Become a Non Exec in a small business

More than ever SME’s are seeking out Non Executive Directors as an alternative to other support mechanisms offered by consultants or organisations such as Business Link. It is not the case that a capable Executive Director can slot immediately into a NED role. It’s rather like saying that a good footballer can walk into a [...]

Friday Rant – flying without wings

The title of my blog today is taken from a recording by West Life that sits on a short CD on which another title is “You raise me up”. I just happened to see the cover of that CD on a shelf in my office this evening and I was struck that these two titles [...]

Best Practice Corporate Governance in the SME

We have a public course running on this very important topic on 25th May at our training room in Romsey. We deal with the new 9 Principles from the IOD and provide you with a superb framework for assessing your own company and rating it in terms of its approach to governance. By enrolling on [...]

Lord Sugar and Football Governance

I watched Lord Sugar and his programme about governance in the Premier League. I was not in the least surprised; more dismayed that the rules the rest of us in business need to observe are conveniently suspended for the LA LA Land that is football This is the blog I penned about a year ago [...]

It’s Friday – and it’s a reflective rant

The end of this month, and then leading into May, has seemed somewhat like an extended holiday interspersed with the odd day at work. I am far from being an anti-holiday apologist, but I have to say that this staccato pattern disrupts the normal rhythms and the regular ebb and flow relationship between work and [...]

Thoughts from Harvard on Governance

Harvard Law School Forum 10 April 2011 Four Steps for Boards to Take to Improve Performance and Gain Shareholder Support Even in this changing environment, the essential nature of the board’s job remains management oversight – specifically, overseeing the performance of the CEO and the senior management team to enhance the corporation’s long-term prosperity. While [...]

My rant today is about late payers

Running a small business involves high degree of risk, and almost every owner/manager I speak with sees the greatest risk of all as that relating to cash flow and balancing incomings and outgoings. And here there is widespread duplicity. It’s all fine and dandy to be energetic in collecting, but if that is a right [...]

Getting to be a world class board in a SME

World class boards requires world class people no matter the size of the business. The 2006 Companies Act is the longest and most complex piece of legislation passed by Parliament, or indeed, by any Parliament in the world. At 1,300 sections and 16 schedules it flies in the face of the government’s attempt to reduce [...]

I rant; You rant; He rants;We rant; They rant

Conjugating Latin verbs with the added complexity of a seemingly endless number of tenses was not one of the highlights of my teenage years and was, I felt, a distraction from spending time in front of our newly acquired Defiant brand mono TV. At that time, no matter how I rationalised my thinking, I could [...]

Positive energy and the “Can Do” attitude

Last night I had dinner in a superb restaurant overlooking Bournemouth Bay with someone who shall remain nameless. The dinner itself was excellent but what I have really taken away from the time spent was the sheer energy, positive spirit and hunger for success of my dining companion. I have written in the past of [...]