absolutely fantastic initiative to help the county’s business community identify what business support exists and how we can access that support. Everything from how to access finance to marketing and sales is covered through the excellent ‘Boost’ project.

Aimed at those entrepreneurial companies who are determined to grow, Boost offers a range of services, including an exciting events programme and a comprehensive website outlining how you can access business advice and support from leading private and public sector agencies.

‘Boost’ is underpinned by the Business Growth Hub, and in the coming months I am confident that this will significantly contribute to the county’s ambitious agenda of economic improvement and an increased appetite to encourage enterprise and entrepreneurship across Lancashire.

As part of the ‘Boost’ events programme Downtown Lancashire has teamed up with Lancashire Business View to host what promises to be a first class conference in the autumn. The ‘Lancashire Business Growth Conference’ will feature presentations from business leaders, academics and decision makers – and offer delegates the opportunity of voicing their opinion on what a ‘growth’ agenda for Lancashire should include.

To learn more about Boost and the Business Growth Hub go to www.boostbusinesslancashire.co.uk

The Liverpool Echo

Liverpool Echo

The Echo is a Liverpool institution, so Downtown did not take lightly the decision to undertake a poll last week that asked if the local newspaper’s front page headlines had a damaging effect on the city’s reputation.

The vast majority of those who participated in our poll, around 300, believe that it does, and that in itself is cause for concern. You can view the results here.

The reason we undertook the poll in the first place came as a result of consistent complaints from our members during and outside of our events over the past six months, many expressing the view that the constant barrage of crime related front page news headlines was a cancer in the city that was sapping confidence within Liverpool’s indigenous community and potentially putting off potential inward investors.

Of course the Echo can legitimately point to the fact that our poll was taken by only a tiny percentage of people in comparison to its own very healthy readership. It may also argue that the poll was not as representative as, say, a MORI led focus group.

But I think that the gut instinct of Downtown’s members and wider network is a pretty decent reflection of what many in the private sector think, and so I have written to Echo Editor Alistair Machray and asked him if he will meet a few of us to discuss our concerns. I have also offered him the right of reply in TFI, which seems only fair.

As a business organisation that wants our city to continue to grow and progress, we recognise that a successful local newspaper is important. In this city we are fortunate that we have another great title, the Echo’s sister paper the Liverpool Post, and both media outlets not only offer valuable media services, but quality jobs and a significant contribution to the local economy.

Nonetheless, as a local newspaper, we believe that there is a responsibility to balance the need to sell newspapers with a duty of care to the city and its image. Many of the Echo’s front page headlines in recent times don’t reflect our modernised, regenerated, transformed city.

I argued in this blog (Does Bad news Sell?) that the Echo was out of step with the city’s new found confidence and a more upbeat Liverpool community. I still believe that to be the case.

The Echo is not the enemy though. Indeed if we were to ask the question, ‘does the Echo stick up for the city against outside knockers’ we’d have had an equally resounding YES vote. If we’d have asked if you trust the Echo, I think the result would have been positive. And in its campaigning work from ‘Stop the Rot’ to Hillsborough, the Echo deserves huge credit.

But it doesn’t get everything right, and the balance between reporting the good and the bad on its front pages feels to be out of kilter to us at the moment – and those who took our poll last week seem to agree.

I look forward to meeting Alistair to have a constructive conversation about the issue, and I’ll let you know how we get on.

Finally, to the guy from Trinity Mirror who phoned our PR agency last week and told them that Downtown should not expect be getting any coverage in the paper anytime soon, I’d simply say this – don’t shoot the messenger!