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Steve Jobs has really only become an influential figure in my life, within the last couple of years. Getting access to his products, especially my iPhone, have made me a happier person. How is that possible? – I don’t know, but I am not alone.

He will be missed by many and it is a sad way for him to leave us.

Here is an inspirational talk he gave in 2005. Very inspiring for me and I hope for you too – its emotional but that is actually a good thing.

Enjoy:

Here is a link to my latest blog post on Prat Perch. It’s been an exciting few weeks so just sharing an update.

This is a good article by Elias Chelidonis. It tells the partial story of his internet start-up, although which one is not named. It seems like he had good success but in the end was a victim of that success. The lessons learnt and shared by people like Elias are really great. Each case is unique, each business unique but I try and learn from everyones story, and hope to give a little back to this community myself through my blog on the Prat Perch journey. Enjoy.

Read the article but his points are summarised below – yes there are 13 but you could argue some over lap …

1. Paid too much attention on web design – keep it simple
2. We had a solution for everyone, consumers, businesses, free users – be specific
3. We had very low prices. This was one of the most crucial mistakes.
4. Focused on growth and not profitability – focus on profit.
5. We did major changes in the user interface without asking our users first – don’t surprise customer. keep it simple.
6. Did not hire support team and did not have in place a good support platform – put support in place early.
7. Wasted time trying to be acquired – don’t bother.
8. Did not have a good backend system – be able to interrogate what’s happening in the business at all levels.
9. Did not keep in touch with our users – keep in touch via email.
10. Had too many features – keep to 4-5 core features

1. How fast your business can grow – Have option to scale instantly (i.e. per minute).
2. Be prepared for the unexpected – Backup
3. How service would be a year from launch date – be prepared to change

This is a theory I have been working to. It is a process for selling consultancy services and one that aims to side step the hourly / day rate hurdle completely. Its a concept, an idea and a way of approaching this thorny subject. Credit for its inception must go a friend of mine who is working as a Director at a major consultancy firm, although, interestingly this isn’t they way they do it. I like the idea so thought I would put it in a slide and share it.

Please let me know what you think, or try it even and let me know how you get on.

How to sell consultancy?

UPDATE: “I work for myself and have a number of different types of role.” – just an idea?!

A seemingly innocent and easy question. It is one that I, and I assume everyone, asks and gets asked, whenever we meet people.

In the past, for me at least, this was an easy question to answer – “I am a car designer”. This response acted as somewhat of a filter so that if people were genuinely interested, they would ask more questions and, if not, they’d continue talking about themselves.

Now, post-MBA, I find it much more difficult to answer this question as, to be quite honest, I have a few roles. Not wishing to bore my audience with a whole life story every-time they ask this seemingly innocent question sometimes proves a challenge.

The simple answer is “I am an entrepreneur”. The issue with that is that the definition of entrepreneur means different things to different people, much more so than car designer. It largely also implies that you have one thing that you’re focusing on and, in my case, that is simply not the case!

Another answer is “I have a number of hats depending on who I am talking too”. Now this just sounds shifty! It is true but needs the audience to have some imagination and genuine interest, which of course, they may not.

A third answer is “I am a business consultant”. Again true but so vague as to be almost irrelevant, plus, business consultants seem to be regarded in society as only one step down from estate agents, double glazing sales men and bankers; all full of fast flowery talk, expensive and offering no tangible benefit to an organisation.

Society expects you to have just one role, one identity, so that people can easily box you. This boxing has also been coined “personal branding” in management consulting speak, because it partly represents what activity people instantly (and subconsciousness) think of when they think of you. Clearly one has a lot of control over this, at least within boundary’s, so its worth thinking about because it could make a big difference ultimately to happiness and quality of life.

I have (at least!) four roles currently:

- a business consultant (focused on strategy, marketing and business planning).
- a business development guy (selling engineering software),
- a business owner (offering online marketing, website / app design, web hosting and SEO) and,
- an entrepreneur (looking for market opportunities to develop & sell my own products).

If that were you, how would you answer the question “What do yo do”. Comments welcome

As a nascent entrepreneur myself, I was interested to find this new nascent entrepreneur website.

The website is work in progress by the sound of it but definitely something I would be interested in joining, if its put together well – I have sign-up for up dates at least.

This link gives a great visual representation of the UK population. It shows male / female numbers, aged 1 – 85years old. Most interestingly, it shows how the profile has changed and will change over time – between the 1970′s until 2080′s !

Having come from an automotive engineering world where simulation has long since been adopted as the way to improve operational efficiency and reduce costs of design and manufacture, it is surprising to discover lower adoption in other sectors, industrial or otherwise.

Recently I took on a new customer who is in the engineering software sales field. They offer solutions to automotive but also in any industrial sector; aerospace, energy, motor sports etc.

This has led me to really think about simulations place and what the benefits really are. Have we all been duped by awesome software sales teams (possibly), or, (as it more probably) does simulation provide a tangible and quantifiable benefit to business capability and therefore its competitive advantage?

The fundamental physics of mechanics, fluids and electrics don’t change so why has there been lower adoption of simulation in other industrial sectors so far?

Its a question I don’t have a definitive answer too, at the moment at least, but its something I am now deeply considering for my new customer.

As ever, I would welcome your comments.

Currently doing some background research. This is a great little animated graph showing population distribution over time, past and present.

It is the eagerly anticipated start to the F1 season and the first race is at Bahrain, somewhere I spent the very early years of my life. This video shows Mark Webber in the RedBull F1 simulator (something not often shown to the public …) driving the new for 2010 circuit layout.