#BI21.3

Working to the format of a festival, our line up comprises LIVEstream content, LIVEtalk discussions, LIVEtalk Forums, and our festival fringe events.

LIVEstream

Our LIVEstream programme is broadcast from a host venue, scheduled over the two festival dates. Panel discussions, expert comment, keynote advice around topical and relevant business issues form the creative business programme.

LIVEtalk - Forum

Our sector specific LIVEtalk forums are a boardroom style discussion chaired by a sector professional with invited guests from the same sector. The Forums are held on a video conferencing platform, they offer a valuable strategic overview, they tackle topical issues and also provide ab opportunity for an audience to learn, ask questions and become better informed on the sector business.

LIVEtalk - Discussion

Our LIVEtalk discussions on a video conference platform bring a topical chaired discussion with experts, key opinion, and thought leaders in a discussion with an audience who have an interest in the subject and want to explore further.

Partner Events

Hear from some of the great businesses who are contributing to our Online Festival of Business & Innovation across the two days packed full of content from across Gloucestershire and wider.

#BI21.3

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High Streets – Back to Business

Wednesday 19th May | 10:30am

Lead Participant: Sam Holliday, Development Manager, FSB

Having spent over 25 years in the regional media – 15 of which was as an editor and director at amazing newspaper groups in the Midlands (Tamworth) and the South West (Bath) – Sam became a Development Manager for Britain’s biggest and most successful business representation group the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) in March 2013.

Sam works to help and support the thousands of FSB members who run small businesses, are self-employed or have that entrepreneurial spirit throughout the Gloucestershire and the West of England area.

Event: 

The future of our High Streets has been the subject of debate for many years. However, that debate has never been more urgent with the pandemic potentially changing everybody’s shopping habits forever. So, can the high streets fight back or will they need to fully change to ensure their survival?

Sam Holliday from FSB Gloucestershire and the West of England, will host a discussion with experts on this issue looking at, for example, how a hybrid approach could see digital and traditional retail work together to keep shops alive and how non-retail developments – such as the University campus replacing Debenhams in Gloucester – could bring new life to town centres and create more opportunities for independent outlets.

We are all interested in our local community so this event is not just for retailers or would-be retailers – it is for anyone who cares about the role our high street plays for local communities, local businesses and the local economy.

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Visitor Economy – International Opportunities

Wednesday 19th May | 12:45pm

Lead Participant: Steve Gardner-Collins, Director Visit Gloucestershire
Other Participants: Roger Mackrill, Director, Sabre UK Ltd

Steve is an experienced and highly motivated tourism & hospitality Sales Director with the drive, passion and enthusiasm to inspire and lead others.

He enjoys leading a sales culture throughout business and is a marketer with experience across design, digital and social platforms in multifaceted environments in local, domestic and international markets.

Steve describes himself as an Organiser, a team player and a champion for well-being, diversity and inclusivity.

Event:

As the Visitor Economy starts to open up following a very troubled 2020 into 2021, we ask ourselves what the international opportunities might be that we can take advantage of?

Our partners from Visit Gloucestershire and Sabre UK Ltd Host a panel from the Gloucestershire Visitor Economy and wider to explore opportunities to grow the sector not only within the UK but in a wider context as well.

As we plan for recovery and growth in the visitor economy following Brexit & Covid, what part does international trade play from sports, through the Arts to education and Uk Vacations?

Gloucestershire is host to international sport events, premium and internationally recognised education and the Cotswolds are a magnet for foreign visitors.  How do those sectors interrelate?

We’re looking forward to a good discussion and some innovative thinking.

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Visitor Economy – Business & Environment

Wednesday 19th May | 2:45pm

Lead Participant: Steve Gardner-Collins, Director Visit Gloucestershire

Steve is an experienced and highly motivated tourism & hospitality Sales Director with the drive, passion and enthusiasm to inspire and lead others.

He enjoys leading a sales culture throughout business and is a marketer with experience across design, digital and social platforms in multifaceted environments in local, domestic and international markets.

Steve describes himself as an Organiser, a team player and a champion for well-being, diversity and inclusivity.

Event:

As the visitor economy starts opening back up in 2021, what part does it play in the response to the climate emergency?

Gloucestershire Hosts some great visitor attractions, events and is centred in the Cotswolds with Areas of outstanding Natural Beauty, significant waterways, significant forests and woodlands and a rural landscape that covers in excess of 80% of the land.

How does the much needed recovery in the visitor economy fit in with the stewardship of the natural world and the environmental challenges created by the impending climate emergency?

International and domestic  travel, preservation of wildlife environments and challenges created by temporary events and infrastructure all contribute to climate problems, so how do we manage our priorities and what is the right balance?

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#BI21.3 Solution Storming – Mental Health

Wednesday 19th May | 4:30pm

Lead Participant: Sandra Baer, CEO, Personal Cities

Sandra Baer is the CEO of Personal Cities based in Washington DC

She is focused on building trusted relationships, creating new collaborations, and uncovering the skills to navigate bigger, bolder city transformations. Personal Cities works to inspire cities to make better, faster decisions around innovation, to enrich and improve their identity and to create a sense of belonging in every community.

Event:

What role should the business community play in addressing mental health in the workplace?

A facilitated discussion will follow the Question Storming event. We will tackle the most revealing questions and expand the dialogue toward potential solutions.

With complex issues, enduring solutions will require more time, conversation, analysis and work. However we can get some immediate insights, ideas, & innovative solutions that had never come to mind before.

There are no definitive answers about “how” to accomplish effective actions following the question storming. The questions developed will create new thinking about the drivers and priorities for next steps.

Our panel picks up the discussion from the difficult questions and looks for conclusions and recommendations to better create the workplaces and business communities that we aspire to.

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Re-imagining Workspaces

Thursday 20th May | 9:30am

Lead Participant: Julie Kent MBE, Chair, Open Door

Julie is an experienced Trustee working in the non-profit organization management industry & Fundraising.

She is named as one of the 50 Greatest Women in Gloucestershire, Top 100 Women in the West and recently Gained the Most Outstanding Woman in the Charitable Sector in the West.  Julie has been a housemistress at Dean Close for over 20 years specialising in teenagers coping with life!

Event:

Following a very difficult year, many businesses look very different to how they were 15 months ago.

Businesses that are thinking about smaller workforces, Businesses who have hugely grown while their workforce has been based at home.

We have businesses who are a similar size, but with home-working now well recognised, do they need the premises they had – and with mental health and wellbeing, is it time for a re-think?

There’s never been such a time to look at business with a clean sheet.  With mental health and climate change as significant threats, we see three pillars of thinking:

  • Re-evaluating supply chains
  • Re-evaluating Environmental processes and values
  • Re-evaluating workplaces, working environment and staff wellbeing

It’s a work in progress and a discussion affecting everyone.

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#BI21.3 Business Risk & Resilience

Thursday 20th May | 12:00pm

Lead Participant: Steve Gardner-Collins, Director Visit Gloucestershire

Steve is an experienced and highly motivated tourism & hospitality Sales Director with the drive, passion and enthusiasm to inspire and lead others.

He enjoys leading a sales culture throughout business and is a marketer with experience across design, digital and social platforms in multifaceted environments in local, domestic and international markets.

Steve describes himself as an Organiser, a team player and a champion for well-being, diversity and inclusivity.

Event:

Letting the past guide your way for the future…

COVID has changed the way we do business, can we take it day by day, week by week, month by month?

Do we need a longer-term plan? How flexible do we need to be?

Should businesses be more financially secure without the need for government grants and job retention schemes?

Are you set up to respond to rapid change and business disruptions?

In times of long closure are you safeguarding your people and assets?

Join us for this critical discussion, lots of vital questions to answer, critical thinking & logical planning could make or break your organisation.

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Visitor Economy – Procure Local

Thursday 20th May | 2:00pm

Lead Participant: Steve Gardner-Collins, Director Visit Gloucestershire

Steve is an experienced and highly motivated tourism & hospitality Sales Director with the drive, passion and enthusiasm to inspire and lead others.

He enjoys leading a sales culture throughout business and is a marketer with experience across design, digital and social platforms in multifaceted environments in local, domestic and international markets.

Steve describes himself as an Organiser, a team player and a champion for well-being, diversity and inclusivity.

Event

Local Procurement across private and public sector businesses is a significant pillar in economic recovery.

Procurement of goods and services with a local emphasis supports carbon reduction and environmental response to the climate emergency.  It also supports businesses based in a locality, employing locally, buying goods and services locally and generally keeping the UK pound in a circular, local pattern.

The visitor economy is leading thinking with its spend on the food and drink supply chain spending being used to think about re-focusing towards the local economy.

Visit Gloucestershire have pulled together an informed panel of those in the sector to discuss how this can be fast tracked.  Implications for other sectors is clear making this an important discussion supporting local economies.

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#BI21.3 Brand – Marketing Matters

Thursday 20th May | 3:45pm

Lead Participant: Cathryn Hage – Pentacom PR and Marketing

Cathryn is a freelance marketing professional having worked across the communications spectrum for clients in B2B and B2C. Her experience has touched many industries including engineering, health & wellbeing, food & beverage, electronics, clothing and sport.

With her roots in PR and the written word, she can often be seen on social media and blogging as digital marketing content forms an important element of work today. Cathryn is very active in fundraising as a Trustee of the Pied Piper Appeal children’s charity, and also holds vice chair and sponsorship at Cirencester Rugby.

Event:

Marketing, like brand, can sometimes be a misunderstood term. As businesses come out of lockdown and start to recover after the effects of a worldwide pandemic, it is imperative that they have a robust and workable marketing strategy. This session will discover the importance of marketing and the value that it can add to a companies profile and ultimately sales and turnover. The panel will address all aspects of marketing, looking at strategy, what channels of communication are best suited to different marketing requirements, how results can be monitored and assessed and the synergy between brand and marketing.

LIVEtalk - Discussion

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Mental Health & The Ethical Workplace

Wednesday 19th May | 9:30am

Lead Participant: Kay Hamblin – Director, Eight Legal

Kay developed a fascination with people dynamics during her years as a practicing vet. As part of Eight Legal, she has been supporting businesses with HR & people development for about ten years.

She received her Master’s in Business & Organisational Psychology from the University of Liverpool in 2019, and combines this expertise with HR experience to help businesses get the best out of their people. She has a particular interest in resilience, self-efficacy and Mindsets and how these relate to workplace well-being and engagement.

Other Participants:

James Cronin, Eight Legal Ltd

Su Porter-Scott, Respond Training

Victoria Lukins, Healthy Workplaces Gloucestershire

Camille Patricot, Clockwise Offices

Event:

Mental health, well-being and business values and ethics are all hot topics for discussion, but how do they relate to each other?

An ethical workplace will go beyond mere compliance in trying to create a healthy, happy workforce, but this needs to be more than a few nice ‘extras’ like fresh fruit and yoga. What are the fundamentals you need to address to ensure your people are positive and engaged? How do the values and culture of your business impact on the well-being of your team? Where do your responsibilities as an employer end and what about the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic?

Join us to discuss all this & more, to share best practice tips & ideas, and to learn about the Gloucestershire Healthy Workplaces initiative.

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#BI21.3 Question Storming – Mental Health

Wednesday 19th May | 2:30pm

Lead Participant: Sandra Baer, CEO, Personal Cities

Sandra Baer is the CEO of Personal Cities based in Washington DC

She is focused on building trusted relationships, creating new collaborations, and uncovering the skills to navigate bigger, bolder city transformations. Personal Cities works to inspire cities to make better, faster decisions around innovation, to enrich and improve their identity and to create a sense of belonging in every community

Event:

What role should the business community play in addressing mental health in the workplace?

In the second quarter of 2021, businesses need to plan ahead to adjust to a changed work-life environment. As the economy begins to open up and as employees return to offices, companies need to find a new equilibrium that helps employers and employees create a healthy, stable workplace.

Things will be different. Mental health was a serious, if under acknowledged problem before the pandemic.  How can employers help workers face unexpected challenges and proactively support their emotional and mental well-being?

Question Storming, is a unique process designed to tackle complex issues, to think beyond traditional approaches to problem solving. Participants may only ask questions, to see the issue through the lens of others.  Held under Chatham House rules, the most challenging questions will be taken forward to Solution Storming later in the day.

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#BI21.3 Students Mean Business

Wednesday 19th May | 3:15pm

Lead Participant: Julie Kent MBE, Chair, Open Door

Julie is an experienced Trustee working in the non-profit organization management industry & Fundraising.

She is named as one of the 50 Greatest Women in Gloucestershire, Top 100 Women in the West and recently Gained the Most Outstanding Woman in the Charitable Sector in the West.  Julie has been a housemistress at Dean Close for over 20 years specialising in teenagers coping with life!

Event:

Julie Kent MBE, formerly a house mistress at Dean Close, hosts a question time discussion with leaders from Gloucestershire’s business community around the journey that school leavers are facing as they think about the future, their careers and accessing the workplace.

It’s a challenging time for everyone and students presently in years 12 and 13 are dealing with disrupted education, uncertain HE and FE provision and an employment landscape that is heading towards significant redundancies and reducing opportunities.

Add into that anxiety, mental health, student loans and the inevitable uncertainty for any student about where they want to head for their career and we see ourselves in a position that is unlike any faced by students before.

Ethical Food & Drink – Provenance Matters

Thursday 20th May | 9:45am

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Ethical Food and Drink – Provenance Matters

Thursday 20th May | 9:45am

Lead Participant: Steve Ackroyd, The Job Guru

Steve is founder and Owner of The Job Guru, a recruitment business based in Gloucestershire.

As a Gloucestershire Business leader, Steve has long held an interest in understanding more about food provenance and the need to understand better the ethical values around food production and impact it has in the world we live in.

Other Participants: Claire Thayers, Happerley

Event:

Post Covid, more people are asking about their food – where does it come from – next door, the UK or abroad? What is the carbon footprint? Has it been ethically produced?  What are the welfare standards like? The list is endless! How do we find the answers, where should our priorities lie and are we motivated to make a difference?

Understanding where our food comes from becomes more and more important.  We have a panel of experts, from field to fork, food and beverage supply chain and a discussion that affects us all as we make important buying decisions every day.

The format will be a discussion on a video conference platform, we invite you to join the meeting, the chair will host the discussion with the panel and questions from the audience will be taken during the event.

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#BI21.3 International Trade Q&A

Thursday 20th May | 2:30pm

Lead Participant: Roger Mackrill, Director, Sabre UK Ltd

Following an extensive career in automotive, aerospace, nuclear power engineering and senior management in US, UK, Europe, India and China, Roger is the director and founder of Sabre UK Ltd. Founded in 2007.

With abundant experience as Quality Director, Managing Director in a wide range of global corporations, including GM, Rolls Royce, SKF, ISMT India, Kalyani Group India and Changan Group China, Roger is an experienced professional guiding clients through strategic direction and planning to enter and establish presence in Asian markets.

Event:

Following our International Trade Forum discussion, we bring together a number of international specialists to take questions around building business development though trading internationally.

Brexit has created both opportunity and vulnerabilities, the current pandemic has exponentially increased the use of online communications that have made it so much easier to reach out internationally and build new business relationships.

Culture, language and the simple interpretation or brand, graphics and body language are all areas of discussion and our panel will be looking to understand business concerns and uncertainties around how to build new international business.

You can submit questions via the event registration process, or on our dedicated email address: BI21.3@business-shows.co.uk

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