18 October, 2012, by Steve Upcraft
A Fishing Trip?
Can early stage businesses gain useful knowledge and successfully grow their organisation by interacting with a virtual network of ‘experts’ and the wider business community?
Will these entrepreneurs be able to ask for advice in public and will the ‘experts’ be willing to share their knowledge freely in an open forum?
These are just a few of the questions the new Ingenuity ‘Fishbowl’ will attempt to answer over the coming months.
Two local businesses and a social enterprise have teamed up with an extensive panel of experts drawn from the Greater Nottingham business community and the University of Nottingham. Their combined objective is to stimulate additional growth for the businesses – the ‘Fish’ – through an interactive on-line exchange environment – the ‘Bowl’.
The technology to make this happen will be ready by the end of October 2012 and the bowl will go live on the Ingenuity site by mid-November,after which the forum will be open for anyone to add comments and hopefully become regular contributors to the Fishbowl.
Will it work? If the initial meeting between the Fish and the Experts is anything to go, by there is little doubt it will quickly develop into a lively exchange of questions, suggestions and comments – the acid test is however, will the businesses gain valuable insights and grow their operations.
Have you been involved in a similar process? What are your thoughts? We’d welcome your comments.
Additionally, to learn more about the Ingenuity Business Network please follow the link.
BAC-IN Line and Form Progenitor
David Jammeh Shahid Younis Leonie Winson James Rowe
Laura Hutchinson Darren Gent
The level of enthusiasm at our workshop on Wednesday was fantastic – it seems this will be a very interesting project . I am very much looking forward to the launch and working with the fish as the finance “expert” with a customer communication / retention and content management twist.
This is a real opportuntiy not only for the business ‘fish’ but also for the experts to showcase their expertise. Will they be brave enough to give indepth insight into their own tricks of the trade? Come back and watch!
I just wanted to say that the team at Funding People CIC are really excited about working with our new friends & colleagues, as part of ‘In a Fishbowl’. TEAM – Together Everyone Achieves More (looking forward to sharing)
For me it’s great to be involved with the University’s ‘Ingenuity’ programme again, as I was involved in its early development, from a funder’s perspective. It’s great to see life after the grant funding is long gone.
I’m also thrilled by the challenge of learning all about Blogs, Tweets and stuff. Ludite I’m not, and I’m keen to see how this technology can benefit our own business. So thanks Fishbowl for giving me the nudge towards the 21st century that I needed.
From ProGenitors perspective, the most exciting aspect of the project is the access to a resource pool that overcomes the deficiencies in our own skills and experience. How many other small businesses have such a fantastic breadth and depth of knowledge at their disposal.
Many thanks for the opportunity and support.
Positive start today with ProGenitor. Focus on your lead customers to be clear what they buy and why. Use that knowledge as the basis for scaling up through finding more of the same. ‘Markets’ are not defined by ‘sector’ but by the problems customers experience. Don’t sell a solution until and unless you can be sure it addresses the customer problem.
Thanks for the guidance. As engineers, we are very good at providing answers to problems we are presented. The lesson learned yesterday as you eloquently described in your blog, is first making sure that we understand the customers definition of the problem rather than an interpretation that fits our products. We are already working on this.
Darren you asked me about visiting a number of Schools on a casual basis to talk with the staff to better understand their processes and the administrative challenges faced. Two linked approaches a) personal and b) strategic:
a) if you have personal contacts with schools (i.e. your kids go there or your old schools) use them. Try to see the Head, but the School Business or Office Manager will know the day to day issues they face.
b) Schools link together in clusters made up of Primaries and the Secondary they feed in to. When you have met your personal contacts and have discussed their needs, ask them about you talking to other Heads or Managers. They have cluster meetings that you could present to. You don’t need to be selling a product, but ‘researching’ what schools need to make their lives better.
NB: not all schools are managed in the same way. More are becoming academies, controlling their own budgets and less controlled by the Local Education Authority (LEA = usually County or City Council). So research the individual school, most have their own website. Some can make their own decisions, some need to go through the LEA. A good place to start your research and get info on individual and clusters of schools is http://www.education.gov.uk/edubase
Focus on their needs and benefits to them, not just the features of your product.
Engineers work different to Marketers. Qualified in both what does that make me? Getting the balance right from both disciplines is what makes Innovation different to Invention. Innovation = a great idea commercially exploited!
Here we find ourselves at the beginning of a journey with In a “Fish Bowl” and already I’m getting out of my comfort zone! Much easier working with lifers in prison than facing a camera…..
The past week has been very busy for all the staff at BAC-IN, on Wednesday 14th November we celebrated the birthday of our 9th year of service. The celebrations involved staff, volunteers and service users and was held at our office on Mansfield Road. Festivities included inspirational testimonies, plenty of food to share around, cultural dancing, fireworks and of course a birthday cake. It was really important for us all to come together as a family on this special day to celebrate the achievements of not only BAC-In, but our service users too. It was a special day for us all, and one that will not be forgotten.
We are part of a consortium called Recovery In Nottingham (RIN) which will be delivering substance misuse services (SMS) within Nottingham from 1st January 2013. As an organisation this will be a challenge as it will require many adjustments personally and professionally to “fit” the new service specifications. Applications for funding will play a major role in the on-going life of BAC-IN. How can we well represent our organisation to potential funders? How do we keep our integrity and client-focussed mind-set whilst pursuing funding opportunities – and thus satisfying funders priorities too?