Free time for City BusinessesFebruary 06 2008
Business support fund through the gift of their time
We busy professionals at the sharp end of Yorkshire business are used to having a premium price charged for our time and expertise. But there are a great many projects out there whose success could well depend on our help and experience and for which we could quite reasonably attach a very different price tag – one which says “Good luck. This is for free.”.
I’d been an accountant for 25 years, and a Partner at the Chartered Accountants and Chartered Tax Advisers Horwath Clark Whitehill for 16 of them when I was asked to join a board of volunteer members of the Leeds and Bradford-based Business Enterprise Fund.
The Fund, as readers of these business pages will know, is helping economically disadvantaged people to establish themselves in successful commercial enterprises. Projects which can not attract funding from the traditional sources such as the high street banks can apply to the Fund.
Like most people with a heavy workload, you have to have a pretty good reason to be persuaded to spare the time to get involved in unpaid projects. But it’s definitely worth thinking about the bigger picture. One very good reason is that it is rewarding to play a useful role - in other words making sure the funding reaches the right sort of businesses and isn’t simply thrown away.
The fact that busy people are willing to bring their expertise to committees like these, and to give their time for no financial reward demonstrates their confidence in the important role that initiatives like the Business Enterprise Fund play in the region’s economy. The advice and scrutiny these committee members bring is pivotal in making sure that the money goes to where it can make a real difference.
Committee members bring their own particular expertise – and a degree of common sense – to the discussions. Whilst it is an important role, the time commitment is not too onerous. We don’t meet just for the sake of it. We are keen to have other people come forward to help us maintain an appropriate number. The bigger the pool of people we have to draw from, the more manageable the process will be for the team.
It’s not just accountants who are needed to keep this important organisation running. Bank managers, regeneration managers, entrepreneurs and others skilled in business all have something to give – and “give” is the important word. This is giving something back into the economy from which we all get our living.
The fund’s role isn’t just about considering applications for loans, but also about mentoring the successful applicants and keeping in close contact with them with a view to helping their business succeed. The Business Enterprise Fund is significant in that it offers help to people who would not be able to source funding elsewhere, in order to establish themselves in businesses.
Even if only a relatively small proportion of them go on to become substantial businesses, the fund is helping to create the right conditions for these businesses to help sustain and improve the local economy. If it wasn’t for the fund, it would be very difficult for these businesses to get off the ground.
So why not come on board and spend a bit of “free” time helping others get a kickstart on the road to business success?
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Free time for City Businesses
Business support fund through the gift of their time
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