Innovation Masterclass Series is Right OnCourse following First Event
Over 60 guests of Nottingham Development Enterprise were treated to a masterclass from two of Nottingham’s prominent business innovators last night (23rd March) when the OnCourse Innovation initiative was launched at Experian’s Embankment House.
Chaired by a local broadcast journalist in an informal Question Time style, John Saunders, chief executive of Experian, and Patrick Hughes, strategic business development and marketing director at ClinPhone, discussed the importance of innovation in their respective businesses and the wider economy.
In what was a relaxed event, Saunders and Hughes swapped anecdotes and lessons on the formative years of their respective companies before going on to discuss the future role of the emerging markets of India, China and Eastern Europe in their plans.
Following this, the discussion was opened up to the floor covering a range of topics from advice on patents, venture capital and how to get started to developing staff skills, team-working and nurturing an innovative company culture, market awareness and research.
The OnCourse Innovation project aims to offer ideas and inspiration to local managers by bringing them in to contact with and learning from successful business innovators.
Both Saunders and Hughes were fulsome in their praise of Nottingham as a business location, with a strong pool of employees to serve their businesses. John Saunders said: "Some years ago we were perhaps unsure whether Nottingham would be able to support our forecasted growth. However, there's been a dramatic improvement in the availability of an educated workforce and Nottingham has been and will continue to be of immense value for us."
Hughes was also quick to praise Nottingham, saying: "We are now a big employer in Nottingham and we have never found recruitment for our jobs, in what is a knowledge intensive area, a problem at all. The vast majority of our employees are educated to degree level but we essentially recruit for attitude and train for skill."
Hughes went on discuss the importance of establishing a robust structure within an organisation, in which its research and development team deliver products and services that are actually needed by the market, noting that: "R&D was a misnomer for some years at ClinPhone. We were doing a lot of 'D', but little 'R'. Understanding our market was essential in getting us to and keeping us at, the forefront of our industry."
The crucial role of market awareness was echoed by John Saunders, who said: "As an industry leader, whatever you are doing now, your competition is probably copying. So in three months, you better have improved and moved on. We effectively 'sell-in' our products before we invent them. We work on our ideas with our customers, thereby helping to de-risk the process. I also personally spend at least 10 hours per week researching our competitors."
Feedback on the event from guests was positive, Richard Dearden, chief executive of Nottingham Business Venture, described it as "an excellent evening with two interesting speakers and good networking opportunities."
If you are interested in attending future events, see our overview of events or phone 0115 934 9584 or email sb@nde.org.uk.