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Joe Sinclair (Creative Director of Burson-Marsteller) will lead a workshop on Tuesday 22 May 2012 from 17:30 to 19:00 on the subject of creativity in business. The session will explain:
Address: Central St Giles, 1 St Giles High St, London WC2H 8AG
To book, please visit: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/2873882861
If you have any misgivings about whether you can afford to start up and run a business, Jo Tall will happily meet you for a preliminary consultation. Off To See My Lawyer are proud to have successfully helped launch many small businesses – but equally we take pride in our honest and realistic advice. If we consider that you will be taking too many risks (– financial or otherwise) we will let you know.
Here is a non-exhaustive checklist to help you assess whether you can afford to start a new business:
While the intended outcome of employing staff is to increase your profits, employees add to your list of burdens and liabilities. You will need to draft contracts of employment, deal with relevant taxation issues, invest in time (and perhaps money) in training your staff, etc.
Where: O2 Workshop, 229 Tottenham Court Road , London W1T 7QG
When: 12 June 2012 from 10:00 to 14:00
How much: £65.00
Johnny Martin has extensive experience turning around businesses such as Baring Venture Partners, JO Hambro and Monument Trust.
Mr Martin will be leading the Getting To Grips Workshop, offering financial advice for setting up a business, working with accountants, raising capital, and cash flow management. Attendees are asked to bring their laptops!
To book your place, visit: www.women-unlimited.co.uk/getting-to-grips-with-finance-worksho/ (Note that for £65, you will not only get to attend the workshop, but you will receive a few added extras and bonuses!)
British educational institutions are increasingly encouraging students to launch their own businesses by providing bursary schemes and training courses in entrepreneurship. For example the University College of London runs a technology entrepreneurship masters programme – and it offers a one-year scholarship, where students with existing business concepts can test their ideas to see whether they will work.
If British Universities are successful in their endeavours to produce a new generation of entrepreneurs, the UK economy will of course benefit. One thing to bear in mind, however, is the fact not all University students in the UK are British. Therefore the UK Border Agency has just launched a graduate entrepreneurs’ visa, in order to enable non-EU students to remain in the country for an additional 12 months after graduating, if they have an idea for a business venture.
There is a long-held belief that American culture fosters entrepreneurship more readily than European. Due to the relatively weak welfare state and liberal free-market economy of the USA, Americans are perhaps more inclined than Europeans towards starting enterprises of their own, and taking risks. The Fulbright Commission are promoting an educational exchange programme with the UCL, for American students interested in enrolling on the UCL’s technology entrepreneurship masters programme. It may seem a little perverse that American students are being encouraged to come to the UK to learn about entrepreneurship. However, by enticing foreign talent into the UK and facilitating their chances of staying, Britain may start to lead a new wave in entrepreneurship! Only time will tell…
Social media such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and You Tube have proved invaluable as conduits for successful on-line businesses. Julie Hall (founder of Women Unlimited and Springmedia), will be running a workshop aimed to introduce you to this subject, and provide you with basic operational know-how – so perhaps you too could become a social media entrepreneur!
The workshop will take place on 15 May 2012 from 10:00 to 16:00, at O2 Workshop, 229 Tottenham Court Road, London, W1T 7QG; and costs £125.
If you are interested in attending, you can book a place via this link: http://www.women-unlimited.co.uk/social-media-strategy-workshop
Off To See My Lawyer are cheered to hear about yet another woman who has turned an adverse situation into a business!
It was only two years ago that Sarah Turner was first diagnosed with breast cancer, and had to undergo chemotherapy which caused her hair to fall out. Dissatisfied with the existing market for unflattering headwear and uncomfortable wigs, Ms Turner decided to come up with her own designs and pitch them to various British milliners. She now runs her own on-line business, Elizabeth Rose (http://www.elizabethroselondon.com/) selling fashion-led headwear for women with hair loss. Ms Turner writes on her website, “I am delighted to be able to give you an exciting seasonal collection twice a year. My aim is to bring you style and a little bit of joy and confidence back.” 
Off To See My Lawyer would be interested to hear from you if, like Ms Turner, you have a good idea for a product and the necessary motivation to market and sell it – but perhaps lack the skills and resources to actually manufacture the product in the first place. We now have such an admirable client base of female entrepreneurs, we may be able to help you source an appropriate business associate to complement your own skills! For any such assistance, please contact Jo Tall at jo@offtoseemylawyer.com.
We all know that Britain’s economy is in need of a boost, and the optimistic among us expect a renaissance at some point in the not-too-distant future! Amid this tense anticipation, more and more alternative funding options, and attractive business savings account deals are emerging – so now could be a good time for businesses to “shop around” for advantageous deals.
Partly as a means of encouraging a resurgence in business activity in the UK; and partly in the hope of capitalising on the future success of UK businesses, Britain’s high street banks and building societies are vigorously promoting their business savings accounts. Business savings accounts are in fact expected to grow by about 25% over the next five years.
In addition you may wish to consider the loan services of reputable organisations other than banks, such as Funding Circle. Since its foundation in 2010, Funding Circle has loaned more than £28million to 670 British businesses. Funding Circle has recently received a £10million boost, as it is now being backed by Index Ventures and Union Square Ventures.
Britain’s copyright licensing system has been the subject of a fair amount of criticism of late.
The V&A, for example, complained they’d spent 125 working days and £14,000 in order to track down the copyright owners of 270 still images for one of its exhibitions.
Similarly an educational institution, Scotland’s Colleges stated its members had faced various problems when endeavouring to get permission to use teaching materials from nine different copyright-collecting agencies.
Complaining about the labour intensiveness and expense [ie. around £10m a year] of conducting copyright clearances, the BBC issued a statement that they “would like a copyright licensing regime in place which reflects the needs of a digital converged world – a world increasingly dominated by high-volume, low-value transactions as opposed to the low-volume, high-value transactions that were a feature of the analogue era”.
The Government responded in November 2011 by appointing Richard Hooper (a former deputy chairman of Ofcom) to investigate whether the current copyright licensing system was “fit for purpose”. Mr Hooper’s final report will be submitted to Vincent Cable in July 2012, when he is expected to recommend the creation of a “Digital Copyright Exchange”, or some other industry-funded solution.
Based upon his research so far, Mr Hooper states that the system needs to be “streamlined”. So far he suggests that copyright information relating to a range of different industries should be collated and stored in a database, which will then be made accessible to small and medium-sized businesses. The intended outcome is to “drive economic growth across the UK’s creative and technology industries”.
Location: Broughton House, Northamptonshire
Date: 13-15 July 2012
Businesses may be saved the expense of rent and overheads by trading on-line, but some business owners prefer the traditional idea of renting real estate and creating a physical presence on the high street. Many such traders are enjoying the fact an increasing number of buildings are becoming vacant as a result of commercial chains closing their branches in the high street. It is becoming increasingly possible for small businesses and entrepreneurs to rent spaces for a short duration in order to set up a temporary shop, for the purpose of helping establish their brand and attracting customers. Thus a new culture of small “pop-up” shops is being generated.
Co-founder of the fashion business Red or Dead Wayne Hemingway enthuses, “we are seeing a renaissance of a variation of the serendipitous market.” Since 2007, Mr Hemingway (alongside his wife and the HemingwayDesign team) have run an annual festival which celebrates the history and influence of British creativity.
This year’s Vintage Festival will take place in July, at Broughton House, Northampton. At the festival Mr Hemingway wishes to recreate a “vintage high street” as “a place to promenade, shop, watch street artists, eat and drink and just sit and take in the magic of the high street, with the authenticity of a film set, in the middle of a wonderful landscape” and thereby ignite a new enthusiasm for the traditional British high street.
For more information, visit http://www.vintagefestival.co.uk/.
Prior to May 2011, the owners of UK websites were legally permitted to set up a system whereby small data files called “cookies” could be automatically installed onto the hard drive of the computers of any visitors (to the website). These cookies record the on-line browsing activities of the visitor – both for the essential purpose of facilitating certain transactions (such as the sale of a product), and for the less essential purpose of targeted advertising.
On 25 May 2011, however, the UK implemented new EU Regulations which essentially require the consent of the consumer/ website user before a cookie is installed on his/her computer. The Regulations recognise the fact that certain information needs to be retained in order for an on-line transaction to take place. Therefore it qualifies the rule by applying it to any personal information which is not “strictly necessary”.
The UK authorities allowed for a 12-month “grace period” which is due to end on 26 May 2012, which means that a breach of the new law could mean a monetary penalty – and in some cases even a criminal prosecution, if deemed serious.
Of course, Off To See My Lawyer adapted its template Privacy Policy in time for 25 May 2011, and we have been advising our clients accordingly – so existing clients need not be concerned about the end of the 12-month “grace period”. For any prospective clients, however, please contact Jo Tall at jo@offtoseemylawyer.com for advice on how to comply with this E-privacy law.
