NatWest Enterprise, East Midlands & East of England Community Newsletter May 2023

May; a month fit for the King and more bank holidays than you can shake a stick at.

When I owned my own business, bank holidays and half terms were our busiest time. I remember seething when I saw people posting memes about 'that Friday feeling' and their long weekend plans. But the tills rang and it really helped oil the wheels of profitability. So business owners, I'm raising a glass to you and pledging to shop local with the extra day off I acknowledge that I'm lucky to receive.

Buckinghamshire Business First will be launching the #KingsAwardsforEnterprise on 11th May if you'd like to find out more and meet some local winners sign up to their free event.

With 'end of fiscal year' hangovers subsiding, what 'new years' business resolutions did you make? To look at grants to drive growth? To 'know your numbers' better? True financial literacy took me a long time to grasp. Long after I exited infact. Thank goodness for my accountant who worked super close to plug the gaps he knew I had around financial planning, reporting and strategy. I cant recommend outsourcing enough. But in hindsight, I really should have made more effort to really get under the skin of my figures and make more data driven decisions for my business. With that in mind I'm delighted to be speaking at the the 'iconic wealth for women' book launch this Thursday from 4pm. Speaking alongside Ella B. , some of the chapter authors and the project manager and book creator Kylie Anderson .

NatWest Business were delighted to gift 150 #MoneySense TopTrumps cards for the Willen Hospice Milton Keynes Mini Moo that took place at the end of April to get kids talking about money sooner, we hope they loved their goodie bags.

Last week we showcased the very best of #miltonkeynes businesses on #lovemk day. I created a #lovebusinessmk hashtag campaign and it gained a whopping 7000+ post impressions on just one day on linked in (and helped me pass my 5k followers vanity metric, thanks for that happy side effect!) not to mention the traction it gained on twitter, facebook and insta and the ripple effect of sharing, liking, commenting and connecting. Thanks for engaging, I am looking to roll this activity out across the #EastMids & #eastofengland patch with my teamies in the coming months.

Speaking of the East of England, I'm sooo excited that our new local enterprise manager will be starting next week (all will be revealed in my June newsletter) and I'm looking forward to the renewed focus on Notts, Derby & Leicester in the coming quarter.

Other events that you might be interested in...

Women's Business Club?‘Coffee & CoWorking’ on the first Tuesday of every month (so today) 10am-1pm in?Cambridge?&?Milton Keynes. We provide the wifi, the caffeine and the venue, you come along and support the community of likeminded?#womeninbusiness?to network and co-work with others who want to be better connected and inspired too.

Asy Ho has brought back #BreakfastBoost a breakfast networking session monthly held at our #CMK NatWest branch from 8:30am in the Enterprise space; breakfast is on us! At 10am immediately after, he switches to his #StartUpSurgery to help those in the very early stages of business-building with support to get set and go. Give his eventbrite and linkedin a follow if you are doing business in MK, Northants, Beds or Bucks.

In Cambridge Ricke Williams hosts a monthly WIB Tribe event (18th May) with BIPC Cambridgeshire that is growing a fantastic #womeninbusiness community but he also has a trio of NatWest business builder sessions happening live on 17th May (other dates available). If you're in or around CB/PT give him (and his eventbrite page) a follow.

Awards...

The Multicultural Business & Community Champion Awards (MBCC) are now open for applications.

The East Midlands Chamber (Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire) awards are now open for entries - and I'm loving the business network newsletter availably digitally) details on P36.

The Buckinghamshire Business Awards are open and close on 15th May.

Just 9 days left to enter the SME Business Awards national awards.

Finally a look ahead..

Will you be taking advantage of the Cambridge #WideOpen day event on 14th June? Explore the cities world class science and technology facilities as these orgnaisations (and ours) open up their doors for you to take a peek inside?

We have scheduled our Milton Keynes #hubreunion event for June 28th from midday, join us for lunch and an update from some of our accelerator alumni. A chance to reconnect and reenergise at our social summer mixer and celebrate success.

In honour of the recently deceased Jerry Springer, I'll leave you with my final thoughts and ask you to 'take care of yourselves and each other' ;0)

Do just one kind thing this month if you cant get out to volunteer for the coronation weekend. #makekindnesscontagious

Schedule a real break, if you haven't already, because summers coming, and you deserve a little downtime, even when building a very exciting empire.

May the fourth be with you on voting day- get up and be counted. Our cities (and especially our businesses) need you.

Enjoy.

Debbie x