Peter Wilkinson Speaks at Inaugural Tech Dinner, KPMG, Leeds

Peter Wilkinson Yorkshire Tech Entrepreneur

Graham Pearce, Director at KPMG in Leeds, invited me to the inaugural Tech Leeds dinner with guest speaker Peter Wilkinson. Peter started off in the tech business back in 1974 and, whilst not being very academic at school, he started his first business selling potato chips to students before it was shut down. His costs were a potato peeler and and some potatoes – he still claims it to be one of his highest margin businesses to date. Whilst Peter was not the most academic at school, he probably had the most pocket money.

On the issue of Entrepreneurship – “Are Entrepreneurs born or can it be learnt?” – Peter believes it is something you are born with. Peter’s success has meant the creation of over 7,000 jobs and this is one of the things he is most proud of. His philosophy was to start a business, get it to a certain size and then sell it or hand it over to professional managers for the repetitive operational management. Peter is very much a creative personality full of both ideas and the determination and energy to make things happen. He admits it isn’t getting any easier, and you need to get the timing in business correct. Sometimes you can be too early.

Peter got involved with game-activation with Sky set top boxes and pressing the red button. This is now commonplace, but at the time it was ahead of the market and so it failed. In failure, Peter expresses, you need to be able to write off the failures, learn from them and start again.

Peter’s involvement in telehealth and MedTech came from the fact that a work colleagues was spending ridiculous amounts of time visiting the hospital for health checks. Focusing on the problem, Peter developed an application to automate this process without the need to go to hospital, saving time, money and the inconvenience.

At 61, Peter is nearing the end of his career, and he openly admits his next two projects will be his last. One project is to put Wi-Fi networks into football stadia and the other is a telehealth app aimed at reducing the burden on the NHS. The NHS now has 70% of beds taken up by the elderly and the more of this care which can be done outside the hospital, the better for the healthcare system, which is already under pressure.

Peter is very humble in his achievements and downplays his intellect – he only got one A level in Ancient History and failed everything else! Peter is also a proper Yorkshireman, telling it how it is with no waffle – he is direct and to the point.

The founder of Freeserve has been involved in many tech success stories in Yorkshire including Sports Internet, Planet Online and InTechnologies, and he bought Hull City Football Club before selling it a few years later after Hull’s promotion to the Premier League. Peter has also made a donation to Leeds University and the incubator facility, helping seed fund many university spin-outs and start ups which show much promise.

On TechNorth and the Northern Powerhouse, Peter says the North needs a “Boris Johnson-like figure”, and without it there will be too many egos and clashing of agendas rather than the joined up thinking of a figurehead to drive it forward. Peter considers himself politically neutral but admits the transport infrastructure needs to be better to make the Northern Powerhouse happen.

Peter, when questioned by KPMG’s Dermot Callinan (Partner and Head of UK Private Client), explained the importance of respect and good old-fashioned traditional values. He also warned of the entitlement attitude and the potential threat of the emerging economies, where people have to work hard or they are fired. Peter stated he would like to see more big businesses and corporates buying from small to medium sized enterprises. He feels we have evolved into a risk-averse culture where corporates only buy from corporates.

On the issues of talent, Peter commented on the fact that most talented people are already running a business. The people left are hard to find and are a rare breed. Dermot commented that this talent is really the differentiator between growing a business with A-players and not making the grade. It was openly admitted that there is a shortage of tech skills in Leeds, and an example of this is Sky Bet, a company Peter sold to Sky. Sky Bet is now having to find its tech talent not only in Leeds but also in Sheffield due to shortages.

In 1974, Peter explained, tech was quite narrow, but now it is all-consuming and very broad. There is great demand for tech talent and it cuts across many industries – be it smart TVs, MedTech, FinTech, EdTech – the list goes on. So when you talk about tech, you need to ask what sort of tech do you actually mean, as all businesses are becoming tech businesses.

All in all, it was great to meet and connect with other Yorkshire tech businesses such as York Data Services, AQL, Fleet On Demand (FOD) and more. Peter shared words of wisdom from someone who is very much a private person – he rarely does public speaking. Peter joked this is the first tech dinner talk and probably his last. Peter prefers to spend his time with the peace and quiet of the North York Moors. Silicon Dale, after all, does not have the earthquakes that you get in Silicon Valley!

Yorkshire Post UKTI International Business Roundtable

Exporting Yorkshire

The need for the right skills dominated a roundtable discussion which I attended at the Yorkshire Post headquarters in Leeds.

A group of Yorkshire businessmen from a diverse range of industries met with Greg Wright, Deputy Business Editor of the Yorkshire Post, for a discussion on International Business, sponsored by UK Trade and Investment.

Alongside the Post’s delegation other people attending the roundtable included Stephen Crow (Business Development Partner at Clarion solicitors), David Wragg (Operations Director of Hargreaves Industrial Services), Mark Parks (Managing Director of Boston Air Group), Colin Russell (UKTI), Jim Hart) CEO at OneGlobal) and Daniel Hughes (Director at Turner & Townsend).

Starting off proceedings, Greg asked questions regarding selling the Yorkshire brand overseas. Do foreign firms buy from you because you are a Yorkshire business? Daniel Hughes, of Turner & Townsend, responded that it wasn’t the fact that the business was Yorkshire-based which decided why customers should buy. However, Daniel went on to state that the region did have positive connotations around the character of the people of the County and their trustworthiness. OneGlobal’s Jim Hart added that being a UK business in terms of USA trade was deemed as a negative, because Americans preferred to buy local.

UKTI advisor Colin Russell added that Indians might know of the “brand” Yorkshire due to the deep roots of cricket. Nonetheless, Colin went on to state that, fundamentally, customers want to know you have the knowledge and skills to deliver a quality service. The Yorkshire brand adds colour to the UK story but it’s ultimately about what you deliver. Mark Parks, founder of Boston Air (a recruitment business focused on the aeronautic industry), went on to say it’s easiest to start exporting British into North West Europe. David Wragg of Hargreaves Industrials went on to state that the Yorkshire accent is notable, and people do ask where the accent is from when you’re abroad.

Greg then challenged the group on the importance of getting the right skills. Daniel responded that the key barriers to doing international business were mobilisation issues. Jim Hart stated the importance of selling in the local language and having a local website presence. When you are trading with a foreign country, you’ve got to be committed to it and localise your products and services.

Exporting Yorkshire

Some of the bigger challenges around international business, highlighted by Mark Parks, were deemed to be around the issues of regulation. Another businessman added the importance of understanding the culture of the country and how to deal with people.

Everyone attending the roundtable agreed that service exports, which were once traditionally done by the largest plc companies in the UK, are now being seen by mid-market firms. Quite often, what happens is suppliers follow their clients from one country to another and this is how internationalisation occurs. UKTI suggested the importance of Yorkshire businesses collaborating and learning from each other.

Daniel Hughes went on to reflect on the importance of having the right partners and being very selective when it comes to finding business partners overseas. Once you find the right partners you can then scale up your business.

Greg’s final question was to ask us what tips we would give to other businesses looking to export around the world.

Here’s a few snippets of the best pieces of advice for going International:

UKTI advised to go for easiest markets first e.g. North West Europe.
Jim Hart – Commit to one market at a time.
David Wragg – Go to the top of an organisation when selling abroad and find the right decision makers.
Stephen Crow – Make sure you talk to UKTI.

Personally, I think businesses should start small and scale fast. The difference between a good business and a great business is whether it is international. We now live in a global village and, with cheap air travel and the Internet, it has never been a better time to get started.

Connecting knowledge with those who need it…

Research shows that more than 70% of employees use search engines to learn things. They use their smart phones for just-in-time solutions to improve their performance. Of course searching on the web does not give your company’s specific context.

How often do you send an article link or a YouTube video in a email for a colleague to see? What if you could track this across your organisation? What if you could see what other colleagues are searching for? What if all learners became content curators?

We all have a calling in life and quite often this is our vocation. Of course, if you love your work you’re always trying to get better through learning from others. That’s why, over a number of years, we created Promatum. Pro in latin means “In” and Matum means “The Call”. Promatum is a tool that helps you and your peers improve in your given calling.

Promatum provides just-in-time, social learning, to take your organisation’s performance to the next level. We created Promatum in collaboration with Fortune 500 companies to enable a bottom-up approach to learning.

The above diagram demonstrates how new members of staff need the traditional LMS to provide them with induction and compliance training. Once a member of staff is established and competent in their job, less formal learning can be used to drive value. Promatum can be used to capture the knowledge of the top 20% of your staff and then share this with B-players to turn them into A-players. Perhaps the platform could even help C-players become A-players! Equally, you can share knowledge outside your enterprise within your supply chains or distribution channels using the same technology and generating similar competitive advantage.

Promatum allows you to:

Harness devices already in your workplace
Capture knowledge on the job
Promote contextual learning
Deliver “bite-size” learning
Promote sharing of knowledge
Embed learning within daily routines

What’s unique about mobile devices in a learning context is that most people already check in several times per day, as part of their daily routine, so they’re the perfect vehicle for embedding learning as a day-to-day activity rather than something for training days and other “special occasions”.

The only sustainable competitive advantage is the ability to learn and apply the right stuff faster. Using smartphones to deliver learning has been so effective that participants now take their courses in about 45% less time.
Some of the benefits of Extended Learning Enterprise are:

Quickly update customers and resellers about new product launches, or changes to products (e.g. software)
Track compliance of franchises and other VARs to ensure they are providing the best advice to customers
Reduction in support costs using e-learning
Creating an active community around your product and services
Learning and Development becomes a profit centre as they are able to provide sales training to their VAR

You can learn more about Promatum, a new product by Webanywhere, at www.promatum.com

How teachers can do what technology can’t, BETT 2016

Sean Gilligan with Tom Starkey

Having just been at the BETT Show in London Excel, one of the most interesting talks was chaired by Tom Starkey, a teacher and columnist for the Times Educational Supplement. He was joined on stage by guest panelists Miles Berry (principle lecturer for computing education at Roehampton University) and Maurice de Hond (founder of the Steve Jobs School).

The discussion was somewhat controversial subjected on “How teachers can do what technology can’t.” Some in the profession (and this isn’t just limited to education!) fear that computers, robots and indeed artificial intelligence (AI) will replace them. The advent of machine learning and the ever-changing and fast-evolving technology landscape means things like driverless cars are just around the corner, and with the internet of things, people may be less needed. Indeed Miles Berry stated that the chances of a school secretary being replaced by a robot were 65%. However the replacement of a primary school teacher was 9% and a secondary school teacher just 1%.

Miles argued that if robots can do the repetitive, low level tasks, then why not let them? This would then free up teachers to do the more important tasks of teaching and learning. After all, if marking can be automated then why not allow for this and free up more time for lesson planning?

Tom Starkey and Miles Berry BETT 2016

Teachers are needed for helping with creativity and curiosity, as well as building pupils’ character. Teachers are needed and don’t need to worry about their employability. What’s more important is the employability of their students in a digital world. It’s the learning process which is key, and the relationship between the teacher and the learner.

Agile methodology works for software developers, so why not teachers? Students need to be curious, challenge authority and be creative. Teachers should be courageous and set an example to their pupils as role models. Miles suggested that agile software development works in business, so why not therefore apply it to the classroom. Why not let teachers and learners have 10% of their time during the week free to teach what they want to teach, or for learners to learn what they want to learn?

Miles Berry and Tom Starkey taking questions at BETT 2016

Our future workforce need to work with computers and robots, not against them. Teachers are not going to be replaced by computers any time soon. Computers and the internet are here for enhancing learning outcomes and transforming education. As Sugata Mitra said in his BETT keynote earlier in the week, “freedom and collaboration are key to creativity.” Knowing “stuff” will be obsolete, because “you plus the device” means you know everything – there’s already evidence that the ability to rapidly look information up on search engines is impacting how we store and remember information. “I know” is irrelevant. It’s how we apply the knowledge to create new businesses, new ideas and the jobs of the future that’s what’s important. Sugata suggested assessments should be shifted to the employer rather than at the end of school. To establish real change, you would need to change the assessment system in schools.

Below is a short video of the BETT 2016 discussion on “How teachers can do what technology can’t.”