The Britannia Conference 2011 was held in Cardiff, and rather have a succession of individual speakers Britannia brought the whole of a day's business session into a 90 minute workshop. A welcome evening opened the first night and a black-tie dinner the following evening, the conference did not just have parties but an awards ceremony too.
The Britannia companies gathered for their annual conference in June, this year in the vibrant city of Cardiff. For those of you who have not had the pleasure of visiting Cardiff recently, perhaps it’s time you gave it another try. The city has enjoyed a multi-million pound regeneration in recent years and this, combined with some knock-on benefit from Dr. Who no doubt, has contributed to what was a drab city becoming a real hub of activity and excitement. As an illustration, the Britannia members were treated to a procession of naked cyclists taking part in a charity event, trundling by in broad daylight. Most, of course, averted their eyes but did, it is rumoured, spend rather a long time on YouTube afterwards engaged in ‘professional research’. No connection presumably.
No, of course, not. Britannia was much more concerned with the business at hand with a somewhat re-designed business forum all on the theme of ‘Develop and Prosper’. Instead of the usual string of presentations Britannia sandwiched an intensive business workshop between two entertaining and informative speakers – of which more later. Steve Jordan, editor of The Mover, had been given the job of facilitator which meant that he had had to perform his usual ‘cat herding’ party piece to keep everything on track which he achieved in his usual practiced way. Gavin McCarthy later reported that it was the first time in living memory that a Britannia conference had finished on time.
John Dilks, Britannia’s Chairman, started off proceedings with introductions and thanks, followed by an overview of the conference programme. Most significantly, the announcement that Mark Tresler had been appointed Britannia’s managing director having previously served as the company’s financial director. Mark would, later in the day, have an opportunity for his inaugural address in his new role.
Mark Tresler, Gerard Burke, Nick Hewer,
new Britannia managing director from Your Business Your Future right-hand man to Lord Sugar in The Apprentice
Your Business Your Future
Steve Jordan introduced the first speaker, Gerard Burke from Your Business Your Future. Gerard runs his own business development company in partnership with the Cass Business School in London. His message was clear and straight-forward (it’s not often those two words are used in the same sentence as ‘business consultant’) and it would have been hard for anyone in the audience not to take away a few nuggets back to their business.
Gerard’s presentation revolved around what he called his ‘Seven Pillars of a Better Business’. Space does not allow us to go into detail in these pages but broadly the pillars are:
- It’s up to you: Your business is the way it is today because of you. If you want a better business you need to be a better manager.
- Know what you want: Make sure you know what you want from your business then design and build a business that gives those things to you.
- Become a strategist: Don’t spend all the time working in your business or meddling with what other people are doing. Work on the strategy.
- Know where you are going: If you don’t know where you are going you won’t get there. Get yourself a business plan.
- Stick to the knitting: Identify what you are good at and do it well. Don’t get distracted by diversification.
- Master the right numbers: Don’t be a busy fool. Get the right numbers at your fingertips and the right level of financial support for your business.
- Build a better team: Get the best people, with the best skills and give them something to do that they enjoy.
Gerard has kindly offered to contribute articles to The Mover magazine from time to time to give everyone to opportunity of his wisdom. If you’d like to contact Gerard directly, you may do so via his website: www.yourbusinessyourfuture.co.uk
The Workshop
Rather than have a succession of individual speakers Britannia brought the whole of a day’s business session into a 90 min workshop with members choosing which subjects interested them most and switching every 20 minutes or so. Steve Jordan then had the interesting task of summing up the discussions on each of eight tables for the whole audience in 10 minutes flat. The whole process was certainly high energy but nobody wasted a moment and everyone had the chance to speak to experts about subjects that were important to their businesses and bounce ideas off each other. The subjects on discussion included: Search Engine Optimisation; Commercial Moving; Van Hire; Increasing Shipping Revenue; Document Storage and Shredding; and much more.
By the end of the 90 minutes everyone was gasping for breath but had learned a lot and enjoyed the experience immensely. Other conference organisers might be well advised to consider such a change for their own events in future.
Left: facillator and expert cat herder, not to mention editor of The Mover Steve Jordan; other pictures: delegates during the 90 minute workshop, which was scheduled as an alternative to the more usual succession of expert speakers.
Nick Hewer
Nick Hewer, Lord Sugar’s right-hand man from The Apprentice, was the keynote speaker. Nick had actually arrived the evening before so the Britannia members had had the chance to pick his brains, and share his wine I’m told, until the small hours. As it happened there was no real need for the brain picking as Nick was, once on stage, at least as forthcoming in the cold glare of daylight as he had been in the more informal setting of the previous night.
Although Nick had spent much of his working life as a PR man, handling clients such as the Aga Kahn, Securicor and, of course, Amstrad, he kept his talk strictly Apprentice focussed. He described how Lord Sugar had dragged him out of semi-retirement to take a position in the public eye in, what turned out to be, the immensely successful BBC series. He told of when he recommended to Lord Sugar that he should inject a little glamour into his campaign to land the Apprentice role as the initial meeting had gone badly. Lord Sugar then flew the production team out to his Spanish villa and locked them in until they agreed he was the right man to do the job. That was also when he convinced Nick to join the show.
Nick did explain that The Apprentice is TV it is not supposed to be reality. “We don’t pick the most intelligent people in the world, if we did the show would be boring and nobody would watch. We pick people that we feel will work together to provide good entertainment.” He also said that there is a serious side to the show that most people don’t appreciate. Referring to the sometime inept actions of the contestants he said: “If the guy sipping is Stella, who’s been unemployed for months, thinks he could do better, we’ve achieved something.” It was a different way of looking at an entertainment programme as a social motivator, an interesting way of looking at it.
Everyone enjoyed Nick’s performance although some of it would have gone over the heads of those who were not familiar with the show, and the overseas visitors did look a little bemused but, all in all, he provided good value and many smiles. Many of those who had not previously included The Apprentice on their viewing list resolved to give it a go.
Asked how long he would continue working on the show Nick said: “Not forever.” But it was clear that he had found a niche and he wasn’t planning on making any changes in the foreseeable future.
Mark Tresler, in his new role as managing director, took the anchor role at the end of the conference. He painted a realistic and up-beat picture of Britannia’s position with a resumé of the company’s recent performance and objectives.
Party Time
Britannia certainly knows how to throw a party and the 2011 get-together was no exception. In fact here were two parties, one on the opening night and a black-tie dinner the following evening at the Millennium Stadium. The welcome evening included a karaoke opportunity for the brave and talented. Ray Inskip from Red Recruit did a fabulous Gerry Lee Lewis impression and John Mitchell from Pluscrates did equally well with Mustang Sally – talents that they had both kept well hidden until that moment.
The dinner celebrated Britannia’s 30-year anniversary and guests were invited who had played a formative role in the organisation’s development including David Tracey, Bill Walker and founder member of Britannia, John Court. Angus Russell did a fine job as MC and auctioneer and David Trenchard gave a bouquet of flowers to Jenny Horner who was celebrating her 65th birthday. To mark the 30th anniversary of Britannia, John Court, who had been there at the company’s inception, cut an anniversary cake specially prepared for the occasion.
Awards
Britannia honours its great and good every year at its award ceremony. Trophies were awarded by John Dilks and Nick Hewer. This year’s winners were as follows:
Quality performance awards
Domestic International
Winner: Thomas Casserlys Winner: Beckwiths
Runner-up: Sandersteads Runner-up: Leatherbarrows
Sales performance awards Shipping performance
Winner: Sandersteads Winner: Leatherbarrows
Runner-up: Robbins Runner-up: Beckwiths
Quality performance award international runner-up Letherbarrows. Quality performance award runner-up Sandersteads.
Quality performance award winner Thomas Casserlys. Quality performance international winner Beckwiths.
Sales performance award winner Sandersteads. Sales performance award runner-up Robbins.
Shipping performance most improverd Beckwiths. Shipping performance winner Leatherbarrows.