You can find out more and book a place at http://cambridgenetworksocialnetwork.ning.com/events/andrew-campbell-on-why-good

[Update: Jo Whitehead will be giving this talk, not Andrew Campbell]

To find out more, go to:

http://www.cambridgebusinesslectures.com/louise-makin-on-leading-teams-in-challenging-times/

Alain will explore the joys and perils of the modern workplace and raise the big questions we all tend to ask of our work: what is the right job for me? How can I make the best of my talents? What should I be aiming for in my career?

The event is free, and there will be an open bar afterwards. To find out more, go to:

http://www.cambridgebusinesslectures.com/alain-de-botton-on-the-pleasures-and-sorrows-of-work/

David was Head of HR for the SAS Institute, the world’s largest privately held software company. David helped grow SAS from a handful of people into a world-class employer with over than 5,000 employees and a billion dollars of annual revenue, all the while consistently keeping SAS in the top 100 companies to work for. Since leaving SAS, David has consulted with organisations including American Express, Johnson and Johnson and the CIA.

To find out more and book a place, go here.

If you’ve got any ideas for speakers for next year then let me know.

Read more here.

Bird – the founder of the Big Issue – has no romantic misconceptions about the people he is helping. Those who interest Bird are not the protagonists of the fairy-tale success stories much loved by politicians. He does not care about the people who achieve despite the odds, but rather the people whom the system fails: the feckless, the crooks, the addicts and – to use Bird’s description – the scumbags.

Bird was born into this underclass, to an abusive father and sweet-natured but viciously racist mother. He was homeless by seven. By his early twenties he had served sentences for vandalism, arson and theft. The underclass in John Bird’s youth was small though - some two hundred thousand people, Bird reckons. He now puts the number much higher – at five million.

And what is responsible for this swelling? According to Bird, it’s the welfare state. The welfare state steals from the poor. It robs them of their initiative. By handing people money we destroy their sense of responsibility and snuff out any spark of entrepreneurism. We reduce them to the state of seven year olds, dependent on other people to survive.

Bird believes that people need opportunities not hand-outs. He uses The Big Issue as an example. The sellers buy the magazine for 70p and sell it on the streets for £1.50. This gives them something to do and creates a chance to earn money. Most importantly, it puts them back in control of their lives.
But Bird points out that opportunity is a double-edged sword. Some people will use the Big Issue to lever themselves out of poverty, but others will simply pour the profits down their throats or inject them into their veins.

If things are going to change, Bird believes more people must apply their entrepreneurial skills to cracking social problems. The politicians will do nothing. Indeed, they refuse to acknowledge the reality, claiming soothingly that everything is fine, not to worry and that all that needs to be done is being done. But nothing changes.

Bird told the largely middle-class audience that we are complicit in keeping the downtrodden in poverty. We need to stop our conscience-salving donations to Shelter and Crisis, and instead repossess democracy and make a difference.

Bird’s passionate speech went down well with the audience. Scott Devereux, of Red Gate Software, said “I was expecting a dry, academic history of The Big Issue, but John’s talk was incredibly engaging and almost profoundly enlightening”.

At the free bar after the event there was near unanimous conviction that Bird had succeeded in making people challenge their assumptions. Not everybody agreed with the substance of his talk though. Bill Parsons, of ARM, said “I disagree with most of what he said, but he really made me think. He was the Johnny Rotten of business speakers.”

This was a strong, second lecture in the Cambridge Business Lectures series. Future speakers include Arnoud De Meyer (Director of the Judge Business School) and Tim Campbell (the winner of the first UK series of The Apprentice).

Thanks Greg!

According to Arnoud, we all know how to innovate don’t we? You need a good idea, a bit of hard work to solve the technical problems, a good business plan, a bit of money, and the world will want to buy our better mousetrap. It sounds easy. But why is it that so many excellent ideas fail? Or worse, why is it that the people who copy the innovation are often more successful than the innovators themselves?

Read more, and book a place.