Continuing my occasional look at the building of the first British Airways Airbus A380, we are getting close to delivery day. It’s been interesting to see this huge aircraft’s construction over the last year.
And now here the first British Airways Airbus A380 take off video.
I still don’t think that the A380 has the grace of the Boeing 747 Jumbo – but it is undoubtedly a magnificent site to see it soaring up into the sky. Or should that be “lumbering”?
Your turn: Have you flown in an A380? I’d love to hear your stories and experiences. Please leave a comment below or post a link to your own blog.
Last Friday was my last day as Managing Director of a company I helped to build from scratch over 12 years ago. I was one of 6 people who set out with 6 chairs and 6 mobile phones.For most of that time I was Marketing Director, spending the last year as MD. It has been an amazing adventure and experience. I have met and worked with some inspirational people.
I took the decision to leave and not face the complications of another internal restructuring. This will be the first time in 25 years that I do not have a full-time job, but I have 3 months garden leave to consider my future.
Best wishes.
As well as the day job, over the last decade I have also developed a successful sideline as a fitness and yoga teacher. My passion for yoga and teaching, plus my keen interest and experience in marketing, social media, speaking and blogging suggest to me a whole series of opportunities and dreams. And these are the areas I think I will focus my attention.
Offering consultancy services in marketing and social media, picking up some speaking engagements and of course teaching yoga, Body Combat and Body Balance sounds like an ideal combination – if I can get the business mix right.
I’ve already made a start. On my first day of garden leave I went along to a local club and covered a yoga class. It was a class I hadn’t covered before. In the studio I met 15 ladies who were quite surprised to see a male teacher. That’s hardly surprising as most yoga teachers in Edinburgh are women. An hour later I finished the class in my usual way and invited questions from the participants. Was there anything about what we had done today that they wanted me to explain in more detail?
One lady put her hand up and said, “I only have one question. When are you coming back to teach us again.”
I love that sort of feedback.
So I am sat in my garden, slightly nervous that I no longer have the safety net of corporate life to support me. But I feel very excited about leaving the politics and bureaucracy behind and looking forward to possibilities and opportunities of working for myself.
To quote from one of may favourite songs.
“I’d like to make myself believe.
That planet Earth turns slowly.
It’s hard to say that I’d rather stay awake when I’m asleep.
Because my dreams are bursting at the seams “
Your turn: Have you made a big leap from a secure full-time job into the world of consultancy or full-time teaching? I’d love to hear your stories. Leave a comment below or post a link to your own blogs or articles.
I do. I love it when someone comes up with an idea that is genuinely clever, new and racy. I get excited by the potential opportunities such ideas present.
In almost twenty years as a marketer I have seen my fair share of agency pitches for advertising campaigns. Or proposals for communications collateral to support a proposition launch. I’ve seen budgets for such campaigns as low as a few thousand pounds to many millions. But no matter how much budget was available to entice the agency to win the job, I have on occasion felt disappointed when I see their pitches.
Sometimes they are too “samey”. Others are too safe or lack any originality. Granted the agency responds to a brief written by me so I have to make sure that I haven’t caused my disappointment with poorly written requirements. But when I know I have given a strong brief, the heart sinking feeling of disappointment is even harder to bear when a pitch lacks that unique spark.
For the last few years we have sponsored the Product Design students at The Glasgow School of Art (GSA) to run a creative project. This year we asked them to come up with four original ideas for what a Mutual Company might offer as its proposition. Mutuality is perhaps a bit of a tired concept. And not many people understand that unlike a Public Company, which shareholders own, it’s the customers that own a Mutual Company.
In the past I have been very impressed by the concepts the students have come up with, so I was looking forward to seeing what their ideas were. Could they make mutuality interesting?
Needless to say their presentations overwhelmed me. The six students had locked themselves away in a brainstorming room for a week. Not only had they met our brief and come up with four concepts, but they had also produced posters, leaflets and copy explaining the proposition, and flow charts to show their processes.
Some of the material the students put together.
Their production was professional. The material was eye-catching, Their copy was simple and to the point.
But the jaw dropping moment came when I realised that they had come up with two ideas which were genuinely original. In fact they were innovative, clever and racy. I almost felt like nipping out and filing a few patents. Yes really their ideas were that good.
Okay so there might have been a bit of naivety in some of the high level concepts, but these students are not (yet) business people.
And here’s the thing. They put all this together for a prize amount of just over one thousand pounds.
Their ideas were fresher, more interesting, and more exciting than agency pitches I have seen for a hundred, maybe a thousand times that amount of money.
So well done to Santini Basra, Steven Payne, Eloise Foster-Smith, Yee Ruh Ooi, Alice Gunn, Struan Wood and to their Professor, Gordon Hush for such an exciting presentation.
From left to right: Gordon Hush, Santini Basra, Steven Payne, me, Eloise Foster-Smith, Yee Ruh Ooi, Alice Gunn and Struan Wood.
I wish you all the very best for the future.
And do you hear me big corporate enterprises? If you end up employing one of these guys one day, don’t you dare stifle their creativity with bureaucracy and governance.
And if you are thinking of spending a fortune on an agency, why not try some students first, and then refine their ideas with an agency later? That’s what I’m going to do. I bet I end up being disappointed much less in future.
Your turn: I would really like to hear your stories about new creative and innovative ideas. Where do you go for inspiration. What’s the most unlikely source of innovative thinking that you have found. Please leave a comment below or paste a link to your own articles.
After the sweaty excesses of the Quarterly Workshop for Body Combat 56, I staggered out of Virgin Active at the Omni Centre in Edinburgh and found sanctuary in St. Andrew Square for a couple of hours. It was lovely to sit on the grass in the sunshine people watching as my muscles recovered from all those “matrix kicks”.
But soon I was heading back to Virgin Active for the Quarterly Workshop for Body Balance release 61. Our trainer was Kathryn Cullen, a very witty enthusiastic lady who had us all in stitches during the education session. As the only male instructor at the session, I wasn’t as interested in her stories of the perfect bodies of some International Master Trainers she had met recently, but the ladies seemed to appreciate her graphic descriptions.
Here are my first thoughts about Body Balance release 61.
Screenshot from the DVD Masterclass.
The class begins with a stunning piece of music by Delerium (featuring Aude Feuilerat) called Paris which sounds almost angelic. We build up a lovely tai chi sequence layer by layer until we finish with a very beautiful flowing set of moves. A great start.
Pink’s song Try is very aptly named for the standing strength track. You will really have to try hard to get through a tough set of poses including triangle, extended warrior and sun warrior.
If you have tight hips from running then you are going to love the hip opener track. The combination of cowface pose and modified half lotus is exquisite, almost pleasureably painful. I know us guys find cowface pose difficult for obvious reasons but stick with it. Flexibility will come.
The core abs track is a great bit ouch. This could be one of the toughest ever.
I like the way we use upward facing dog and bridge pose to extend our backs in track 7. We do it slowly and I found this a refreshing change from the more recent full back bends we have had to contend with.
Once again we have two forward bends tracks amounting to nearly nine minutes of hamstring stretches. I love the focus on the wide leg forward bends in the first one and then the seated bends in the second.
It seems that we have another tough but lovely release. I can’t wait to learn this and launch it to my classes over the next few weeks.
Your turn: Are you a Body Balance instructor? Do you agree with my first impressions of Body Balance release 61. Share your thoughts. Leave a comment. Participants let me know what you think of the class once we’ve launched it.
