Welcome to the Make Your Mark campaign’s Enterprise Insights where only the most interesting enterprise developments and stories are delivered to you fortnightly.
 

Creating enterprising places

The Global Competitiveness Report 2009-2010 (World Economic Forum - html)

The UK has the thirteenth most competitive economy in the world, according to a report by the World Economic Forum. Despite slipping one place from the 2008-2009 ranking, the UK still compares favourably to other major economies – particularly in the areas of innovation and technological readiness. Business executives interviewed as part of the report suggested that access to finance, bureaucracy and tax are the most problematic factors for doing business in the UK.

Creative Industries UK (UKTI – pdf: 6MB)

The UK has the largest creative sector in the EU – and its advertising industry is leading Europe in the number of start-ups – according to a report by UK Trade & Investment. Highlighting successes within the UK’s creative industries – by sector and region – the report suggests that ‘as a leading international centre for innovation, R&D and entrepreneurship’ the UK economy will continue to perform well in this area whilst promoting ‘socially responsible and environmentally sustainable innovation’.

Real-world education and skills

Skills policy in the UK needs to be assessed and adapted in light of changes brought about through the recession, a new report by the Learning and Skills Network argues. The current system of training provision, developed following the Leitch Review, has proved to be short-termist and insufficiently demand led, the report suggests.

Growing good business/ social enterprise

Powerful People (David Lammy MP/Demos – pdf: 164 KB)

The recession offers an opportunity to redress ‘the rampant commercialisation and powerlessness’ that has defined western capitalism for the past twenty five years, Government Minister David Lammy MP has argued in an essay for Demos. Lammy argues that new models of ownership, such as co-operatives, as well as empowering consumers to make ethical decisions, will help to ‘reconcile the prosperous economy with the good society’.

Speakers' corner

Enterprise Insights was joined this month by four of the UK’s top young entrepreneurs who have all started businesses providing opportunities to young people. In these three videos, they bring their knowledge, experience and dynamism to some serious policy questions, looking at;

• How the economic climate is affecting young people
• Whether entrepreneurship features enough in careers advice
• Whether we can encourage more entrepreneurship in the UK

In the media

Political parties need to draw up their own Entrepreneurs’ Manifesto in advance of the next General Election, Richard Lambert, Director-General of the CBI, has argued. As well as targeting structural barriers to entrepreneurship, policymakers must address the ‘cultural and psychological barriers that hold the UK back’ – with Lambert highlighting the success of the Make Your Mark campaign in addressing this.

The Government has announced its partnership with the Federation of Small Businesses to provide 10,000 internships in small and micro businesses for graduates to boost their employability skills and ‘embrace ambition and British enterprise’.

The Government is providing £1 million in funding for 5,000 graduates to receive support and guidance in starting a business, in order to harness the ‘entrepreneurial spirit of our new generation of graduates’.

Queens University, Belfast has been named the ‘Entrepreneurial University of the Year’ at the Times Higher Education Awards.

7 out of 10 young people believe that anyone can set up their own business – yet two thirds of those with a business idea have never sought out advice or information to develop their idea, research for Business Link suggests.

Nominations for the 2010 Queen’s Award for Enterprise Promotion - to recognise those who have played an ‘outstanding and significant role in promoting enterprise skills and attitudes in others in the UK’ - close at the end of October.