Platinum Business Magazine - issue 103

BIG

20 Sir Richard Branson

As a person diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia, the founder of the Virgin empire also believes neurodiversity can be a superpower.

FORUM

40 Influencers Forum

Seven leading industry figures discuss what the future of work may look like

CONTENTS

8

and international

round-up of the

stories in Sussex

around the

2

Business

for

coming to

in December?

Business

big event is in

Better Business Show

Round up of Worthing’s

and commerce

BUSINESS

14 Mattioli Woods

Be wary of unexpected tax bills on your pension

16 Brewin Dolphin

Three ways to secure your family’s finances

18 Surrey Research Park

Introducing pioneering

driverless training technology

30 Let’s Do Business

East Sussex has attracted £200m of investment in the past few years. Here’s what it’s gone on

32 NatWest Business

NatWest’s PMI Business Activity

Index: the indicator of regional economic health

56 MDHUB

An interview with Tim Green, founder of gpsurgery.net

60 NatWest client profile

Celebrating three decades of Hogs Back Brewery

65 Cleankill

Don’t be afraid to take some time away to recharge the batteries

FINANCE

26 Kreston Reeves

Global Britain - businesses look for growth from domestic markets

49 Haines Watts

How best to define your values as a leader

CHARITY

36 Martlets Hospice Martlets invites businesses to be part of the #BrightonFlock

59 Chestnut Tree House

Support your local charity –abseil down Arundel Castle!

All rights reserved.

omissions

LEGAL

12 DMH Stallard

A snapshot of the current state of the Mergers & Acquisitions sector

34 Loch Associates

The challenges of the four Rs – remote working, recruitment, retention and redundancies

38 Womble Bond Dickinson

Southampton’s contribution to get the UK back on track for net zero

54 Mayo Wynne Baxter

Counteracting the top five excuses for not making a Will

EDUCATION

62 Hurstpierpoint College

Exclusive interview with principal, Tim Manly

INNOVATION

50 Sussex Innovation

How can small businesses respond during times of crisis?

MOTORING

66 Motoring Review

Motoring editor Maarten Hoffmann thunders to Scotland in the all-new Alfa Romeo Quadrifoglio

not necessarily

of the publisher.

publisher

publisher reserves

the return of

Media Group Limited.

www.platinummediagroup.co.uk

I am often asked why we don’t have a permanent politics column in the magazine; l think the government has aptly answered that one for me. If even a daily newspaper cannot keep up with the rapid turn of events, what hope does a monthly magazine have? A prime example of this is that l wrote this on the 19th, and Truss was gone by the 20th! It begs the question “why do we have so few leaders to choose from in a country of 67.22 million people?” Anger Management returns in January!

Suffice to say we are in a bit of a mess, but it will get sorted and we will recover –although there might be a tough year ahead.

In this issue, we launch the all-new Dynamic Magazine. Due to the success of the title over the past three years, we have re-designed it, and added some major new sections and features. We also have a new Editor and, from January 2023, it goes monthly.

In Platinum, we cover a vast range of subjects such as how the M&A market is faring, looking for growth abroad, why we all need a Will, and Sussex Innovation discuss sexTech and toilet rolls – you will have to read it for that to make any sense.

Our big story looks at Sir Richard Branson and his claim that neurodivergence is a superpower. Who can argue when you look at the likes of Musk, Zuckerberg and Gates?

We have an exclusive interview with the principal of Hurst College and a look at the changes going on there and we have the last in the series of Infl uencer Forums on the subject of the Future of Work.

Hogs Back Brewery in Surrey celebrates its third decade, and we look at how Southampton is contributing to the target of net zero.

We hope you enjoy the November issue of Platinum and the all-new Dynamic.

The PlatinumTeam

maarten@platinummediagroup.co.uk

lesley@platinummediagroup.co.uk

fiona@platinummediagroup.co.uk

tess@platinummediagroup.co.uk

design@platinummediagroup.co.uk

alan@platinummediagroup.co.uk

www.platinummediagroup.co.uk

MASS CABLE CURE

European Union MEPs have voted for a law requiring all new portable devices to use the same type of charging cable. Smartphones and tablets, including the Apple iPhone and iPad, would have to use a USB-C charger from 2024, while laptop manufacturers would have until 2026 to make the change. There were 602 votes in favour and 13 against, with eight abstaining. Member states are expected to grant approval on October 24th, before the rule is signed into law at the parliament.

Following a provisional agreement by the European Union, in June 2022, the UK government said it was not “currently considering” introducing a common charging cable. But under the current post-Brexit arrangements, the new regulation could apply to Northern Ireland.

NEWS BULLETIN

FINANCIAL CONDUCT FAILURES

The City regulator is rejecting more applications from financial firms wanting to do business. The FCA said that in the last year the proportion that had failed to gain its authorisation had grown from one in 14 to one in five.

LOOSER PLANNING

The government want to relax height restrictions on new developments in dozens of areas across England. The government is in talks with 38 local authorities about creating new ‘investment zones’. These would be ‘hubs for growth’, offering tax cuts for businesses, which ministers hope would boost investment in shopping centres, restaurants, offices and homes.

The investment zones would have looser planning rules than

other parts of the country, with height restrictions removed on

the development of housing and commercial sites. For developers in the zones, councils would not have to negotiate with developers over the amount of affordable housing they built. Instead, there would be fixed number of affordable homes required.

The then Prime Minister Liz Truss said: “The new zones rejuvenate local areas in the same way the London Docklands was regenerated, with new jobs in the industries of the future”.

❛❛ The same boiling water that softens the potato hardens the egg. It’s what you’re made of, not the circumstances ❜❜ Unknown

FLOATING PORSCHE

Porsche shares rose on their first day of trading as the sports carmaker shrugged off a worsening global economy in a €75bn (£67bn) stock market float, the largest European listing for more than a decade. The shares were issued at €82.50 on the Frankfurt stock exchange, before rising in value to €86.30 by late morning. The German carmaker Volkswagen listed 12.5% of Porsche’s shares to raise the billions of euros needed to invest in electric cars – as well as hoping the sports car company would be able to match its Italian rival Ferrari, which has been able to attract a valuation more typical of luxury fashion brands.

The deal raised €19.5bn, about half of which will go to Volkswagen. Volkswagen intends to pay a dividend using part of the proceeds.

BRANSON GIVEAWAY

Sir Richard Branson has invested all the royalties he received from the Virgin brand back into the companies for the second year running. Accounts for the year to December 31st 2021 show Virgin Enterprises paid a £30 million dividend to its UK parent group Virgin Holdings. The previous year it was £35 million, down from the £85 million paid out in 2018.

MORNING CAMPERS

The media-shy billionaire family that owned Butlins holidays resorts for 21 years until 2021 has bought back the business from its private equity owner in a £300 million deal. Blackstone, which bought Bourne Leisure for £3 billion last year, has carved out the tourism group’s Butlins offshoot, removed its property interests and sold it back to the family headed by Peter Harris, the Bourne co-founder. The family is estimated to be worth £1.6 billion and owns Haven holiday parks and Warner Leisure hotels, and attracted more than 4.5 million guests on 2021.

INNOVATE UK FUNDING

Aerospace giant Rolls-Royce has been awarded the highest innovation funding of any UK company over the last 18 years, new research suggests. The company, which has its UK sites in Filton, near Bristol, and Derby, has been handed £689m by Innovate UK over nearly two decades – equivalent to nearly £38.2m each year. It is over four times more than any other company has received for their innovation projects, and accounts for 7% of all funding awarded by the government’s innovation agency.

Michele Ruiz

❛❛ Greatness only comes before hustle in the dictionary ❜❜

Ross Simmonds

❛❛ If people are doubting how far you can go, go so far that you can’t hear them anymore ❜❜

LOCAL

JOB DROP

A UK Report on Jobs has found that the South of England has found the South of England has recorded a drop in permanent placements. Southern firms have made the lowest number of permanent appointments in 19 months. The September data pointed to a renewed slowdown in temporary positions at recruitment agencies across the South.

The Report on Jobs which is compiled by S&P Global found both permanent and temporary staff vacancies expanding at the slowest rates for 19 months. Although the South of England figures are broadly in line with the UK average, the rate of expansion was among the slowest seen over the past two years.

NAMED AND SHAMED

Individuals and companies in Sussex have been named on the government’s latest list of tax defaulters. HMRC’s Publishing Details of Deliberate Defaulters (PDDD) scheme provides information about people and businesses given financial penalties for failing to comply with tax obligations or deliberately filing errors in tax returns. Details are published when a person or business has made at least one deliberate default on more than £25,000, according to HMRC. The list is updated every three months and the information wiped after a year.

TOP FOR START UPS

Brighton has been named one of the best places to start a business despite office rents being among the UK’s highest. The city has been heralded as one of the best stomping grounds for small businesses with the highest survival rate of all the cities in the top ten. However, the region is also among the costliest places to rent an office, with higher prices on average than Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool.

Research by business experts Utility Bidder found that there are currently over 18,500 active businesses in Brighton & Hove. Of businesses in the city, the study also found that around 44% of businesses survive. The study also took into account average net monthly pay for workers, the monthly cost of broadband and the percentage of the population with an NVQ level 4 qualification or above.

Altshuler

ROYAL WARRANT WORRY

More than a dozen Sussex businesses have seen their Royal Warrants expire with the death of the Queen. Royal Warrants are proof that a company provides goods or services to the Royal Family. Businesses with a Royal Warrant can display a royal coat of arms and advertise that they provide goods or services “by appointment to” that royal.

However, all Royal Warrants automatically expire on the death of the royal who granted them, and firms have two years to remove the coat of arms from their products, vehicles and stationery. That means an anxious wait for the 620 businesses who held Royal Warrants granted by Queen Elizabeth II.

FORENSIC LEAD

For the second year in a row, Lead Forensics has been voted one of the finest places to work in technology. ‘Great Place To Work,’ the global authority on workplace culture, conducted the study recognising the Portsmouth firm.

Through creative and cutting-edge website visitor identification technology, Lead Forensics, a prominent mid-size B2B SaaS company, assists organisations in driving revenue and generating leads. They do so in a way that focuses on providing staff with an enjoyable workplace. The report’s findings are based on anonymous feedback from people working in the IT sector on their employment experiences. According to the study, the IT industry is also the best at cultivating a ‘good employee experience.’

GOODBYE BA

The i360 in Brighton will have no sponsor once British Airways parts ways with the landmark next month. From November 1st, the vertical pier will be known as ‘Brighton i360’, which the owners say will “further align the attraction to the city of Brighton & Hove”.

The upcoming rebrand will include large-scale external signage, new staff uniforms and a new lighting scheme for the tower and pod. The red, white and blue livery of the i360’s logo has also been changed to a pink and white design, featuring a graphic of the 162-metre tower. To date, the owners are £11 million behind in payments to the council.

NEW APPOINTMENT

Dr Sophie Carr CMath CSCi FRSS FIMA MRaES MORs CStat, Founder and Director of Guildford-based Bays Consulting, has been appointed to the Executive committee of the newly formed National Academy for Mathematical Sciences (NAMS). On this committee Sophie will be focusing on Practitioner Affairs, including the role NAMS should play alongside existing organisations, Knowledge Exchange, and Education.

She is also currently Vice President of the Royal Statistical Society for Education and Statistical Literacy, and serves on the General Council of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications. She was named the World’s Most Interesting Mathematician, 2019.

❛❛ Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving ❜❜ Albert Einstein

❛❛Believe you can and you’re halfway there ❜❜

Theodore Roosevelt

Much has been written about the economy and the state of the Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A) market. I have set out below my thoughts on how businesses should navigate the market over the next year, and some insights into changes we have observed.

By Jonathan Grant, Partner, DMH Stallard

How can the M&A market be active, while economic headwinds increase?

Most lawyers and corporate finance professionals say the same thing when asked …”never seen a busier market”!

The truth is that the current market is more complicated.

2020/21 WAS ASTONISHING

The 12 months to summer 2021 really was the most buoyant market I can remember. We saw a huge number of private equity and large corporate buyers (with finance). They were actively looking to buy businesses for growth, to deliver synergies and increase speed to market, for key areas they did not already have. Deal values also rose with many more deals in the £20m+ bracket and far fewer below that.

THIS YEAR, THE HEADWINDS ARE GREATER

This Autumn, we are holding the biggest pipeline we have had for many years. Expected values remain high; the CF advisors we know say the same thing.

I have had two significant deals confirmed in the second week of September, where the businesses have gone to market over the summer; this indicates a positive climate.

The important difference this year, is how buyer/investor confidence will last? Some doubt over this, makes successful completion of those deals less certain. This is not a huge surprise given the economic head winds, and perhaps explains the apparent disconnect between the

economic indicators, and the deal community’s confidence.

My recommendation, for clients looking to navigate in these choppy waters, is to qualify all approaches. Ensure you are very clear on buyer/investor’s pricing assumptions/key deal drivers. It is particularly important to be clear before you enter into exclusivity or agree the letter of intent/heads of terms. An LOI is a document which is non-binding, but lays out clearly all key deal issues; whilst this can never guarantee success, it greatly reduces the risk of a deal falling down part way through.

THE CHALLENGE

We normally complete a very high proportion of the deals we start to run for clients. Over the last 12 months, we have seen some high value deals ‘pulled’ by investors. In most cases the inves tors cite limited growth opportunities,

or financial diligence not matching their investment metrics. This really comes down to lack of confidence in the market.

Despite these challenges, there remain many well-funded investors/buyers in sectors which see positive growth opportunities. This is combined with many owners looking for an exit and feeling weary of dealing with constant challenge.

THE OPPORTUNITY

As well as demand from buyers, there are positive signs from the economic landscape. The pound is at a record low, making acquisition of UK busi nesses by US and other international buyers very good value. Culturally, the UK has always been attractive to inter national buyers; London/home counties are a big draw for executives, there is good access to finance, a strong advi sory community, and the UK is still seen as stable. While Russian oligarchs may be withdrawing, we see Middle Eastern investment, and other international investment likely to increase.

Active trade and PE buyers are still completing high value deals, but the business sector is likely to be a better indicator of deal activity. As the economy evolves and changes, with issues like supply shortages, inflation, and the war in Ukraine resolving them selves, these sectors are likely to change.

WHICH SECTORS?

Building products, engineering and architecture continued to perform strongly in 2020/21, but may be slowing. This could transition into more stable public sector/secured living providers, who give a more reliable return, as the housing market slows.

Professional services remains busy, particularly insurance brokers, where we act for two consolidators, but also wealth management, accountancy and, to a lesser extent, legal.

Travel and leisure are seeing a gradual return of deals, although it may need a little longer until clear trends can be found and real confidence returns; the pattern is simply not there yet. Hotels and food suppliers have been taking the opportunity to renew banking lines in the last 12 months.

Technology and software businesses remain popular with trade and PE, particularly SAAS, where returns, and earnings multiples are high. We also see demand for e-learning, PR and marketing businesses, to feed the demand for on-line BD, staff retention and develop ment in a competitive market. The ‘big resignation’ is having an impact.

Higher margin/HNW consumer prod ucts are continuing to attract investment, but retail (B to C) is continuing to see pressure. This is likely to be worsened by the cost of living pressures. Some very profitable/high growth online busi nesses have failed to secure deals. In part, this seems to be down to the disruption faced by large businesses in that market, who would be obvious buyers.

Defence suppliers and AI businesses: defence spending is set to increase, and unmanned/tech support is increasingly necessary. Across a wider field of busi ness, AI provides an opportunity for greater efficiencies.

MBOs/investment/shareholders agree ments are increasingly in demand, as those businesses who cannot identify a trade or PE deal, look to plan for the future. A more active and receptive banking market has helped this process, so deals below £20m are increasing.

CONCLUSION

The market remains good, but not univer sally. Strong sectors, with good short/ medium term growth potential will attract good offers. Strong businesses in weaker sectors could find it harder; the key for these businesses will be to demonstrate savings/efficiency/higher profit to buyers seeking to consolidate, or to extend their territory. For some, it may just be a question of biding your time.

Buyers are putting greater importance on commercial and technical diligence, but may not want to reveal their true requirements early in the negotiation.

Sellers must be willing to ask direct questions of buyers, and not get swept along with the excitement of an attrac tive offer. This can be hard for a business seeking to build a relationship with the buyer. Good advisors, whether corpo rate finance or legal, can take this responsibility.

Having ensured the offer is properly tested and qualified, a good advisory team can ensure diligence is well managed, to avoid any loss of buyer confidence.

DMH Stallard is known for providing a service that is always partner led, tailored and highly responsive to the needs of our clients.

For further information enquiries@ DMHStallard.com www.DMHStallard.com

www.platinummediagroup.co.uk

❛❛ Active trade and PE buyers are still completing high value deals, but the business sector is likely to be a better indicator of deal activity ❜❜

If only Victor Meldrew had planned his retirement income before he became a grumpy old man, with one foot in the grave! By Julie Sebastianelli, Wealth Management Director at Mattioli Woods

I DON’T BELIEVE IT!

When you have spent a lifetime dreaming of enjoying your retirement, safe in the knowledge you have enough put aside in your pension, the last thing you want is to be hit with an unexpected tax charge as you turn age 75. Never rest on your laurels; changes happen and sleepwalking through them might cost you dear.

In 2015, new pension ‘freedom rules’ provided greater fl exibility in terms of payment and accessibility. At the same time, there was a widening of the scope of benefi ciaries to whom the passing of undrawn funds could be made free of inheritance tax (IHT).

The favourable IHT position pensions enjoy has seen an increase in clients using their personal wealth to fund their lifestyle, and to reduce their taxable estate on death. In this scenario, clients prefer to view their personal pension pots as ‘next generation’ monies.

❛❛ Never rest on your laurels; changes happen and sleepwalking through them might cost you dear ❜❜

However, you need to be mindful you are not caught by a lifetime allowance (LTA) tax charge. The LTA is the total amount you can build up in all your pension savings without incurring a tax charge. Any excess could be taxed at 25% and potentially up to 55%. The standard allowance for the current tax year (and until April 2026) is £1,073,100.

You will not use any of your LTA until you start taking benefits from your pension arrangements. When this happens, it is known as a benefit crystallisation event (BCE) and at each event your pension is tested against the LTA to see whether an LTA tax charge is due. All final salary and money purchase pensions are included.

At age 75, money purchase pensions are tested again against their LTA, whether they have been crystallised or not, creating a nasty surprise for some.

It is possible to maintain the LTA at a higher level through one of the protec tions that have been available. This is still an essential planning tool for indi viduals who have, or may have, pension savings in excess of the LTA. There are two LTA protections currently still avail able: fixed protection 2016 (FP16) and individual protection 2016 (IP16). Each type protects the LTA at or up to £1.25 million but with different considerations and conditions. This is where expert advice can be most valuable.

Protecting the LTA does not mean you can avoid the LTA charge, as any BCE at a time when the fund is over the appropriate LTA limit will trigger a tax charge.

THE CASE OF MR AFFLECK

On April 5th 2016, Mr Affleck’s pension was valued at £1.2 million and he was aged 68. He did not protect the pension benefits he had accumulated as the LTA at the time was £1.25m. He took tax free cash of £300,000 leaving a fund of £900,000 and decided to draw no income. As time has gone on the Government reduced the LTA to £1 million on April 6th 2016, later increasing it by RPI annually until it was frozen in 2021 at £1,073,100.

Accessing his pension triggered an LTA test against the £1.2 million. This used up 96% of his allowance. Any further growth that causes the fund to exceed the remaining 4% at the next crystallisation event will then be subject to the LTA tax charge.

By May 2022, Mr Affleck has taken no pension income. He is 75 in May 2022, which means his pension will be tested against the LTA for the last time.

The £900,000 he had left in his pension has now grown to £1,050,000. The increase of £150,000 has to be tested against the current LTA of £1,073,100. With only 4% of the LTA remaining, there is now an excess of £106,773. This excess will now attract an immediate 25% tax charge of £26,693. The liability becomes immediately payable by the pension fund.

If Mr Affleck draws some of these excess funds from his pension in the future, he will be subject to income tax at his marginal rate. The same applies after his death when his beneficiaries draw from their inherited ‘designated fund’.

The above example shows how important advice is, as pensions now have greater flexibility and with that comes greater choices for individuals. It is not a straightforward decision to leave the pension untouched in the knowledge that an LTA charge

may be lurking. At Mattioli Woods, we can help you with your retirement plans. Even though retirement may be some years away it is never too early to plan. Then you may not have to utter those words ‘I don’t bel… !’

Julie Sebastianelli, Wealth Management Director, Mattioli Woods

E: Julie.sebastianelli@mattioliwoods.com T: 020 8936 3970

Mattioli Woods plc is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority

❛❛ You need to be mindful you are not caught by a lifetime allowance (LTA) tax charge ❜❜

Three ways to secure your family’s finances

The uncertainty of the past couple of years has shown how important it is to have a robust plan in place for securing your family’s finances. While no-one knows what is around the corner, reviewing your protection, updating your will, and creating an estate plan will help you rest assured that the financial side of things is taken care of.

A financial adviser can help you determine what is right for your individual circumstances but, in the meantime, these are some of the main considerations.

Protect against illness and death

Protecting your finances against illness and death is a fundamental part of any financial plan. Death and illness are tough topics to think about, but they could have a devastating impact on your family’s financial security. Without your income, your loved ones could struggle to pay the bills and may need to make large sacrifices at what is already an upsetting and stressful time.

There are several protection products that could help your family’s finances hold up should the worst happen to you. Life insurance pays out a lump sum on death, and is typically used to pay off the mortgage and / or provide a cash buffer. Critical illness cover provides you with a lump sum if you’re diagnosed with a specified critical illness, perhaps helping you to pay off debts or adapt living arrangements to your new circumstances. Income protection pays out a regular income if you’re unable to work because of an accident or illness, with some policies paying out until retirement.

There is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ protection solution, so it’s important to seek advice on the right products and level of cover for you and your family.

Write or review your will

If you still feel relatively young and healthy, it might seem odd to start thinking about how to pass on your assets on death. However, you are never too young to write a will. Having a will ensures your money and other assets go to the people and causes that matter to you. It also enables you to appoint guardians for your children, so you can rest assured they’ll be looked after by people you know and trust. If you die without a will, your assets and possessions will be distributed according to the rules of intestacy, which might not reflect your wishes.

It’s important to bear in mind that your family’s circumstances are likely to change over time, and you may wish to update your will to reflect this. Marriage, birth, death and divorce are just some of the triggers to review your will and ensure it still reflects your wishes.

Create an estate plan

A comprehensive estate plan could make a substantial difference to your children and grandchildren’s financial future. Many people assume estate planning is only for the very wealthy; however, the steep rise in house prices over the past decade and the freezing of the inheritance tax (IHT) nil-rate band until April 2026 mean the so-called ‘death tax’ could hit more families. There are several ways to mitigate IHT – from making lifetime gifts to using pensions and trusts – yet people often fail to take advantage of what is on offer. A financial adviser can help you build a tax-efficient estate plan that ensures you are laying the firmest foundations for your family’s future.

Next steps

In uncertain times, taking some smart advice can help you feel confident you’re doing everything you can to secure your family’s finances. A financial adviser will look at your personal, family and financial circumstances to recommend the right products and solutions for your individual needs. You can focus on enjoying life today, safe in the knowledge that you’re prepared for whatever the future may bring.

Paul Cannons, Senior Investment Manager paul.cannons@brewin.co.uk 01293 661323 brewin.co.uk/gatwick

The value of investments, and any income from them, can fall and you may get back less than you invested. Tax treatment depends on the individual circumstances of each client and may be subject to change in the future. Information is provided only as an example and is not a recommendation to pursue a particular strategy.

RBC Brewin Dolphin is a trading name of Brewin Dolphin Limited. Brewin Dolphin Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (Financial Services Register reference number 124444) and regulated in Jersey by the Financial Services Commission. Registered Office; 12 Smithfield Street, London, EC1A 9BD. Registered in England and Wales company number: 2135876. VAT number: GB 690 8994 69

The virtual reality (VR) sector has grown exponentially in recent years. Applications of the technology are impacting a range of industries – from healthcare to education, tourism to logistics – and transforming the way we live and do business

Introducing pioneering VR driverless training technology

For Surrey Research Park tenant, Diverse Interactive and Linde Group, VR has proved to be a real game changer, with their pioneering driverless training project recently celebrating a big win at the Motor Transport Awards and taking home the ‘Best Use of Technology Award’.

As a multinational chemical company, much of Linde Group’s international operations are underpinned by a broad network of haulier and road freight services. Back in 2020, BOC, part of the Linde Group, approached Diverse Interactive, an independent immersive content agency, to explore how the firm’s VR capabilities could be applied to its driver training and safety programme.

Both businesses are based at Surrey Research Park in Guildford, and their interaction whilst on site essentially inspired the DIViRT (Driver Immersive Virtual Reality Training) project. The system utilises Linde’s world-leading gas cylinder delivery vehicles and integrates cutting-edge virtual reality technology to provide a highly realistic and immersive driver training experience.

❛❛ It looks like Linde Group’s blueprint for success could push the use of VR forward as a training tool for the future! ❜❜

DIViRT has been two years in the making – from a proof of concept prototype to a fully operational produc tion unit, which has been successfully rolled out across the country and deliv ered to over 100 drivers so far.

So, how did Diverse Interactive go about developing the virtual reality driver training solution? As part of the initial discovery process, the team visited different sites to collate feedback from the drivers. “We held workshops to fully understand Linde Group’s needs, objec tives, priorities and how their current training is working,” explains Diverse Interactive’s Hannah Speck. “The key aims were to increase competency and improve safety performance, with the new interactive solution needing to be cost-effective and scalable.”

Utilising the HTC Vive headset and a bespoke motion seat, Diverse Interactive created a solution that emulates an authentic driving experi ence for training purposes, with high levels of precision and accuracy.

Video footage of vehicle journeys was captured in great detail using state-ofthe-art cameras. Meanwhile, telemetry was used to collate an outstanding amount of data from various fixed points within the cab, with motion stim ulation, including accelerometer data from the seat, creating the sense of driving a real lorry. Perhaps most inter estingly, eye tracking technology was used to measure eye positions and eye movement, allowing the trainee and the trainer to review the session and assess where the driver has been looking throughout the test.

Combined, all of these data elements within the software created a vastly more accurate picture of the driver’s abilities to spot hazards and when necessary, react to them – thus enhancing the overall training experi ence and providing a unique insight into driver behaviour and safety.

As well as providing a positive learning experience for trainees, the technology cut costs, downtime and travel for Linde Group’s drivers. The positive feedback gained from the internal teams, coupled with the recent Motor Transport Awards win, has spurred Linde Group and Diverse Interactive to build out the development roadmap for the tool.

“At the moment, there is one mobile training unit which travels to sites up and down the country, but we are

looking to deliver more units in other regions globally,” explains Hannah. “We will enhance the technology by creating more driving scenarios – specifically looking at different weather conditions and locations, such as night-time, city and countryside driving. Enhancing the interaction between the trainer and driver will also be a key focus moving forward – and we will take the ideas and feedback we’ve received from trainees on board.”

The DIViRT project is offering an exciting, revisionary approach to training, proving that, when it comes to immersive VR technology, the possibili ties are infinite. It looks like Linde Group’s blueprint for success could push the use of VR forward as a training tool for the future!

For further information please contact Hannah Speck at Diverse Interactive, 01483 399 699. www.diverseinteractive.com www.linde.com

❛❛ DIViRT has been two years in the making –from a proof of concept prototype to a fully operational production unit ❜❜

SIR

Sir Richard Branson is one of those selfmade entrepreneurs from a very well-to-do background whose omnipresence is such that there’s a good chance you cannot recall seeing him on the television for the first time.

However, underneath all of the evident, external, charismatic charm, academia and mental health wellbeing haven’t always been his best life journey companions. By Alan Wares

RICHARD BRANSON ADHD, dyslexia and more

If you didn’t know better, one might be convinced he’d enrolled at drama school; he has undertaken so many TV and film roles, almost exclusively playing himself, such is his omnipresence.

Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson was born in Blackheath, London on July 18th 1950. His father was an eminent barrister, his mother a former ballet dancer, air steward and entrepreneur. He comes from a long line – on his father’s side – of well-regarded, senior people who have operated within the UK judiciary system.

EARLY DAYS

His first entrepreneurial venture was at the age of 16, founding the magazine ‘Student’ in 1966 with his friend Nik Powell. During the magazine’s lifetime, he interviewed the likes of Mick Jagger and eminent psychiatrist RD Laing.

Branson opened his first record shop in Oxford Street, London in 1971. In 1972, using money earned from his record store, Branson launched the record

label Virgin Records with Powell. The name ‘Virgin’ was suggested by one of Branson’s early employees because they were all new at business.

One of the first shops opened after the Oxford Street store was in Queens Road, Brighton, and it stayed open in that location until the early 1980s before moving to Western Road.

Meanwhile, Branson had bought a country estate near Oxford – always nice to get that family leg-up – in which he installed a recording studio. He leased studio time to hitherto unknown artists, where his first, and still one of his greatest, success was the multiPlatinum selling Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield (1973).

By 1979, Branson, still not a major player in the music industry, and very much considered an ‘independent’, was considered to be worth £5 million (about £28 million today). It was around this time he made his first foray into travel and holidays.

VIRGIN EMPIRE AND BEYOND

He eventually formed Virgin Atlantic –an airline – in 1984, and Virgin holidays a year later. In 1992, he sold Virgin Records, his first successful company, to EMI for an estimated £500 million (about £1.15bn today).

In the intervening 30 years, Branson has rarely looked back as a successful ‘captain of industry’, as his fortune has grown to an estimated personal wealth of £3 billion. His acts of self-promotion are legendary, and his world record attempts as barking as they are varied. The media could often rely on Branson for good copy.

He was knighted in 2000 for ‘services to entrepreneurship’.

That said, there have been a few instances of Branson not getting it quite right. Virgin Cola, Virgin Cars, Virgin Publishing, Virgin Clothing and Virgin Brides have been launched and summarily closed without pricking the public conscience too hard.

“I suppose the secret to bouncing back is not only to be unafraid of failures but to use them as motivational and learning tools... There’s nothing wrong with making mistakes as long as you don’t make the same ones over and over again,” he was quoted as saying when it comes to his attitude to business failure.

Like most billionaires who make no secret of their billionaire status, Branson is a heady concoction of juxtaposed ideals. On one hand, he will stand on a platform of saving the planet, while at the same time being an exponent of some of its ills.

His support for global humanitarian, environmental and technological improvements are well recorded, although this is somewhat count er-pointed by his involvement for nearly 40 years in airline ownership both in the UK and abroad. Similarly, he champions the UK economy while he himself living as a tax exile.

However, in the field of academia and mental wellbeing, Branson offers up a strong level of consistency. And as one of those noted billionaires who make a point of letting people know they are billionaires, they are not alone in this regard.

CHAMPIONING NEURODIVERSITY

Branson is a champion of neurodiver sity, coping with dyslexia, and openly talking of his ADHD diagnosis. He performed poorly academically, and on his last day at school, his headmaster told him he would either “end up in prison or become a millionaire.”

Writing about it in April 2021, he said, “Many businesses have caught on to the benefits of inclusion, but there are still lots of opportunities for thinking bigger and embracing different ways of thinking. I’ve always believed a great business is one that values new perspectives, different ideas and broader ways of thinking.

“The world needs a neurodiverse work force to help try and solve some of the big problems of our time. Many people on the autism spectrum excel in areas such as logic, technology skills, problem-solving, pattern recognition, precision, sustained concentration, analysis and other unique cognitive functions.

“Yet people on the autism spectrum are often overlooked for jobs that they might be brilliant at. It’s a staggering statistic that 85% of autistic adults are unemployed or under-employed.”

WHY ARE THERE SO MANY SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE WITH ADHD?

It is known that people with ADHD have specific strengths, as a result of their brain functioning difference. They are more spontaneous, creative, energetic, intuitive, imaginative, and inventive. They also have the ability to hyperfocus on subjects that interest them to a far greater extent than their non-ADHD counterparts.

They can be outside-of-the-box thinkers and often produce the most original and creative ideas, and their superior energy means that they can achieve more and work harder and faster than others. Impulsiveness and spontaneity are closely related and many people with ADHD succeed in redirecting impulsivity and turning it into spontaneity, which can be utilised positively in every area of life.

People with ADHD need to work in professions that allow them to direct their need for physical activity, creativity, imagination, or sense of innovation into a profession in which they can utilise it positively and in which it will stand as an asset.

Given the explanation above, even by the most conservative of yardsticks, Branson’s sense of entrepreneurialism and subsequent can easily fall under the auspices of ADHD behaviour.

Virgin Records’ second shop, central Brighton, 1974

ADHD

ADHD is an acronym for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, a cogni tive difference, resulting in hyperactivity, impulsivity, inattentiveness, and poor executive functioning.

It is not a medical condition or a disorder, but a dysregulation of the biological functioning of the brain. The human brain is a complex communica tion network, whereby messages are relayed between neurons. In order for messages to be relayed, the brain requires two key neurotransmitters –also known as chemical messengers – they are called dopamine and noradrenaline.

In an ‘ADHD brain’, there is an irregula tion of these neurotransmitters resulting in a variety of symptoms, both positive and negative, that can impact on education, work, and relationships.

The symptoms of ADHD usually fit into three general categories: hyperactivity, impulsivity, and executive functioning.

SYMPTOMS OF HYPERACTIVITY INCLUDE

n Difficulty sitting in a chair

n Poor sense of danger

n Fidgeting

n Excessive talking

n Excessive physical movement

SYMPTOMS OF IMPULSIVITY

n Interrupting conversations

n Problems with self-control

n Aggression

n Overreacting to criticism and disappointments

SYMPTOMS OF DIFFICULTY WITH EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONING

n Disorganisation

n Forgetfulness

n Chaotic work/home environment

n Poor planning

n Poor prioritising.

DYSLEXIA

On the subject of dyslexia, and how he has managed to cope, survive and thrive with this social and academic albatross, in 2018, Sir Richard wrote a letter to his younger self, encouraging him through his tough times.

To that end, Branson’s Virgin empire supports ‘auticon’, an IT and technology services firm that employs autistic people as technology consultants for businesses all around the world. It also provides support for Made By Dyslexia, and charity dedicated to changing the stigma around dyslexia.

Given the range of superpowers neuro diversity can offer, it may be time for the rest of the business world to wake up and take notice, rather than have it prejudicially rubbished by an uncaring society.

Dear Ricky, I know you’re struggling at school and I wanted to give you some advice on how to become the best you can be, even when it’s difficult and you feel like the world is against you.

You should never see being different as a flaw or think that something is wrong with you. Being different is your biggest asset and will help you succeed.

I know you have problems with reading, writing and spelling and sometimes find it tricky to keep up in class. This does not mean you are lazy or dumb. You just think in a more creative way and struggle to find the relevance in school. Just make sure you turn your frustration with education into something positive.

Find things that interest you and pursue them doggedly. This passion is what will keep you going when things get tough – and life is always full of challenges. Your alternative ways of thinking will help you see these challenges as opportunities.

It’s ok not to be good at some things; as long as you find good people you can trust and surround yourself with them. Learn what you’re good at and channel that, instead of focusing on what you can’t do.

Use your alternative ways of thinking to be creative and think bigger. Look around you and see where things aren’t as they should be and try and come up with huge, big solutions that can have a positive effect on people. You might not realise it, but there are many, many other people out there that struggle at school in similar ways to you and many of them have gone on to invent or create wonderful things.

As your mum is teaching you, never be afraid to fly higher. If you’re scared and excited about what comes next, you’re probably on the right path.

Keep smiling, attitude is everything. You can accomplish anything you set your mind to – don’t ever believe anyone who tells you otherwise.

All the very best wishes for the future, Richard Branson

❛❛ I suppose the secret to bouncing back is not only to be unafraid of failures but to use them as motivational and learning tools ❜❜

❛❛ Branson is a champion of neurodiversity, coping with dyslexia, and openly talking of his ADHD diagnosis ❜❜

It’s finally time to bring that idea to life.

It’s finally time idea life.

Join NatWest’s free online Business Builder course today to start turning your idea into a business tomorrow. Search NatWest Business Builder to sign up

Start Up Loans celebrates 10th anniversary and reveals its South East Ambassador

Former Hollywood stunt double, Chloe Bruce, is among 12 small businesses to be selected as champions of UK start-ups by Start Up Loans, part of the British Business Bank

The announcement comes as the programme celebrates its 10-year anniversary, having delivered more than 9,600 loans worth over £97m to new business owners in the South East since 2012.

One such recipient of these loans is Chloe Bruce, founder of the Chloe Bruce Academy, a business offering virtual martial arts classes and tutorials. Chloe took out her loan of £2,500 in 2020 to start the business.

Chloe said “As a mum of two juggling work and childcare, having an online business has been essential in ensuring I maintain a work-life balance. My dream was always to launch a virtual platform, and when Covid meant that people were forced to stay at home, it felt like the right time to formally launch to the public after years of planning.”

START UP LOANS

AMBASSADORS

2022/2023

Two Dragon’s Den winners, a former Hollywood stunt double and a PhD graduate turned toymaker are among 12 business owners announced this month as Ambassadors for the Start Up Loans programme. The announcement comes as the programme celebrates its 10-year anniversary, having provided more than £900 million in loans since 2012.

The annual Start Up Loans Ambassadors programme, now in its seventh year, celebrates exceptional business owners who have followed their ambition of becoming their own boss after receiving support from the government-backed Start Up Loans programme.

Drawn from each of the UK’s 12 Nations and regions, the 2022 Start Up Loans Ambassadors reflect the broad diversity and ambition of the nation’s smaller business sector at a grass roots level.

Susan Elliott, Senior Manager, UK Network South East susan.elliott@british-business-bank.co.uk

Steve Conibear, Director, UK Network South & East of England steve.conibear@british-business-bank.co.uk

Chloe Bruce

UK owner-managed businesses have an increasingly global outlook but will look for greatest growth from domestic markets over the next year, finds our ‘Global Britain?’ survey.

GLOBAL BRITAIN? Businesses look for growthfrom domestic markets

The survey of 615 directors and owners of businesses with a turnover of between £1 million and £50 million finds:

n 81% of businesses currently export or trade overseas.

n Of the 19% that do not trade internationally, 38% are actively planning to do so and 43% are likely to consider expanding into overseas markets in the next three years.

n 84% of businesses surveyed will, however, focus growth plans on domestic markets over international markets in the next 12 months.

n 61% of businesses report international trade levels returning to pre-pandemic levels.

n 63% of businesses have cancelled or delayed international expansion because of the COVID pandemic, Brexit or supply chain issues.

n Europe is the most important overseas market for 71% of businesses that trade internationally.

n 36% of businesses turn to their trade body and 33% to their accountant as their preferred sources of advice on international trade.

Andrew Griggs, Senior Partner and Head of International at Kreston Reeves, said, “UK businesses continue to face significant challenges to international trade. The impact of the new trading arrangements with the European Union, the Covid pandemic and conflict in the Ukraine will continue to hamper international trade for many months to come.

“Yet there are refreshing views from UK businesses despite all the challenges. Businesses are increasingly international and global in their outlook and expect to see significant revenues from global markets over the next three years. But for the next 12 months, businesses are focusing on domestic markets which was surprising considering the UK is heading towards a recession.”

Kreston Reeves first conducted an international trade survey in 2019 where businesses faced greater uncertainty over the shape of the UK’s trading relationship with the EU. Back then, 58% saw the EU as a priority market for growth; today 71% of business leaders see it as a priority market. Brexit has not dimmed the appetite of UK businesses for a close trading relationship with our closest neighbours.

Our survey also reports increased barriers to international trade over the past three years. Tax, primarily VAT and duties, tariffs and trade barriers and the increased cost of trading internationally are considered greater barriers today than three years ago and are, arguably, a result of government policy.

❛❛ For the next 12 months, businesses are focusing on domestic markets which was surprising considering the UK is heading towards a recession ❜❜

CHANGING BARRIERS TO INTERNATIONAL TRADE

Andrew, adds, “Our survey asked business leaders what would best help them increase levels of international trade. The single greatest measure for over a third (35%) of businesses would be free trade agreements, closely followed by tax breaks (34%), the removal of red tape (32%) and then financial incentives (31%).

“The complexities of international trade see businesses seek advice from many quarters. Professional bodies are the

primary source of advice for 38% of businesses, closely followed by their accountant (33%).

“It is, of course, a combination of support and advice that would truly help businesses grow overseas.”

“Although UK businesses are increasingly global in their outlook, they are still focusing growth plans on domestic markets. The continuous economic challenges cannot be ignored. The Government should actively look for ways to support businesses with their overseas ambitions. That could easily be achieved by removing the red tape and barriers to international that have arisen following Brexit.”

You can access a full copy of the report at www.krestonreeves.com/shapingyourfuture Andrew can be reached at andrew.griggs@krestonreeves.com or call 0330 124 1399.

❛❛ Professional bodies are the primary source of advice for 38% of businesses, closely followed by their accountant (33%) ❜❜

THE 2022 FINALISTS

Professional Services Award

Sponsored by projectfive

HJP Chartered Financial Planners

Morr & Co Rosewood Solicitors WS Planning & Architecture YRH Finance Team

Business Innovation of the Year

Sponsored by Surrey Research Park

AURA Veterinary Bays Consulting ipTEST Parcours Velo Signapse

Start-up of the Year

Sponsored by Sandown Mercedes-Benz Invuse Signapse Surrey Hills Accountancy

The Fertility Coaching Company The Social Table

Business Growth Award Sponsored by People Puzzles Antler Homes Bays Consulting Opus Technology ServiceMaster AAA YRH Finance Team

Chamber Member of the Year

Sponsored by Surrey Chambers of Commerce

Clandon Wood Nature Reserve and Natural Burial Ground Perfect Pitch Speaking in Public

The HR Dept Surrey Hills YUnique Marketing

Most Sustainable Business Sponsored by Heathrow Airport Clandon Wood Nature Reserve Dignity Pet Crematorium For Earth’s Sake CIC Mesh Energy Puremess

Young Professional of the Year Sponsored by Inspohub Lewis Dennett, Broadplace Ellie McFadden, howell jones solicitors Jamie Garrett, Invuse Carla Nokes, The Fitness Directory Emily Hall, WS Planning & Architecture

Small Business of the Year

Sponsored by Surrey Business Magazine Bays Consulting For Earth’s Sake CIC RJ Osteopathic Clinic Signapse The Social Table

Medium Business of the Year S Sponsored by Partridge Muir & Warren Black Label Creations Pro Drive IT ServiceMaster AAA Surrey AV Solutions YRH Finance Team

Large Business of the Year Sponsored by RSM Antler Homes Bruce’s DMH Stallard Fluid Hygiene V4 Woodflooring

Community Hero Award

Sponsored by Greatest Hits Radio Alliance For Better Care Charles Russell Speechlys Fard & Co Solicitors Oakleaf Enterprise Two Ducks

Best Customer Service Sponsored by Dynamic Magazine Bruce’s Dazzle & Fizz Igenomix Opus Technology Pro Drive IT

Businessperson of the Year

Sponsored by Mayo Wynne Baxter Clive Price, Barons Pub Company Mandira Sarkar, Mandira’s Kitchen Frances Rutter, NESCOT Rachael Hurton, Synergy Dance Claire Leigh, Two Ducks

International Business of the Year

Sponsored by DMH Stallard Babycup ipTEST LGM Products Parcours Velo NatureMetrics

Employer of the Year

Sponsored by Surrey Business School Broadplace Gold-i Mesh Energy Morr & Co Pro Drive IT

Company of the Year Sponsored by Haines Watts Antler Homes AURA Veterinary Black Label Creations Barons Pub Company Opus Technology

East Sussex attracts £200m of investment

Business support and inward investment agency Locate East Sussex highlights the vast amount of investment being ploughed into the county, regenerating our towns, improving our business connections and creating jobs.

Since the start of this decade, over £200m of government funding has been awarded to East Sussex through a range of programmes to improve infrastructure, town centres, high streets and building commercial units. All of it goes to support the levelling-up agenda, levering in signif icant private sector funding. Below are the highlights.

❛❛ Over £200m of government funding has been awarded to East Sussex through a range of programmes to improve infrastructure ❜❜

EASTBOURNE

Eastbourne successfully secured nearly £20 million for its Levelling Up bid linking the town centre regeneration with a strengthened visitor economy. Victoria Place business district, just off the seafront, is being regenerated into a vibrant pedestrianised zone special ising in food with independent cafes, eateries and small businesses to attract year round visitors. Meanwhile, just out of town, on the edge of the South Downs, is the Towner’s redevelopment of Black Robin Farm into an arts and education centre. This will attract visi tors, create jobs and offer training to young people.

NEWHAVEN

Along the coast, Newhaven has also been successful with its Levelling Up bid and been awarded £12.6 million to re-establish the town as a maritime centre of excellence, and to ensure Newhaven’s fishing industry receives the support it needs.

In 2021, Newhaven was also allocated nearly £20m from the Government’s ‘Towns Fund’ to regenerate deprived towns. The council has been working on the detailed plans ever since. They hope to drive economic growth through the ‘Newhaven Enterprise Zone’ and support the development of creative businesses and makers in the town. This will help bridge the creative coast between Eastbourne and Brighton, along with the redevelopment as a thriving port facility re-positioning the town as key southern gateway to the UK. An additional £5m from the ‘Future High Street Fund’ will focus on improving the town centre.

HASTINGS

Hastings has also been awarded £24.3 million. The funding will support a range of projects, such as sustainable business incubator units at Churchfield Business Centre, the creation of a ‘Green Low Carbon Skills’ centre of excellence and local labour supply, the regeneration of the town centre to reconnect with residents, businesses and visitors, and develop ment of three key facilities into anchors for a new ‘Creative Quarter’.

COUNTY-WIDE

Across East Sussex, the Getting Building Fund, via the South East Local Enterprise Partnership (SELEP) is supporting projects that enable town centre modernisation, physical connec tivity, improvements to human capital, and improvements to digital infrastruc ture with £11,179,000 across eight projects.

These include the development of 4,000 sq.m of Class B1/B2 industrial units, built using sustainable construc tion techniques; a new co-working office space for creative industries in Lewes; and the redevelopment of the Observer Building in Hastings into a leisure/retail/living space.

SELEP has also provided almost £2 million from the Growth Fund to create 84,000 sq. ft of light industrial floor space on Bexhill Enterprise Park North – another major development on the Bexhill Hastings Link Road which has already seen two major new office developments completed in the last few years.

A precursor to the Shared Prosperity Fund in 2021, the Community Renewal Fund invested £2.5 million across five projects in the county which will safeguard 300 jobs and offer 470 participants skills and employment support.

Currently, project plans for the £1m allo cated to each of the borough and districts in East Sussex from the Government’s long awaited Shared Prosperity Fund are being worked up and will soon be submitted to govern ment for approval.

Road infrastructure investment in the pipeline:

n A £75m investment in small scale improvements to the A27 east of Lewes by National Highways, formerly Highways England. Junction improvements at Polegate and Drusillas roundabout were completed at the end of 2021 with the comple tion of the pedestrian/cycle route planned for the end of 2022;

n With a £23m investment into the Newhaven Port Access Road and further Government investment from the Port Infrastructure Fund to provide the link into the south of the port, the road was opened to traffic in February 2022;

n The Exceat Bridge on the A259 over the River Cuckmere successfully attracted £7.9m of Levelling Up funding which will make a huge differ ence to traffic using the coast road from Brighton to Eastbourne.

These investments are only part of the recent story of East Sussex. The unprecedented level of investment, together with the shift in working prac tices since the pandemic, is making the lifestyle East Sussex has to offer appealing for investors and new resi dents alike.

Locate East Sussex is delighted to see East Sussex being put on the map as a location for business, and is pleased to be able to support businesses on their journey to success.

❛❛ The unprecedented level of investment is making the lifestyle East Sussex has to offer appealing for investors and new residents alike ❜❜

CATHERINE VAN WEENEN

NatWest London and the South East

Board:

close of the third quarter revealed some concerning results for the South East’s private sector, as well as for the UK as a whole, with activity stagnating while demand faltered for the first time in 19 months. The impact of the cost of living crisis could not be clearer, with clients thinking twice when placing orders for goods or services. The months ahead are dubbed to be tougher given market turmoil and currency weakness which has hit the UK particularly hard. This also showed through in sentiment which was among the lowest since the pandemic amid growing concerns over a recession.

a more positive note, the South East ranked third in regional rankings, suggesting other regions were more adversely affected. Moreover, there are tentative signs that inflationary pressures - although high - are starting to ease. Businesses also welcome government support on energy prices, though firms will hope this extends beyond the planned six months.”

NATWEST'S MARKET ANALYSIS

DEMAND AND OUTLOOK

BUSINESS DECLINES, ENDING 18 SUCCESSIVE MONTHS OF GROWTH

Private sector firms in the South East

a renewed reduction in new business during September. The rate of decline was marginal, but the first monthly contraction since February 2021. According to respondents, clients kept a closer eye on their budgets in the wake of the cost of living crisis. The weak economic environment was also blamed.

INDEX

FUTURE ACTIVITY INDEX

SENTIMENT MODERATES AMID RECESSIONARY CONCERNS

optimistic that output

would improve in the coming

months with sentiment again in positive territory, a trend observed since the question was first asked in July 2012. That said, the degree of positivity was weaker than the series

amid concerns of a recession.

also mentioned the cost of living crisis had weighed on confidence.

Humber

degree of

than the South East.

TOP EXPORT MARKETS

East

Market Weight Output Index, Sept 2022

1 USA 16.4% 49.3*

2 Germany 12.0% 45.7

3 Netherlands 6.3%

4 France 6.1%

Ireland 6.0%

Sources: *US flash composite figure

EXPORTS BACK-TO-BACK DECLINES IN EXPORT CONDITIONS

East Export Climate

national PMI

importance to the manufacturing exports of the South East. This produces an indicator for the economic health of the region’s export markets.

at 49.1 in September,

from 48.7 in August, to signal two consecutive contractions in export market conditions for firms in the

the region’s key export destinations, only two registered an expansion, namely Ireland and France.

the US saw output fall marginally while back-toback contractions were recorded in the Netherlands.

registered a sharp and accelerated reduction in activity during September.

BUSINESS CAPACITY HEAD-COUNTS RISE AT A MARKED AND ACCELERATED PACE

Staffing levels in the South East’s private sector increased for the 19th month in a row during September. Moreover, the rate of growth quickened from August and was sharp compared to the long-run series average. Firms sought to build their workforces ahead of expectations of greater demand.

Service providers registered a stronger rate of employment growth compared to their manufacturing counterparts.

INPUT

Natwest, IHS

PRICES INPUT PRICE INFLATION MODERATES TO NINE-MONTH LOW

Average cost burdens faced by private sector firms in the South East increased for the 28th month in succession in September amid rising energy, wage, transportation and material costs. That said, the overall rate of inflation slowed to a nine-month low. The region recorded a quicker increase compared to the UK as a whole.

SELLING PRICES RISE

IN SEPTEMBER

charged for goods and services by private sector companies in the South East rose at a sharp and accelerated pace at the end of the third quarter. Moreover, the rate of inflation was among the sharpest in the series’ history. Panel comments indicated that firms passed on higher costs to customers. Manufacturing firms reported a steeper rate of inflation than service providers.

Prices charged for goods and services by private sector companies in the South East rose at a sharp and accelerated pace at the end of the third quarter ❜❜

The 4Rs are what many employers are talking about – Remote Working, Recruitment, Retention and, more recently, Redundancies. They are to some extent intertwined though. Pam Loch explains why

THE CHALLENGES OF THE 4R s

The growth in remote working has been accelerated by the pandemic. In 2019, around 5% of the workforce worked mainly from home, with around 30% reporting they occasion ally worked from home. By April 2020, this had risen to 46.6% of people working from home in some capacity, and the numbers have continued to rise with the increase in hybrid working.

The launch in December 2021 of new guidance on hybrid working from the Flexible Working Taskforce however has reinforced that the way we work now is likely to permanently change.

WORK FROM HOME

The pandemic, coupled with the ongoing financial crisis, has resulted in more employees than ever embracing the new work-from-home model, as it provides them with more free time, and less travel stress and expense. A recent poll found that 45% of workers are pushing for more remote working amidst the cost-of-living crisis.

This preference to work from home has, in some instances, led to tensions with employers who want staff back to the office. Some employers are less willing to adopt this new way of working, and increasing numbers are now ques tioning productivity and trust around remote workers.

LEGAL OBLIGATIONS

There is no right to work from home unless a person’s contract of employ ment says otherwise, or an employer is legally obliged to. At present, employees have a right to make a request to work flexibly after 26 weeks of service, and the employer has to consider that request ‘in a reasonable manner’ within three months of receipt of the request. The Flexible Working Regulations 2014 permits one written request every 12 months. If these criteria are met, employers are obliged to give serious consideration to any flexible working requests, such as to work from home, or to change working hours.

If an employee asks for flexible working as a reasonable adjustment because they have a disability under the Equality Act 2010, the employer has a duty to agree if it is a reasonable request. What is reasonable takes into account the employer’s circumstances and on a case by case basis, will therefore vary.

EMPLOYER FLEXIBILITY

Many employers are being forced to rethink their approach and be more accommodating to allow remote/hybrid working as they find it increasingly diffi cult to retain or to recruit staff if they are not prepared to agree to these arrange ments.

There is evidence that remote/hybrid working can increase productivity and improve job satisfaction with staff more engaged and enjoying a better work/life balance. Employees are more moti vated to work hard and enjoy their jobs, making it easier to retain staff and avoid the current recruitment challenges. Similarly, cultivating a reputation as a flexible employer can also help to attract fresh new talent. A recent survey found that 69% of employers advertising vacancies were “open to flexible working”. 68% of those offering remote/ hybrid working found it enabled them to attract and retain more talent.

While being flexible and agreeing to remote/hybrid working can help with recruitment, it can also present chal lenges to retaining staff. The lack of engagement with managers when working remotely can result in employees feeling isolated, and poor management can lead to complaints of bullying or harassment. With the high demand for staff, it is often easier for staff to leave and find a new role, poten tially at a higher salary too.

Managers therefore play an important role in making sure the remote/hybrid model works and need to be skilled in dealing with issues to nip them in the bud, to ensure they retain the best staff. Our Nip it in the Bud training helps managers acquire those skills.

IS HYBRID WORKING APPROPRIATE IN YOUR BUSINESS?

Employers should also consider the remote working psychometric tests we carry out to assess employees’ suit ability for remote working; and highlight areas that could be challenging so that managers can be prepared and address them.

With increasing costs and concerns around recession, more employers are carrying out business reviews which has led some businesses revisiting the way they work. In some instances, allowing remote/hybrid work has led to reduced costs for employers due to lower overheads. This has meant that businesses which may have had to consider redundancies in the past due to cost considerations are now able to avoid that for the time-being.

However, remote working may lead some employers to completely reas sess how they work, potentially deciding to make redundancies, and engage indi viduals who work outside the UK to lower their costs, because they can find lower paid individuals who can work effectively, for example, from Barcelona as they can from Brighton.

THE IMMEDIATE FUTURE

There is no doubt that the remote/hybrid model is set to continue to impact the workplace in the UK, with employees able to stay in work for longer as they fit it around their personal commitments. This, together with the current economic climate, could lead to the economically inactive who left the workplace post-pan demic to return to the workforce, which could ultimately change the current recruitment dynamics.

Whilst there may be challenges in the short term, the impact of remote/hybrid working could ultimately lead to an evolution in the workplace which could reduce the recruitment challenges and help improve retention for employers in the longer term.

Pam Loch, Solicitor and Managing Director of Loch Associates Group E: info@lochassociates.co.uk www.lochassociates.co.uk

www.platinummediagroup.co.uk

❛❛ Employers should also consider the remote working psychometric tests we carry out to assess employees’ suitability for remote working ❜❜

There’s a baa-rilliant new art trail coming in Autumn 2023 – all thanks to Martlets, the much-loved local charity that provides life-changing hospice care

Martlets invites businesses to be part of the #BrightonFlock

‘Shaun by the Sea’ will see a colourful cavalcade of one-off painted Shauns decorate Brighton streets from September next year for eight weeks.

The big reveal was held at the iconic Royal Pavilion where Martlets ambassador and superstar DJ Norman Cook – aka Fatboy Slim – showcased a fabulous Regency inspired Shaun the Sheep, created by local artist Sarah Arnett. Norman’s own Big Beach Café has committed to sponsoring a sculpture.

He said, “If you’re thinking about joining us in being a sponsor for the next trail, my advice would be to go for it! To be a part of such a creative and inspiring commu nity project, in support of a local charity we couldn’t do without, is absolutely priceless.”

In a truly ewe-nique opportunity, local businesses are being invited to sponsor a Shaun. Alongside this there are of a host of additional exciting sponsorship options, including the chance to lead our learning programme and sponsor the trail app.

Brandwatch, the world’s premier social suite, has already confirmed its role as headline sponsor of what promises to be one of the biggest and brightest charity events of 2023. So join our ever-growing flock of sponsors – you won’t want to miss out and you’ll be in great company – including Rockwater, Trident, Enter Gallery and Green Insurance.

Martlets CEO, Claire Irving, said, “At

Norman Cook with Shaun the Sheep

Martlets, we’re passionate about connecting people in need with people who care. Shaun by the Sea will bring together individuals, families, fundraisers, volunteers, schools, artists, community groups and businesses in support of those affected by terminal illness in our community. We very much hope local businesses will seize this opportunity to be part of the #BrightonFlock with Martlets.”

Rachel Peacock from Aardman, the studio behind Shaun the Sheep, said, “We are delighted to be working with the brilliant charity Martlets on their next trail. We look forward to working with sponsors and artists to bring Shaun to the streets of Brighton & Hove. He is

sure to add such fun and colour, and we are in no doubt many will flock to be part of the fun!”

The trail is brought to the city in associa tion with Wild in Art, the organisation who partnered with Martlets on the previous art adventures. These last two trails, Snowdogs and Snailspace, generated millions of social media impressions as well as local and national press and TV interest.

To find out more about the trail and how your business can be part of it visit www.shaunbythesea.co.uk, or email Susi or Amber at Sponsors@shaunbythesea.co.uk

Headline

By Sebastian Briggs and Anthony Alderman, Partners at Womble Bond Dickinson

Southampton’s contribution to get the UK back on track for Net Zero

In 2019, the government set a legally binding target which requires all green house gas emissions to be net zero by 2050. As a city, Southampton must reduce its carbon emissions by 62% by 2025 to keep on track with national targets.

Southampton City Council has already highlighted various cost-effective solutions to achieve 40% of the total target reduction which could reduce the city’s energy bill by £62m, and create significant employment opportunities. However, the government’s recently announced fossil fuels campaign, which is set to include lifting the ban on fracking and expanding drilling for oil and gas, could have a detrimental impact on the UK’s net zero efforts.

In our recent research white paper with Cornwall Insight, we analysed different energy markets and gathered expert insights as to the UK’s progress in the energy transition. The report, ‘The UK and the energy transition: Leading the way?’ draws on lessons from around the globe and identifies that, whilst the UK is well placed to reduce carbon emissions, several challenges must be overcome to meet net zero targets, let alone lead the way.

WHERE TO START?

There are several opportunities identi fied within the report that can be capitalised upon should the challenges be addressed. Firstly, that the UK’s strong reputation as a friendly environ ment for energy and infrastructure investment acts as an extremely

attractive prospect for external inves tors. The robust and transparent UK legal system also offers a desirable foundation for investment and new technology. Lastly, the UK possesses a unique geographical location supporting offshore wind and ambitious domestic climate targets.

❛❛ The government’s recently announced fossil fuels campaign could have a detrimental impact on the UK’s net zero efforts ❜❜

THE UK ON A GLOBAL STAGE

In addition to highlighting the opportu nity energy transition presents for the UK on a global stage, the research brings to the forefront the domestic, economic and job opportunities associ ated with onshoring the supply chain for renewable energy developments. As the cost-of-living crisis continues to challenge consumers and businesses alike, over reliance on an international supply chain could become a barrier to the energy transition progress.

The factors impacting the UK’s energy transition are ever-changing and unpre dictable, as demonstrated within the report. It is difficult to make decisions in

an environment which is constantly in flux – which is why this data and insight should be invaluable for a market currently in a period of change.

HOMEGROWN POTENTIAL

After years of delay, we are now forging ahead in carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) and hydrogen. Due to being one of the UK’s busiest ports and emitting approximately 2.6 million tonnes of carbon each year, the Southampton Water Project will investi gate the feasibility of developing a hydrogen super-hub at the Port of Southampton to help produce and distribute hydrogen across the South Coast of England.

This project will scope the site’s suit ability as a centre of excellence for hydrogen production and distribution, CCUS, as well as other green technolo gies. Should this plan be put into practice, Southampton could become a world benchmark for decarbonising whole industrial areas.

Read our report The UK and the energy transition – leading the way? developed in conjunction with Cornwall Insight here: www.womblebonddickinson.com/ uk/rebuild-energy-transition

Womble Bond Dickinson (WBD) is a full-service international law firm sitting amongst the Top 20 UK law firms and ranking 109th globally. www.womblebonddickinson.com/uk/ locations/southampton

❛❛ Whilst the UK is well placed to reduce carbon emissions, several challenges must be overcome to meet net zero targets ❜❜

INFLUENCERS FORUM

The future of work is now. Digitalisation and globalisation have sparked radical shifts in how we live and how we work.

The pandemic crisis has accelerated these beyond anything we could have imagined. One thing is beyond doubt, the future of work has arrived. Organisations must truly understand the uncertainty of change in order to make appropriate strategic decisions.

To understand the impact of the changes to the nature of work, both momentary and lasting, organisations must first align and invest in a clear set of strategic priorities. Defining these priorities and seeing them through will enable them to derive bespoke value from their financial human and technological capital.

Sharn

SHARN MANKU

HARRY

Harry

Sam

DESIREE

MAARTEN

MH: If I might come to Professor Ying first. Has the future of work arrived? What does it look like?

YZ: I think the process is an evolving one. First, we have fast evolving digital technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning. All these technologies are taking away jobs from humans. And there is a widely cited study suggesting nearly half of all employment is at high risk of automation in the next few decades.

That sounds quite alarming. But later research by the OECD and ONS suggest technologies are unlikely to replace home occupations, because many occupations involve activities that are quite difficult to automate, like public speaking, negotiating, persuading, caring, counselling.

Apart from technologies, we’ve also got a pandemic, which has really changed the way we work. There are so many people working from home, and it’s likely to stay that way in the future. And we’ve also got Brexit. So the future of work implies a lot of uncertainties, which we are still trying to understand.

MH: So in the oncoming tsunami, will there be a retraining exercise rather than people sitting at home having no jobs?

YZ: I think there’s growing consensus that skills will be the key problem. For the majority of the labour force today, you probably need to learn new skills, especially digital skills to cope with what is coming.

PL: The key word here is ‘change’, because some people aren’t coping particularly well with change. That’s caused a lot of anxiety, and we see it coming through in different ways. For example, HR consultants are dealing with a lot more grievances at work. And a lot of that is through this anxiety around the changes that have occurred.

Sometimes it’s also a lack of communication about those changes. People are getting paranoid about what’s happening, because they feel they’re not in control.

I’m not sure if we train our managers to help people to make changes. The pandemic has hampered progress, and made people feel even more anxious about their well being and their job.

SM: The training is there already, and focuses on ‘where do we need to go with our universities, apprentices, colleges?’ The new generation coming up is already involved in technology. AI is not really going to replace everybody.

We really need to think about workforce planning. How are we changing as an organisation? How are we changing as a business? What does our business of the future look like?

DA: I find with my clients who are within business, that they’re feeling very insecure about the amount of changes that are coming up. Some are from a generation that is embracing technology, others are of older generations that fear that technology and worry about their own skills in leadership.

I’m seeing there’s a real conflict in leadership to embrace the changes while reaching out to your hybrid remote teams, and engaging them along with the culture of the organisation. And it’s a culture which has to inevitably change to rapidly globalise and beat the competitors’ demands.

SB: The whole issue of engagement has been pushed right to the fore. I think all organisations including lawyers have recognised the change. And they understand that they now have to take a different approach to how you manage staff remotely; how you engage with them.

At the moment, we’ve got a mismatch between resources and need. You can see that in the unemployment figures. There are opportunities which aren’t getting filled. It’s very difficult to recruit, and that’s the major challenge for all sectors, including the legal sector.

HS: Regarding AI, I have a colleague who works in the dairy industry. What they’ve developed in AI – it’s quite scary in some respects – is the cameras focused on the people working in the milking parlour to assess their movements. It effectively marks them; the AI produces a readout to say how well their employees are performing.

From an employer’s point of view, that’s probably music to our ears. It becomes very easy to have a very cogent basis of saying whether somebody’s performing or not performing for the company.

SD: When it comes to training, there’s a place for the government, as well. The majority of people would be happy to retrain, so I think the government can step up here.

❛❛ I’m seeing there’s a real conflict in leadership to embrace the changes while reaching out to your hybrid remote teams ❜❜

MH: The government is also looking to larger companies to deal with their own training.

SD: They are. There’s no one size fits all. What works for one individual or business won’t necessarily work for another.

Some individuals want flexibility - maybe, for example, working nine days out of 10. Because then they can use that extra day that they don’t work to do something that gives them purpose and meaning. Work is not the be-all and end-all. And that’s where employers and businesses need to change.

HS: There is talk of the unemployment figures. For me, the better guide is the employment figure. If you actually look at the number of people that are employed, it’s not that impressive. And that’s the real problem – the number of people that are actually in work hasn’t grown sufficiently.

PL: Do you think that may change though? Could it have been a blip, as a result of the pandemic, people reflected back on their lives?

SM: I’ve been reading about the great ‘unretirement’. The cost of living process is pushing people back into work. And the more it’s in the media and in conversations like this, about the focus on well being and retraining, the more people will want to come back to work but in a different way. The pandemic has changed the way we work.

MH: Knowing that the pandemic is the thing that kicked off this huge change, there’s the ‘work from home’ consideration. Is it here to stay?

SD: For some individuals, yes. Some people will want to work from home. Some people hate it and want to be back in the office.

There isn’t one answer for everybody. Employers know that they are being interviewed more, and they need to look at their rewards and recognition packages. Working from home is only one type of flexible working.

There’s a movement around the four-day week, or maybe nine days every two weeks. There can be volunteering policies; allowing your staff to go off and volunteer somewhere once or twice a month; giving them flexible start and finish hours, so they have more autonomy over their day-to-day work.

MH: How does that help the economics of the country? To get as much done in four days as I do with five sounds good. In my experience, that’s not the case.

SD: I’d have to disagree with you there. I should declare that I only work four days a week, but I absolutely do at least five days’ work in those four days. And I will always be grateful and loyal to my firm for letting me do that.

MH: But if you if you do five days in four, can you do six in five?

SD: I probably could. But I choose not to because in my day off, I do volunteer for a charity. And that makes me feel fulfilled as a person. And then it means I’m more happy at work, and more effective at work. And a great salary is not compensation for an unpleasant working environment.

MH: Ying, is there any research done in this work from home phenomenon?

YZ: Plenty. Remote working has been around for a long time.

In 1981, 1% of UK workers worked mainly from home. In 2019, just before the pandemic, that figure was 5%. Then the pandemic hit. And we saw an explosion of remote working. In the early months of the pandemic, nearly half of all UK workers were working from home.

Hybrid working is going to be the future. The problem is how to manage that and how to make it work.

The electronic surveillance by AI has been on the rise. During the pandemic, a lot of companies bought electronic surveillance software. But that’s pretty counterproductive because that sends a clear message to our employees that they cannot be trusted.

SD: In our wider group, nobody cares if you’re not going to be at your desk whether your desk is at home or at work between this hour and that hour. As long as you are doing what you need to get done, then we trust our colleagues to do it.

MH: Sometimes for bosses of SMEs, the change is coming faster than they’re able to cope. There’s also a case, with working from home, of ‘how do you see eye to eye if you don’t meet face to face’?

SD: Learning by osmosis? There has to be a hybrid element to it; so you need to make sure that, if you are normally remote, you have your team meetings at least one day a week where you’re all together.

❛❛ I’m not sure if we train our managers to help people to make changes. The pandemic has hampered progress, and made people feel even more anxious about their well being and their job ❜❜

MH: With large companies with several hundred employees, is it viable for the HR department to be able to do that with each individual employee?

SB: It’s not HR’s job. It’s the managers that need to have the education; working out how you deal with the individual employees means that you need high quality managers.

PL: Communication is always critical, and there has to be an open and honest discussion, and giving managers that skill set. Another thing going on is sometimes oversharing information – sometimes personal information. Again, managers don’t know how to deal with it.

LA: We talk to a whole load of different types of businesses. And there’s a different effect that hybrid working is causing. It’s getting increasingly difficult to get decisions because they don’t meet every day in the office. Has anybody else found that as an issue?

YZ: Sometimes it can take a lot of emails to solve a simple problem, where a chat in the corridors probably resolves it in a couple of minutes.

When people meet in office building, you’re also in touch with informal learning. A lot of learning occurs informally between colleagues who learn from each other. So it’s quite important that people do hybrid working. Remote working should not happen five days a week.

SD: It also engenders a sense of belonging. The environment we work in and the friendships that we make are important for our mental well being.

YZ: Social relationships are one of the most important determinants of mental health and well being. There was an interesting study by Harvard researchers, they followed people for nearly 100 years. The question was, ‘Who lives happier long lives?’

And the results shows social relationships – that’s the number one factor; far more important than income, education, social status etc. Happiness is found in the quality of your social relationships.

Research has suggested some people said they became more productive when they did remote working, whereas some people became less productive.

MH: The phenomenon of ‘quiet quitting’. Do you recognise that?

SD: Essentially it’s working to rule. People doing their nine-to-five or their nine-to-five-thirty.

HS: Has anyone seen it for real?

SD: Work to rule is something that’s been knocking around for ages with some people. Again, it goes back to them not being happy with their job. I think it’s just a nice little social media sound bite.

SM: Within quiet quitting are the issues around retraining. What are the government’s obligations here? We all have mortgages, financial commitments, and so forth.

You’re in a miserable job. And you have to be in this job, because you’ve got no choice. So is it viable to retrain? Possibly not. What do we do for those people that haven’t got those skill sets?

SD: I’ve heard of many people who would like to retrain and go into healthcare, or be nurses, but they can’t. They feel trapped because of their financial commitments.

SM: It goes back to mental health. And that’s a big cohort of people that we need to be putting our arms around. It’s not just the next generation; what are we doing in terms of re-skilling current working people?

YZ: We have been focusing too much on the quantity of work, not enough on the quality of work.

People can adapt to a lot of events, but not unemployment. Work provides a lot of mental vitamins for people who like social interactions, and your sense of purpose. However, if you are employed in a tedious job, where you are only using one skill all the time, that is pretty boring.

Quality is the key to our overall wellbeing, pay is actually quite low on that list.

SB: One of the problems with the pandemic was the ‘good work’ agenda, which was designed to improve the quality of jobs; it’s just been virtually abandoned. That was supposed to produce an Employment Bill, which Boris Johnson didn’t take forward at all.

SD: But it probably shouldn’t need legislation for that. The research is out there. Having a voice, feeling like you can influence your organisation and the decisions it makes, we don’t need legislation to tell us.

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MH: One of the biggest issues most companies have at the moment is finding employees. We put out an ad pre pandemic for an event assistant. We had 175 replies. Post pandemic; same ad. We had three. That’s just one snapshot. Is everybody having the same issue?

YZ: There are several factors. One is, during the pandemic, some people who were furloughed didn’t return to the labour force. At the beginning of the pandemic young people were hardest hit. However, later on, it was people aged 50+ who were least likely to come back. They chose to retire or move into economic inactivity.

And some people left the UK after Brexit. The NHS has had a huge recruitment difficulty, and you probably still remember the shortage of lorry drivers last winter. So Brexit makes things worse.

And also, after the pandemic, a lot of jobs which still require people to come to our physical workplace became less attractive – hospitality, retail, tourism, and so on.

MH: I get that. But I wonder, apart from those who’ve retired from the workforce, where have they gone? These things go in a circular fashion. But every sector I speak to seems to be having this issue…

PL: Apart from health and well being apparently. There has been an uptake. And people want to move into those sectors as a result of the pandemic.

LA: I wonder if some of those people that you’re talking about have gone back into education to study.

SM: People have taken a different stance on what they want. I’ve seen lots of people that are yoga instructors, painters and decorators. They just want less stressful roles or responsibilities.

DA: Some of the people have gone into starting up their own businesses. With the rate of SMEs failing, are we not seeing some of those people going back into employment in the long run?

YZ: The hardest of fields are education, transport, and voluntary sector. These sectors are facing the greatest difficulties to fill.

HS: Agriculture must be high as well as it was heavily reliant on Eastern Europeans who aren’t coming any more.

YZ: That’s the Brexit impact. Also, people who have their own businesses are classified as self employed. These last two employment figures, what we are seeing is very low unemployment rates, something like 3.8%. That’s very low. But also we have very low overall employment.

SD: Also, with a lot of these high salaries that we’re all seeing being bandied about, people will jump for a higher salary. And then they realise that’s coming in with a lot of other issues.

MH: And that’s where we come back to the amount you’re paid being quite low on the list of your satisfactions in life. There are lots of reports that women have suffered more in the workplace during the pandemic than men. Do we recognise that?

DA: Definitely so. Especially women working from home during the pandemic. I think we all know women with younger children were really badly affected mentally.

I spoke with many female clients who felt that that their partner being at home was an extra burden on the relationships.

YZ: Depression in general has increased more among young women during the pandemic. We don’t fully understand the reasons why young people are much more likely to get depression than older people, and in my experience, young women are much more likely to be depressed than the young men.

MH: Men have been slightly knocked for leaving the childcare to the woman, and the pandemic shone a light on that. When and how do we retrain men?

SD: Employers can start looking at their parental leave policies, and making sure fathers are not disadvantaged, and are in fact encouraged to take more paternity leave.

MH: Fewer than 9% of men took the parental route in the UK…

SD: We don’t see senior men taking time off, it’s expected that women will take maternity leave.

So employers absolutely have a part to play here. They need to improve their parental leave policies because if we have better paid policies, more men will take time off work, and then therefore they’ll start shouldering more of the burden at home.

SM: 35 to 45 is the worst mental health death rate for all males, And are they able to openly express how they’re feeling? There’s a little bit of isolation there.

At Kreston Reeves – I’ve only been there a short period of time – we have males on parental leave, and I’m really impressed by that. They want an evolution and they are listening, having that open form of dialogue and normalising it.

PL: Unfortunately, I feel the pandemic has resulted in reinforcing stereotypes. I know of situations with females who were pregnant, who had clearly been exited out of the business because they were pregnant. I’ve been working in Employment Law since the 1990s, and I’ve seen the progress that’s been made.

We’ve evolved so much, it’s fantastic. But I think we went backwards by 10 or 15 years with some businesses.

MH: Sadly, that is all we have time for. Thank you very much indeed. I think we have a really interesting discussion.

❛❛ In the early months of pandemic, nearly half of all UK workers were working from home ❜❜

By Daniel Morgan, Managing Partner, Haines Watts Esher

DEFINING YOUR VALUES AS A LEADER

Talent retention has always been a key challenge facing business owners but no more so than in the last couple of years. Motivation and purpose are now key parts of people strategies and your business’s values can be central to this.

The aim of values is to align your teams with a shared purpose and sense of community within their teams. When executed well, values achieve exactly that, and can be crucial to the continued engagement amongst your colleagues. However, if they are not, they can cause more problems than you perhaps began with.

When considering your values you need to ask:

n What are you trying to achieve? What are your ambitions for the business, is it innovation? Fast growth? Providing jobs?

n How do you want to do business? Whether that’s making an impact in the local community, protecting the environment, to the basics around how you want people to be treated within your teams

n What drives you and your key team members? Some will be profi t driven, others want their workplace to feel like a community, others will want to know that what they are doing matters.

Once you’ve considered the answers to all of these questions you have the foundations for your values.

DO YOUR VALUES

REPRESENT YOUR PEOPLE?

The way that values are implemented within the business is pivotal to their success. You could have a great set of values but if they are contradicted or not well communicated, the messaging can fall fl at. In this situation, at best, no one will pay attention and all your hard work will have been for nothing. At worst, people will feel alienated and frustrated by the empty statements.

LIVING YOUR VALUES

While your core values should represent the heart of your business, this does not necessarily mean that everyone will be displaying them from day one.

THE IMPORTANCE OF A CLEAR SET OF VALUES

In the early stages when there are very few people in the business, it is likely that the founding individuals are well aligned and similar values or ambitions were shared.

As the business grows and more personalities are added to the mix, you risk diluting this shared vision you once held. Communicating your core values and implementing them in all areas from recruitment to business processes means you can keep your team well aligned to your goals.

It is important to open up the discussion with your teams. If you implement a set of values that don’t relate to them, trying to apply them through the business will be an uphill battle.

Workshops with people at all levels can offer valuable insights into what they think the key strengths and weaknesses of the business are at present and what behaviours they want to see more of.

Leadership buy-in needs to be concrete and this can mean that conflicts surface. This can be hard and requires you to step up and speak when someone is deviating from your core values. It is crucial that messaging from the top is consistent and that these values are displayed by leadership day in, day out.

Implementing values can be a hugely rewarding process, the increase in personal investment and motivation from your teams can be significant. If you want to discuss defining your business values, get in touch.

T: 020 8549 5137

esher@hwca.com www.hwca.com/accountants-esher

❛❛ The aim of values is to align your teams with a shared purpose and sense of community within their teams ❜❜

SEXTECH AND TOILET ROLL

During the Covid-19 pandemic, a period that brought huge financial challenges for many businesses, the sex toy industry experienced 200% sales growth worldwide. What are the key lessons that aspiring entrepreneurs and small business owners can take away from this unprecedented success?

Most companies will instinctively consolidate and try to weather the storm during times of crisis, but in fact, this is exactly the time when small businesses most need to be brave, take risks and seize opportuni ties. Sometimes these opportunities are obvious – as anyone selling toilet roll or hand sanitiser in the spring of 2020 can attest – but in many cases there will also be secondary markets that emerge because of the upheaval.

Earlier this year, I was part of the team behind Sussex Innovation’s TV series, Sussex Pioneers. During the filming we went around the county speaking to growing businesses with inspiring stories of innovation. I heard first-hand

from two local entrepreneurs about how a combination of different trends in the SexTech industry came together, leading to the rapid growth we saw during the pandemic.

Calandra Balfour, founder of the inde pendent high street retailer Lust!, and Emma Brown, of online women’s sexual wellness community Knude Society, pointed out how lockdown was the catalyst, accelerating a societal shift that had been gradually growing for more than a decade.

In the 1990s and 2000s the conversa tion around sex changed, with once taboo subjects becoming more visible in popular culture. As internet access grew, those barriers were broken down even further, and the mass market was primed and ready to embrace SexTech more widely. At the same time, this conversation led to increasing aware ness of the emotional and mental benefits of a more open and healthy sex life.

How can small businesses respond during times of crisis? Fiona Bennett, Head of Finance and Systems at Sussex Innovation, shares a few key takeaways from an unexpected success story

❛❛ During the Covid-19 pandemic, the sex toy industry experienced 200% sales growth worldwide ❜❜

Calandra Balfour (Lust!) and Emma Brown (Knude Society) in the Sussex Pioneers TV show

Lockdown acted as an inflection point for late adopters of SexTech products; consumers who had already had their interest piqued, but hadn’t yet taken the final step to make their first purchase. Finding themselves alone at home for a sustained period, and with mental health, wellbeing and self-care in the zeitgeist, customers finally took the plunge. In turn, manufacturers and retailers rapidly innovated their prod ucts and distribution networks to meet the increased demand.

A lot of small businesses think of inno vation as something that is only for big businesses with huge R&D budgets, but in fact they hold a distinct advantage.

Small companies are capable of rapid innovation because they are agile, not weighed down by bureaucracy or entrenched processes.

That’s why our plan for Sussex Pioneers was to show that innovation is for every body. We want to leave every business in our region feeling more confident about how they can address their chal lenges and capitalise on opportunities. With so much uncertainty and change happening, we think it’s important that we demystify innovation and make it accessible, not just to digital and tech nology businesses, but retail, food and drink, manufacturing and construction companies.

Most innovation doesn’t happen at the forefront of technology and research. It’s about solving very common chal lenges that every small business goes through – like cashflow, recruitment, productivity and efficiency.

So how can small business owners learn from the example of the sex toy industry? Well, here are three strategies that can help you to embrace innova tion in times of uncertainty:

Pillow talk – one message that we heard repeatedly is that doing your research is crucial. However, it needn’t cost the earth to uncover useful market insights. Get intimate with your customers and try to understand what they really want – whether that’s using feedback surveys, a suggestion box, or good old-fashioned conversation. From these personal insights, you can start to unpack the bigger trends behind their concerns to inform the development of your products and services.

Get on top – you’re either working on your business or in it, and many small business owners find it hard to separate themselves from the day-to-day jobs that need doing. Make time to continu ously review for potential efficiencies across people, process, and technology that can free up your time to plan your next move.

Find your bed fellows – dedicate time to managing your business affairs; from the casual and ad-hoc (e.g. delivery drivers and couriers) to your long-term, stable partners (e.g. accountants and lawyers). Most importantly of all, pursue the relationships that will enhance your own qualities – the co-creators and collaborators you meet along your journey.

If you’re a registered business with an address in East Sussex, you can register to watch all episodes of Sussex Pioneers completely free of charge at http://sinc.mylearnworlds.com

This project is funded by the UK Government through the UK Community Renewal Fund.

www.platinummediagroup.co.uk

❛❛ We want to leave every business in our region feeling more confident about how they can address their challenges and capitalise on opportunities ❜❜

Fiona Bennett at the recent Global Speakers Summit 2022 in Dublin, where she delivered her award-winning speech on SexTech and innovation in times of crisis

Worthing & Adur Chamber’s Better Business Show was held on Thursday September 22nd at Worthing Leisure Centre and was a huge success!

The Worthing BetterBusiness Show 2022

The Show opened at 10am with a few words from the Mayor of Worthing who spoke about the amazing selection of businesses that are based in Worthing and Adur.

A fantastic line-up of speakers, exhibi tors and networking opportunities made this a day to remember. Firstly, they were joined by Lawrence Boon from Fizz Creations who shared his journey to success, along with the chal lenges he faced on the way.

After that, a really interesting session with Luke Pamflett from the NatWest Business Builder Team who gave attendees an insight into how they can improve the way they operate for maximum profitability and rapid growth. Lastly, they were joined by the inspiring

Ruth Anslow from HISBE who spoke about what it means to be a ‘business for good’. There were also some amazing networking opportunities, including a speed networking session. This event highlighted the fantastic businesses within the area, showcasing the vast breadth of industry – and sizes of businesses – that are right on Worthing’s doorstep.

A massive thank you to the Adur & Worthing Business Partnership, Always Possible, Business & IP Centre, BRITE, Classic Collection Holidays, Green Wright Chalton Annis, Sussex Business Show and Yeomans Peugeot for being Show Sponsors. Without their support, the Better Business Show wouldn’t have been the success it was.

We are already counting down the days to the next Better Business Show. Look out for the show returning in September 2023.

❛❛ A fantastic line-up of speakers, exhibitors and networking opportunities made this a day to remember ❜❜

Left to right: Tony Hedger President of Worthing & Adur Chamber ;  Councillor Henna Chowdhury, Mayor of the Borough of Worthing; Councillor Andy McGregor, Chairman of Adur District Council;  Tracie Davey, Chief Executive of Worthing & Adur Chamber

CREDIT: TONY GRAHAM PHOTOGRAPHY

Fiona Dodd, Partner at Mayo Wynne Baxter on the top five excuses people have for not making a Will. And her answers to counter those excuses…

“WHY I DO NOT NEED A WILL”

1“IT COSTS TOO MUCH”

It’s hard to spend money when you are not buying something delicious, gorgeous, or immediately useful. However, spending a relatively small amount now will pay huge dividends later for your family.

Think of your Will as an insurance policy. Most people pay a few hundred pounds for household insurance every year. The cost of a Will is like a single insurance premium which may not need to be renewed for many years depending on whether you decide to change your will or need to update it.

2 “I WILL DO IT, JUST NOT YET…”

Fortunately – or unfortunately – most of us do not know when we will die. It is therefore only right to plan for the worst and hope for the best. Writing your Will can be quite daunting at first but updating it as time goes by is simpler. At Mayo Wynne Baxter, we try to make the process of writing your Will as easy as possible, and you may be surprised at just how enjoyable it is!

❛❛ Writing your Will can be quite daunting at first but updating it as time goes by is simpler ❜❜

3 “I HAVEN’T GOT ANYTHING TO LEAVE”

Some people genuinely have very little, but for many others, pension policies, and more particularly life insurance can have a significant impact on the value of your estate.

Add up roughly the value of what you have. Maybe it’s more than you think. Even with very modest estates there is a certain amount of paperwork which must be sorted out in order get hold of the money or to claim under a forgotten life policy. Having a professionally drawn Will makes it easier for those left behind to sort everything out.

Similarly, you may not have much right now, but if you are due to inherit some money, or your circumstances may change, then you should consider making your Will.

4

“IT WILL ALL GO TO MY FAMILY ANYWAY”

If you do not make a Will, the law will dictate how your estate is distributed. This may coincide with your wishes, but even if it does, the law often imposes unwanted limitations that can be removed or avoided with a well drafted Will.

Do you have any children? If so, don’t you want to make sure there is someone to take care of them and put this in your Will? Do you have a business? Do you have business partners? Do you have an agreement about what will happen on your death? We can review if you have the correct arrangements in place so that the business can continue to provide for your family.

5 “I’M SUPERSTITIOUS.

IF I MAKE A WILL NOW, I MAY DIE SOON AFTER”

If I had a pound for every time I heard this, I’d be very wealthy. Seeing it written down makes it look daft, doesn’t it? Making a Will does not mean you will die sooner, it just means that when you do die, your wishes are clear, and your loved ones can deal with your estate more easily.

Considering your own death is not one of life’s pleasures, but your family and friends will at least have the comfort that you had the foresight to write a Will and make your passing easier for them to bear.

Fiona Dodd, Partner fdodd@mayowynnebaxter.co.uk

❛❛ Think of your Will as an insurance policy ❜❜

MDHUB Member Kate Bendix spoke with Tim Green of GPsurgery.net about his life, business and plenty more besides

YOUR ONE-STOP DOC

I’m chatting with Tim Green about his cutting-edge digital business GPsurgery.net and how he’s got to where he is when suddenly, he pipes up, “Do you remember cassettes? Y’know, C60s, C90s, Maxell?” and I squeal, “Mix tapes!”

I am transported back to the 1980s; Sunday night, Top 40, in my bedroom trying to record ‘Don’t You Want Me’ by The Human League to the end without tipping into Eye of the Tiger. The atmo sphere was tense and skills were put to the test. Now? Spotify! No drama, just Software as a Service (SaaS).

And that is Tim Green’s business in a nutshell.

Tim is your typical engineer. As a child, he loved taking stuff apart to see how it

worked. “I always wanted to do some thing useful.” Judging by his career, it’s mission accomplished.

EARLY DAYS

After studying engineering, he headed to Kenya for a year as a volunteer on a water drilling project. Back home in ‘sunny’ Britain, Tim trained as a primary school Special Educational Needs (SEN) teacher. Sadly, for Tim’s pupils, like many, he loved teaching but found working in education frustrating and, at times, toxic. So, it was back to engi neering he went.

This time, it was to shift work main taining machinery at a company producing those nostalgia-inducing cassette tapes. “It was hard work, but you learn something new from every job. Things were starting to go digital;

cassettes became CDs, and I became interested in digital recording and how people could learn through tech, using CD-ROMs.”

I feel another pang of nostalgia, but at the same time, relief as there’s no mention of floppy disks.

“After a while, I needed something more and went back to do an MA in Interactive Media. I loved it for its creativity and technical skills,” comments Tim.

❛❛ Belonging to the MDHub helps me stop doing what’s in front of me and focus ❜❜

LEGO

After that, Tim landed his dream job with LEGO working on a project combining robotics and coding. “The ad said ‘based in London and Denmark’. What I thought would be the odd trip to the Denmark office turned into eight months in Denmark, flying home every other weekend. I wasn’t too popular.”

Tim worked on a system that combined a LEGO brick with a microprocessor. “Kids could attach, say, wheels to it, or a motor, then drag and drop the right code they needed into place on the screen to start the motor and get it running. I loved it. That kit is sold world wide now used by industry and schools.” Tim then slides in with a casual, “I worked on the first ever Star Wars game too.”

That does sound like the best job ever.

HIATUS

In 2001, Tim became a dad. Burned out and needing a reset in 2003, Tim and his wife, Rosalind, a healthcare commu nications specialist and their baby daughter, moved to Italy for two years. “Two years gives you a lot of time to think as I had no idea what to do next.”

So, after a lot of down time and red wine under the Italian sun, Tim and Rosalind came up with the idea that would revo lutionise how GPs manage their digital presence.

GPsurgery.net is a website platform that simplifies that patient journey allowing patients to help themselves and find the information they need without visiting a practice or their GP. The GP practice can broadcast messages to their patients, communi cate with their network of practices, and admin times are slashed. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

GPsurgery.net operates a SaaS busi ness model with three membership tiers on a compliant and accessible template website. Select the tier that works for you and crack on, creating content any patient can access.

Of course, nothing is born fully formed.

WWW. –

THE WILD WILD WEST

Think back to 2005. Technically, the Internet and websites were all over the place. “One barrier was that there were no widely adopted web standards, little to address accessibility, we had to make eight versions of the same website so that anyone could access it. We had a head start because we were ahead of our time, but we still needed to build something everyone could use.” Tim applied the same logic as he did to the water drilling project in Kenya. “A website is just the tool, so how were we going to build what we needed with what we had to hand? We developed our own standards.

“Everything was on paper in those days, so at first, it was a brochure site. As time passed, we could link up with other sites offering booking services, for example.”

THE DIGITAL FRONT DOOR

The point of GPsurgery.net is to simplify the patient journey. “It’s the starting point for the patient and GP to access information and each other. But it must be simple. If a patient is in distress or a child is unwell, they need information quickly and it’s our job to make it easy for them to find and utilise it.”

We all think GPs do a fantastic job; Tim puts it into perspective “The NHS is messy, huge and multi-faceted. GP surgeries offer an amazing range of services; test results, repeat prescrip tions, mental health provision…the list goes on. We join up all the things they need. We simplify the path for patients to find text messaging, video call and online booking options, referrals and self-help information.”

BUILDING THE BUSINESS

Running a small, agile business means using what you have to the best effect, which appeals to Tim’s engineering/ useful mindset no end. “In meetings, we ask, ‘how can we use what we have to greater effect?’ I use my corkscrew metaphor; you could buy something fancy pants, huge, sitting on the tablelike theatre. Or get one with a piece of wood for a handle and a metal screw. Don’t waste time reinventing the wheel, don’t spend money when you already have what you want right in front of you.”

❛❛ The point of GP surgery.net is to simplify the patient journey ❜❜

LEARNING TO LET GO

In 2019, Tim had a tough decision to make, where to take his business next. He had other projects on the go on top of GPsurgery.net, so he sought the help of Rob Day from MDHub to help him work through the issues and reframe his thinking.

“Rob’s run his own business. He’s been where I am; our conversations were based on real experience. He gave me confidence and was fundamental in helping me make the decision to let my clients go and focus entirely on GPsurgery.net. It was hard, I’d built real relationships, but it was the right thing to do.”

COVID

Four months later, Covid hit, and suddenly, every GP surgery needed online services. So what’s a small, agile business in the medical sector during a pandemic to do? Innovate! Tim and his team created an express template. “Again, we used what we had instead of inventing something new. At one point

we were launching eight new sites a week, including training the surgery staff to use the system. We learned so much and the pandemic forced the pace of change.”

MDHUB

Running a business can be a never ending to-do list. “When I joined MDHub, I questioned what I did every day. Being a member gives me the courage to change, test new stuff and let some things go. My peer group allows me to ask the big questions in total confidence. I now run my business in a more structured and analytical way. Belonging to the MDHub helps me stop doing what’s in front of me and focus. I can sit back and decide on the most important thing to do.

THE FUTURE GPsurgery.net covers the UK and Northern Ireland, with over 6,000 GP surgeries in England alone. “There’s a lot of opportunity out there for steady growth. Where there were only single practices, now there are groups with unique requirements. We now supply a service of one central site covering an entire group of surgeries. Everyone’s on the same message, and admin time is drastically reduced.

“Our customer retention is high; we’re ‘sticky’. We visit practices and chat; what are the pain points, and how can we improve the site for our users? Our job is to ease the burden for everyone with one simple piece of software.”

Only a few years ago, everyone’s medical records were a thick wadge of notes, referrals, and test results wrapped in a dog-eared brown card board cover held together with more elastic bands the older you got. Not so today.

Out of curiosity, I visited my GP’s website, which turns out to be an Aladdin’s cave of self-help. I now know everything there is to know about nasal polyps, I’m not as depressed as I thought, and I managed an over achieving 49 on my hip score! I didn’t even have to pick up the phone.

Thank you, Tim.

If you are interested in finding out more about the MDHUB, please visit www.mdhub.co.uk

Email MDHUB Directors: Fiona Shafer: fiona@mdhub.co.uk or Phil Green: phil.green@mdhub.co.uk

❛❛ Running a small, agile business means using what you have to the best effect ❜❜

Are you looking for your next team-building challenge?

Abseil down

Arundel Castle and support your local children’s hospice!

In March 2023, you and your colleagues could be conquering a castle for local children’s hospice care, as Chestnut Tree House is thrilled to be offering an exclusive opportunity to abseil 180ft down the iconic Bake House Tower at Arundel Castle.

Climb 200 steps up the Bake House Tower’s winding stone staircase. Soak in breath-taking panoramic views of Arundel and the South Downs. Then descend the side of the epic 180ft tower to be knighted with your bespoke medal.

Fiona James at Chestnut Tree House said, “People taking on this challenge

MAISY-LEIGH’S STORY

It’s impossible for anyone to feel sad around Maisy-Leigh because she’s got a smile that is so contagious you can’t help but smile back. She’s also got a life-shortening and extremely rare genetic condition called Coffin-Siris syndrome, with just 200 people diag nosed worldwide.

For Maisy-Leigh, who turns seven this year, the condition has affected the development of her brain and means she isn’t able to talk, and is mostly fed through a tube as she finds it hard to swallow. She’s also prone to respiratory problems and life-threatening allergies, so her parents, Luke and Hayleigh, can spend a lot of time in hospital with her.

will not only be abseiling at an amazing location, but they will be doing so knowing that the money raised will make a difference to local children who need hospice care. Arundel Castle is one of the most iconic land marks in West Sussex, but it is also only a few miles from the hospice, so is the ideal venue for a special charity fundraiser.”

Abseilers will be raising vital funds for Chestnut Tree House, so that the hospice can continue caring for local children with life-limiting and life-threat ening conditions and their families. Families like Maisy-Leigh’s.

When Maisy-Leigh was one year old, they visited Chestnut Tree House for the first time. “We were a bit anxious about being referred to a children’s hospice,” said Hayleigh. “But as soon as we walked through the door it felt so homely. We were treated like family and given so much care and attention. As parents you can’t wish for anything more than your child to be loved and

Arundel Castle Abseil takes place on Saturday March 25th and Sunday March 26th 2023, and places are limited.

Participants can choose from three different registration options, starting from just £20 (minimum sponsorship applies), and the money raised will be helping local children and their families.

To find out more about the Arundel Castle Abseil and sign up, visit arundelabseil.org.

everyone there just adored her. We can relax knowing that she is happy and cared for.”

For Maisy-Leigh, Chestnut Tree House is somewhere where she can have fun, laugh, and do things that any other child can do. But it’s also a place where the family can do things together, like going swimming together for the first time.

“We’d always been too scared to take her to a public pool,” explains Hayleigh.

“So, seeing her little face light up, and her legs kick around in the water at Chestnut was incredible.

“Thanks to Chestnut, we can be a normal family. They give us the time and strength we need to carry on and we’d be lost without them.”

Want to do something adventurous while fundraising for a worthwhile cause?

In August, Hogs Back Brewery celebrated 30 years of brewing from its home in the village of Tongham, in the heart of the old hop growing region of Surrey

CELEBRATING THREE DECADES OF HOGS BACK BREWERY

To kick start the anniversary celebra tion, its flagship cask ale, TEA (which stands for ‘traditional English ale’) was given a fresh new look. TEA was the first brew by Hogs Back when the brewery opened in 1992 and was affec tionately known as Tongham TEA.

Brewed to an almost unchanged recipe, the name “Tongham TEA” has been reintroduced to the new, simplified and more modern design. The book cover style of illustration shows Hogs Back’s journey to brewer and hop grower. As a ‘Farm Brewery’, Hogs Back is leading the way for brewers in the UK who have been founded on a farming heritage that gives them a deep understanding of their brewing ingredients.

The design is deliberately different from other beers, particularly those with abstract names and designs that currently characterise the craft brewing sector and reflects the Brewery’s values of being genuinely local and sustainable.

The hop garden continues to flourish as the hop plants mature in their eight-acre home just yards from the brewhouse. Following a bumper 2021 harvest, this year has been challenging due to the long, hot summer, but the quality of the 2022 hop harvest is reassuring high. The three-week harvest culminated in the annual Hop Harvest Festival & TEA Party with 3,000 visitors.

Embracing the consumer trend towards “no and lo” alcohol beer has seen the launch of Little Swine 2.8% and its even ‘smaller’ brother, Little Swine Alcohol Free (0.5%). The reward of being able to offer consumers a range of naturally brewed pale ales, packed with hop flavour and mouth feel, far outweighs the technical challenges of brewing this type of beer, where it is critical to manage the fermentable sugars that produce the alcohol.

With more consumers wanting an authentic beer but with a lower alcohol content, Little Swine is well placed to capitalise on this growing trend.

The recovery of the hospitality sector post-Covid is long in the making, and Hogs Back continues to focus on its direct-to-consumer retail activities, alongside servicing local pubs and restaurants. The Brewery Shop’s commitment to reducing single-use plastic has seen the introduction of more sustainable draught beer containers, with reusable glass flagons – 3.5 pint Snorters and 1.75 pint Snifters.

This is in addition to refillable stainless steel Brewery Gate kegs, complete with their own CO 2 dispenser, to give the perfect pub pour every time. As well as being more environmentally friendly, these containers also keep the beer fresher for longer.

Housed in a restored hop kiln, the Brewery Tap boasts a bar crafted from aged whiskey barrels, beer fresh from the cellar, comfy sofas, a wood burner, up-cycled tables made from old

brewery casks and historic images of Surrey’s hop growing heritage. Post Covid, the Hop Hall has come into its own. With high ceilings and huge barn doors, it provided a perfect well-venti lated indoor area to complement the beer garden, with views over the hop garden and beautiful Surrey country side.

Complete with hop picker and drying kiln, the Hall is used for harvesting each September. The rest of the year, it doubles as a unique bar and event space. There is a new marquee, woodfired pizza oven, and kitchen block, and the menu is continually evolving using locally sourced produce.

The developments in the Brewery Shop and Tap were recognised with nomina tions in two categories in the prestigious 2022 Drinks Retailing Awards.

The completion of the new event space in the Sunken Garden in spring will

allow more private bookings, wedding receptions and corporate events. This is just one part of the overall site rede velopment, which will also see more complementary business tenants take up residence in the newly refurbished Old Cow Byre.

Looking forward, the brewery will continue to invest to make its whole operation more sustainable.

Hogs Back brewery, Manor Farm, The Street, Tongham, Farnham, Surrey  https://hogsback.co.uk

❛❛ The developments in the Brewery Shop and Tap were recognised with nominations in two categories in the prestigious 2022 Drinks Retailing Awards ❜❜

Hurst College is now one of the leading schools in the south east and that is down in no small part to the Principal, Tim Manly. Interview by Maarten Hoffmann

EVOLVING LEADERSHIP

Tim is vibrant, full of passion and experience, and demonstrates genuine care for every single pupil. This shines through in the exam results, the general wellbeing of the children and the steadily increasing reputation of the college. In short, he is the educational leader every progressive school would want.

But change is inevitable as there is the desire to move with the times and, perhaps, get ahead of the curve. For the past few years, Tim and the gover nors have been planning changes within the leadership of the school and the basic structure of the college.

Tim has now moved on to become the Principal of Hurst, with the former Head of the Senior School, Dominic

Mott stepping in as Head of College and assuming many of Tim’s previous roles. This has allowed Tim to assume responsibility for the strategic direc tion, culture, operations, staff and the finances of the college – no small feat.

This change in roles also allows Tim to focus on the Hurst Multi-Academy Trust. Tim is only too aware that schools such as Hurst can tend to drift into becoming inward looking and rather detached from the wider world. Therefore, the Hurst Education Trust

is growing rapidly with the aim of raising standards across all schools, and follows the government’s white paper which mandates that from 2030; all state schools should be part of such a Trust.

Never known for letting the grass grow under his feet, Tim grasped the baton, and the Trust already includes a number of local primary schools. This brings considerable benefits to all concerned and raises standards across the board whilst keeping Hurst in touch with the issues and problems faced outside the hallowed walls of the college. Tim has now become the CEO of the Trust, leading this initiative with a small team from the college.

The college also introduced a system of flexi-boarding some time ago, whereby parents can elect to have their children board several days a week, thus allowing busy parents to work unhindered whilst their children enjoy all the benefits of boarding but without the pain of leaving home. With the catchment area of the school generally being within an hour’s drive, it feels more like the fun of staying away for a few days rather than full boarding, and then the family is all together on a Friday evening to enjoy their time away from school and work.

Full weekly boarding is available, of course, but the deliberate decision not to have any international students leads to there being no full boarders in the school. The lack of any interna tional students might seem foolhardy as the income that this generates is often irresistible for such schools.

❛❛ It left me with one overriding thought – why on earth didn’t l send my children to Hurst? ❜❜

However, that ignores the tremendous benefits that arise from having a local school for local children, thus gener ating a true sense of community, engagement and, certainly from what I have witnessed, a true spirit within the school that l have rarely seen else where. There is an excellent range of foreign trips to ensure that pupils do not miss out on this international influence.

Further changes are reflected in the reshaping of the college structure. Instead of the Pre-Prep, Prep and Senior School structure, the college has introduced a Junior Prep (Reception-Year 6), and a separate Senior Prep (Years 7 and 8) in recogni tion that 11-year-olds are too young to enter secondary school and much can be gained by having those years at the top of their prep school. This leaves them totally prepared for the senior school setting.

Hurst currently has almost 1,350 pupils with roughly an even split of boys and girls, aged 4-18 years. As with all good schools, the mental health of their students is taken very seriously, especially in light of the current mental health crisis the country

is witnessing. Hurst goes one step further with the use of their Mind Clinic. Not for the use of the students, who are amply cared for, but for the staff.

As Tim said, “We often overlook the faculty when discussing this subject with such a strong focus on the children but as all adults know, we can also suffer from such issues. The Hurst Mind Clinic came about after a conversation between Tim and one of the parents, who ran the clinic for corporate organisations.

Tim immediately saw the benefits, and the clinic was introduced at Hurst. It allows any member of staff to attend and chat, totally anonymously, about any issues they face, be it at school

or in their private lives. As Tim says, “a healthy staff ensures a healthy student body”.

Having spent a couple of hours in Tim’s company, l was inspired by the care, attention to detail and genuine passion he has for the college and these recent changes can only be hugely beneficial for the school as long as Tim is in charge. It left me with one overriding thought – why on earth didn’t l send my children to Hurst?

❛❛ As with all good schools, the mental health of their students is taken very seriously ❜❜

Hurstpierpoint College, College Lane, Hurstpierpoint www.hppc.co.uk

HumaniTea Case Study

HumaniTea is a social enterprise founded by Tina Chen, that focuses on creating the UK’s first chilled, ready-to-drink, plant-based tea lattes, which are currently available in two flavours, Matcha and Earl Grey. The company has a mission statement of being sustainable and promoting wellbeing. This can be seen through using recyclable aluminum cans, using ecofriendly oat milk, as well as ethically sourcing ingredients from Rwanda. The products are low-calorie and avoid the use of artificial flavours and emulsifiers. The brand promotes the message of taking mental health breaks, which is best represented in their slogan, ‘Spreading me time, tea time, any time.’

As a Taiwanese American with a background in economics and business, Tina moved to the UK for her masters degree; she decided to leave her job as a consultant and pursue her passion of food, infusing this with her Taiwanese background. From her beginnings in the farmers market, Tina has successfully grown the business to now being offered in over 60 independent stores, supermarkets and offices, as well as being listed on Ocado.

In the early stages of the business, Tina was working in the kitchen throughout the night, as the premises were cheaper at this time, followed by her selling the products in the morning. This was not only taxing on her wellbeing, leaving her in a state of tiredness but, also lead to an incident where she burnt herself in the kitchen whilst working overnight; this served as a pivotal moment in her journey, where she realised that she had to put her wellbeing first, which resonates with her company’s philosophy of looking after your wellbeing

Tina had heard about the NatWest Accelerator programme through word of mouth when networking with other entrepreneurs. The NatWest Accelerator is a fully funded programme, supporting businesses to grow and scale through coaching, community, network and thought leadership. In the short time Tina has been on the programme, Tina has found the sessions to be a fantastic learning and networking opportunity, with a notable interaction being when she networked with a founder of a supermarket, who after sampling HumaniTea, placed an order. Over the next six months, she hopes to expand her business overseas, using the various sessions, enterprise managers, partners and mentors to expand her knowledge in order to achieve her goals.

Coinciding with Tina’s focus on networking and brand awareness, she asks that readers connect on LinkedIn and Instagram, alongside trying her product, where the easiest purchase point would be Ocado.

TAKE SOME TIME TO RECHARGE

Life in the 21st century is not always easy, and the last three years have been very difficult for many people in many different ways such as financial concerns, mental and physical health worries, family issues, work-related problems etc, and on occasion it is diffi cult to know who we can talk to or where we can turn to.

To help staff, Cleankill Pest Control has set up an Employee Assistance Programme with Health Assured. This is a confidential employee benefit that provides a complete support network of trained counsellors offering expert advice and compassionate guidance 24/7 on a wide range of issues for employees, their partners and any children (aged 16-24 in full-time education) living in the same house. There is also as a mobile health app that allows people to keep track of your own health.

I am the Managing Director of an SME which has become successful due to the incredibly hard work of every member of the Cleankill team but I stand firmly by the saying – ‘work to live, not live to work’. By this I mean no one should let their work become all consuming however much they love their job. We all need down time to rest and refuel our brains and bodies. We weren’t designed to sit at a desk and look at a screen all day. And, let’s face it, most of us have the best ideas for work when we are away from the office doing something completely different and not thinking about work.

I’m not saying people should fill every spare hour they have, but everyone should try and have at least one outside interest. Personally, my regular interests include tennis, being a scout leader and singing in the local church choir. I also try to support my football team (Crystal Palace) as often as I can. All of this means my schedule is pretty packed but these activities give me huge satisfaction. I get to mix with

a variety of people – young and old –from outside my work and still manage to squeeze in some allimportant family time.

My fellow Cleankill directors have a wide range of outside work interests too. Ian Miller is an avid guitarist and also plays hockey in the England veterans team which involves lots of practise and travelling to matches. Clive Bury is the drummer in a band and enjoys beekeeping. Jon Whitehead takes part in walking rugby, the local Round Table and 41 Club and is interested in model railways.

Interests outside work are not only good for mental health but they give you something interesting to talk about at work and to your customers. You might even find you have a common interest or know the same people which strengthens your relationship when you want to do business with them.

Pest control is a people business. We are not selling widgets to faceless customers, we are providing trained people who have to physically visit a premises to carry out a service. Without my staff, I can’t operate my business. That’s why taking care of them and helping them to stay fit and healthy is a priority.

Paul Bates is the MD of Cleankill Press Control. Based in Kenley, South Croydon, the company is a leader in the field of pest control, and deals with everything from rodents to pest birds. For more information, go to www.cleankill.co.uk

www.platinummediagroup.co.uk

Cleankill MD Paul Bates suggests ways to relax way from work. If it’s good for you, it will be good for everyone around you

❛❛ I stand firmly by the saying –‘work to live, not live to work’ ❜❜

AN ALL-TIME GREAT

By Maarten Hoffmann

The first Alfa Romeo Giulia was first produced in 1962 and was known for lively handling and impressive acceleration – and for rusting to pieces overnight if you left it out in the rain. Although impressive at the time, it soon gained a reputation for unreliability and rusting bodywork but despite this, it still carried a mystic and passion that refused to die.

It is often said by diehard petrolheads that you cannot call yourself such if you have never owned an Alfa. Tosh, of course, but l did own a very funky GTA back in the 70s that was a hoot to drive especially with the very first CB radio on board and a ten-foot whip aerial and, as expected, it rusted to buggery within six months and broke down every week. But that was a long time ago and now

Alfa is producing some cracking models and none better that the Giulia Quadrifoglio – or ‘four leafed clover’ in Italian.

Originally aimed at the BMW M3, it not only beats it but blows it away. It has rear-wheel drive, a 510bhp twin-turbo V6 engine, a superbly designed chassis and is a true lightweight at 1,524kg. All working together, it produces a barnstorming family saloon that will rival everything in its class.

This is mightily impressive when you consider that Alfa has not been in this sector for over 15 years. It also still carries some of that Italian passion seen in 1962.

The drive is superb with power galore, a grip that defi es a two-wheel drive and the noise coming out of the pipes makes grown men cry and children run for cover. The eight-speed auto box is smooth and rapid, and if you want to use the paddle shift, you can run the rev gauge to seriously silly numbers.

There are some extras you will needcarbon ceramic brakes are required at £6,000, the Sparco bucket seats are £3,250 but really are some of the very best in any car today. Or just buy it fully

❛❛ The drive is superb with power galore, a grip that defies a two-wheel drive and the noise coming out of the pipes makes grown men cry and children run for cover ❜❜

The Giulia has been around almost 60 years but now they have fitted a proper power-plant designed by a former Ferrari chief engineer, we have an all-time great that rivals all comers.

loaded for £84,000 and, although not a small amount of change, it is very competitive within its class and much more of a rarity in the car park or down the pub.

The interior has received a far amount of criticism but l don’t mind it all at. I drove nearly 2,000 miles in it to Scotland and at all times it was comfy and all was at hand. The infotainment system has been redesigned and now has all the gizmos you need and plenty of driver aids.

The only thing missing really is fourwheel drive. The company has shown they are very good at this if you look at the Stelvio (one of those currently sits in my drive for a future issue), and although the grip is fab in two-wheel mode, we all know what extra traction and road holding can be garnered with a 4x4 system, although perhaps the weight penalty put them off.

You don’t have to drive it like me – a demented bat out of hell – as switch off all the sport features and it is a sedate

calm drive. l don’t see the point myself but its good to know if you want to lend it to your granny.

Obviously, it you want to do 60mph in 3.9 seconds or test the top end at 190mph, you will be pleased that those pesky bods at Alfa have given it a bespoke suspension, much quicker and more accurate steering and, if you can’t afford the carbon ceramics, they have added much larger brakes.

It has been tuned by Roberto Fedeli, who worked on the Ferrari 699, F12 and the 458 Speciale and as Ferrari’s former chief engineer, he should certainly know

a thing or two about tuning a high perfor mance car. I can certainly attest to the fact that he really does know his onions and just to prove it, there is now a faster version – the GTA at £153,000 and, of course, that too is coming soon to my driveway.

This is a fun, fast and furious family saloon that can be driven like a full-on race car. It will take the kids to school, do the shopping and pop granny to her Zumba class but when desired. It will also try to rip your face off, blow away almost anything else on the road, and the only serious issue is – how to get the grin off your face.

❛❛ It has been tuned by Roberto Fedeli, who worked on the Ferrari 699, F12 and the 458 Speciale ❜❜

Women in charge

in the

place

Tax and divorce

REGULARS

Spotlight

All change

Alison Jones of Kreston Reeves looks back at past crises to point out that there is always a rainbow after a storm

Klerk

The Menopause

of a stay in Baden

Maarten Hoffmann maarten@platinummediagroup.co.uk

Tess de Klerk tess@platinummediagroup.co.uk

DIRECTOR:

what

mentor can do for

a cautionary tale about

the right mentor, to even

whether you need one

Alcock lesley@platinummediagroup.co.uk

Graves fiona@platinummediagroup.co.uk

Shakesby design@platinummediagroup.co.uk

Wares alan@platinummediagroup.co.uk

elcome to the brand-new design for Dynamic Magazinethe business magazine for women.

As the new Editor of Dynamic, I am excited to bring a fresh new look to the magazine and to present some new features – subjects that I think resonate with women, or subjects that are very well covered but possibly leave one confused with so much, often contrary, information.

It should be pointed out that the largest growing market sector is women; women leading on the boards of many companies, women rising to the top in SMEs and women starting their own businesses. It is a huge demographic that is getting bigger by the day and we can all be very excited and motivated by this fact. We are gaining equality – inch by inch.

Having said that, there are still far too many areas where there is a marked absence of equality – pay, hours worked and the huge mountain of responsibility that often sits on our shoulders. For example, during lockdown, figures show that over 75% of the burden fell on us – childcare, cleaning, cooking, home-schooling, care of aged parents etc.

Dynamic will cover these subjects and many more. If we don’t cover something you would like to see, get in touch and let me know on the email address below.

I sincerely hope you enjoy the new Dynamic, and I look forward to hearing from you. Our future is bright.

FEMALE SOLICITORS SURGE

The legal profession, often dismissed as ‘fat cats in pinstripes’, is seeing a rapid change in gender as women are joining the profession at three times the rate of men. The latest figures from the Law Society show that in July 2022, there were 153,282 solicitors practising in England and Wales, a 2% rise over the previous year. The figures highlight the increasing feminisation of the profession. The research shows that women account for 53% of the practising solicitors. Stephanie Boyce, president of the society, welcomed the increase saying, “For a long time the solicitor profession was male dominated, but in just 100 years, women have shown how much they have to offer the sector.”

ALL THE LATEST BULLETINS FROM THE WORLD OF BUSINESS

NEW DICTIONARY

A leading Italian dictionary is to publish the feminine forms of nouns and adjectives for the first time as it tackles the sexual bias embedded in the Italian language. In a first for Italian dictionaries, the 2022 edition of the Treccani dictionary will not only add the feminine forms of words but will list them before the masculine form if they come first alphabetically. “We are giving back words a truth and reality denied, cancelled for centuries,” said Professor Patota, an expert in linguistics at the University of Siena.

THE SLOW ABORTION CREEP

In a slow creep of abortion law changes that started in the US, with the total ban and criminalisation of all abortions in many states, Hungary has passed a law requiring women to listen to the heartbeat of their foetus before requesting an abortion. Women must also complete a counselling session before they can have an abortion. However, many women are complaining that these counselling sessions have become more confrontational and much harder to arrange.

Daphne

SURPRISE

Women who start their own businesses aren’t doing it for just more flexibility. This might sound obvious, considering that launching a company means longs hours, tons of pressure, and financial risk—but now there’s proof. A new survey by the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) found that the top motivator for female entrepreneurs is doing something they’re passionate about—and markedly not work-life balance.

In fact, when more than 300 female business owners were asked to rank different factors in their decision to start their own companies, ‘having flexibility to care for your family’ came in next to last. Passion, being your own boss, and the potential for higher pay were all bigger motivators.

Darla Beggs, national board chair of NAWBO, said many respondents felt that, “the time has never been better” for women to go out on their own. While the number of women who said they started a business because they had always seen themselves as an entrepreneur dropped 12% from last year. Slightly more women said that it was a smart business idea that prompted them to branch out. And the shift seems to be paying off – 30% of female entrepreneurs have children.

THE WORLD’S GONE MAD

The sponsor of a charity raffle at a girls’ softball league in Texas (of course) is generously offering prizes to the winners. Several parents complained after discovering that the first and second prizes were an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle and a Glock pistol, four months after a mass shooting at a school in Texas. Words fail me.

Anne Frank

DIVORCE CONCIERGE

For £250 per hour, Lottie Leefe will help female clients who are divorcing with anything from disposing of jewellery to reorganising financial trusts. Whilst laying in her hospital bed suffering from a torn dura in the base of her skull, Lottie came up with the idea of a ‘divorce concierge’ to help with the trauma of a divorce. Having a background in financial services at wealth management companies such as St James’s Place and Cazenove, she then set up a family division, which managed the finances of women who found themselves on their own due to divorce or bereavement. After a lightbulb moment, the Dura Society was born (‘dura’ meaning tough in Latin) aimed purely at women to aid in their financial planning.

LIKE MEN, ONLY CHEAPER

Are you sitting down right now? Maybe sit down. Is there something on your desk you can squeeze to release the wave of total anger and frustration that’s about to hit you?

Bloomberg BusinessWeek reports that, at a tech start-up conference in Sydney, Evan Thornley, the cofounder of an online advertising company in Australia, gave a presentation about the benefits of hiring women, saying women are “often relatively cheap compared to what we would’ve had to pay someone less good of a different gender.”

He then reportedly pulled up a slide that read, “Women: Like men, only cheaper.”

If comments like Thornley’s make you feel like this, you’re not alone. Thornley’s talk didn’t start off so badly; he mentioned how his company, LookSmart, has had women in senior management since the start-up went public in 1999 and the gender gap in tech was the size of the Grand Canyon. But then, Thornley served two years in Parliament and allegedly has an estimated net worth of $54 million.

Every Friday, I like to high fi ve myself for getting through another week on little more than caffeine, willpower, and inappropriate humour

Nanea Hoffman

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world

JUST PLAIN NUTS

Recently, an airline asked two Indianorigin siblings with severe nut allergies, to “sit in the loo” while the cashews were being served on the flight, writes the India Times. Shannen Sahota, 24, and Sundeep Sahota, 33, said they informed Emirates Airlines three times when booking, checking-in and upon boarding about their allergies. But 40 minutes into the flight from Birmingham Airport to Dubai, the cabin crew started serving fried nuts, leaving them “panic-stricken”.

However, when they scanned the flight menu they found that it contained cashew nuts. Just before the meal service began they were asked to shift to a toilet with cushions and pillows to avoid discomfort owing to their allergy. Furious over the suggestion, the two spent the next seven hours of the flight sitting at the back of the plane with blankets covering their faces.

Nigel’s from across the world have gathered at a Worcestershire pub to celebrate their shared ‘Nigel-ness’. Pub landlord Nigel Smith, who runs the Fleece Inn, has made it his life goal to boost the popularity of his name. In doing so, he’s created the dedicated ‘Nige-fest’ which attracts hundreds to toast to all things Nigel. Mr Smith came up with the idea after realising his name had become officially extinct according to new birth records in 2016 and 2020. Janice day coming up l guess!

TRUTH CAN BE STRANGER THAN FICTION

PLASTERED CAT

A woman was in for a shock when she returned home to find her builder had plastered her cat into the bathroom wall.

Ashlin Hadden, who had been away on a business trip, was left wondering where the muffled meows were coming from, only to discover that they were coming from behind the wall. It turns out Stripes had been stuck in there for three days.

Ashlin managed to track down the sound but ended up punching a hole in the wall before being reunited with her beloved pet who, she assured her followers, is doing fine.

COTTON CALORIES

A vet was stunned after a poorly dog’s X-ray reveals what was making him sick. When 13-year-old border collie, Jip mysteriously started to choke late at night, his owner feared the worst and rushed him to the vets – where medics were stunned to find out he had actually swallowed a pair of socks.

WOMEN CAVE

A British mum-of-two is on a mission to build the “most luxurious cave imaginable”, complete with chandeliers, a sauna and a gym - by digging a hole for a home all by herself in the sweltering Australian desert. Jennifer Ayres, 50, a water engineer from Darlington, Durham, is building the 2,400 square metre recess in the town of Coober Pedy - which is a ninehour drive from her family!

HEART ATTACK PENDING

A Dad ordered the UK’s ‘biggest’ bacon roll from Greggs – with 51 rashers. The man ordered the 2,920 calorie butty from Greggs after hankering for a big breakfast, and the 51 bacon rashers did not disappoint – as he urged staff to pile on more meat.

He didn’t manage to finish is and said, “It’s finished me – l think l might take a break from bacon”.

EX-BOYFRIEND?

Benjamin Disraeli

TROUSER SNAKE

A New York City man was charged with smuggling three Burmese pythons in his trousers at a U.S-Canadian border crossing.

Calvin Bautista, 36, is accused of bringing the hidden snakes on a bus that crossed into northern New York state on July 15th, 2018. Importation of Burmese pythons is regulated by an international treaty and by federal regulations listing them as “injurious to human beings.”

The charge carries the potential for a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a fine as high as $250,000, according to federal prosecutors.

Given that a Burmese python’s main line of attack is constriction, Calvin is… well, it doesn’t bear thinking about.

Adrienne Rich

A woman has been left outraged after her boyfriend decided to treat himself to a business class seat on an upcoming plane journey – and he left her sitting in economy. The woman said she and her partner were going on their first holiday together since they started dating seven months ago, and they had planned to split hotel costs 50/50, but had agreed to pay for their own flights. But when she asked her boyfriend about his plane seat, he said he had given himself an upgrade – and told her they could meet up once the plane landed. Now an ex-boyfriend methinks!

❛ ❛You can tell the strength of a nation by the women behind its men

❛The connections between and among women are the most feared, the most problematic, and the most potentially transforming force on the planet

ANA BRNABIC 47, Serbia

In a country known for its machonationalism, Brnabic is the first openly gay person to be Prime Minister. She continues to be hawkish over Kosovo and Bosnia.

INGRIDA SIMONYTE 47, Lithuania

Also on the front line against Russia, Simonyte began her career as an economist and civil servant.

KAJA KALLAS 45, Estonia

Kallas is on the front line of Nato’s eastern shelf against Putin. Estonia has delivered proportionally more military equipment to Ukraine than any other country.

LIZ TRUSS 47, UK

She was elected in September 2022 and is the UK’s third female Prime Minister. Critics say she is trying to emulate Thatcher, cribbing from her playbook of hardline Conservatism. She ruled for 44 days, the shortest in UK history.

WOMEN IN CHARGE

Women are stepping up and taking charge across Europe, a political club that wields real power following the trail blazed by Margaret Thatcher and Angela Merkel. Who’s in the club?

MAGDALENA ANDERSSON 55, Sweden

Andersson led Sweden’s move to counter Russia by dropping its neutrality to join Nato this year. Her days in the top job are numbered as she leads a caretaker government after losing an election to a rightwing bloc recently.

SANNA MARIN 36, Finland

Marin is taking her previously neutral country into Nato after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. She is the world’s youngest sitting Prime Minister.

METTE FREDERIKSEN 44, Denmark

Frederiksen was praised for her leadership during the Covid pandemic, when Denmark had the lowest death rate in the EU.

KATRIN JAKOBSDOTTIR 46, Iceland

Despite her personal opposition to Nato, the Left-Green leader has kept her country in the alliance. She is the country’s second female PM.

NATALIA GAVRILITA 45, Moldova

Moldova is the only country in the world to have both a female Prime Minister and president. Gavrilita is the third woman to head her country’s government.

+Neurodiversity refers to variations in the human brain and cognition, for instance in sociability, learning, attention and other mental functions. It was coined in 1998 by sociologist Judy Singer, who helped popularise the concept along with journalist Harvey Blume, and situates human cognitive variation in the context of biodiversity and the politics of minority groups.

Many businesses are not making use of neurodivergent employees, concentrating on the problems involved rather that the power that can be harnessed. Adjustments can be minor whereby the benefits can be huge. By GEMMA NORTH

Neurodivergent women and work – unleash the power

Awareness about neurodivergence in women is growing with increasing numbers receiving diagnoses in adulthood. The notion of ‘Neurodiversity’ celebrates the strengths of neurologically different people instead of focusing on their perceived weaknesses. Creativity, bigger picture thinking and a greater appreciation of difference are some of the ways in which neurodivergent employees can bring value to the workplace. As Richard Branson said, ”People on the autistic spectrum are often overlooked for jobs that they might be brilliant at. It’s a staggering statistic that 85% of autistic adults are unemployed or underemployed. Th is has to change.”

However, ‘disordered’, ‘dysfunctional’ and ‘deficient’ are all words commonly associated with neurodivergent people despite more public figures than ever before showing up, sharing and embracing their neurodivergent selves. The term ‘neurodiversity was fi rst coined by Judy Singer as including people with traits including autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia, dyscalculia and Tourette’s syndrome. She said it best when saying, “Neurodiversity is really just a new word for a very old idea – a fancy 21st century way of repeating the old adage, ‘From each according to their ability; and to each according to their need.’”

Continued over >

NEURODIVERSITY

Unfortunately, at the point of knowing why they function differently to non-neurodivergent people, the ways in which neurodivergent women can be supported, particularly at work, are still inadequately understood. For example, workplaces often focus on attending to individual differences rather than making their spaces accessible to all.

Women already experience inequalities in career development opportunities and pay. The disability employment gap is largest for disabled women aged 45-49 years and 55-59 years*.

While the employment gap is smallest between disabled and non-disabled people aged 16-19 years, both groups are least likely to be employed at this age. Research by the UK’s National Autistic Society (NAS) shows that the figures for the employment of autistic people in the UK are still very low. In a survey of 2,000 autistic adults, just 16% were in full-time work, despite 77% of people who were unemployed saying they wanted to work*. Autistic women could be described as experiencing ‘double-glazed’ barriers at work.

UNDERSTANDING

Employers are required under the Equality Act 2010 to provide ‘reasonable adjustments’ so that neurodivergent people have as fair a chance as non-neurodivergent people to access and sustain employment. However, barriers are often less easy to see as they may be embedded in cultural assumptions about how people should behave. Employers are often unaware of some the social rules that prevent neurodivergent women from getting on in their chosen careers.

Extra tasks that involve adapting to social norms like making prolonged eye contact can often feel unnatural and exhausting. The nature of this additional ‘emotional labour’ autistic women take on in order to fit in at work is not often acknowledged or recognised.

An autistic woman, Farah, who was interviewed for a recent research project said she was regarded as “obviously untrustworthy” by her managers for not making eye contact. Farrah was sent on a training programme to improve her interpersonal skills whilst men performing the same work with similar communication styles in her workplace were not. Farah was pressured to adopt more gender-appropriate behaviour, rather than simply having her difference in communication style recognised and accepted.

MAKING PROGRESS

Support that is both targeted and wide-reaching for neurodivergent women at work must be a priority. On an individual basis, they may be supported through coaching or mentoring in the workplace that enables them to understand their needs and communicate them effectively to employers.

Employers and managers have a responsibility to attend training sessions and share information about neurodiversity in the workplace that increases awareness and promotes meaningful inclusivity. It is important to remember that not all neurodivergent people may disclose their differences at work. They may choose to ‘mask’ or ‘camoufl age’. They may not even be aware of why they are struggling to carry out their tasks; why it feels uncomfortable and tiring for example.

On a wider level, employers can promote healthy workplace cultures by improving access for disabled people to hybrid workspaces. Research following the pandemic indicates that workplace flexibility can be particularly beneficial in enabling people to control their working environment more effectively. 70% of disabled workers said that if their employer did not allow them to work remotely, it would negatively impact their physical or mental health**.

An appreciation of the skills and expertise employees bring rather than over preoccupation with preferred communication styles is one small change. Employers who take a strengths-based approach to employment practices may reap the benefits. Career outcomes and employment opportunities for neurodivergent women can be improved through increasing awareness of their strengths, promotion of inclusive workplaces cultures and provision of accessible working environments.

* O ce for National Statistics (ONS) 2021) ** e Work Foundation, 2022

People on the autistic spectrum are often overlooked for jobs that they might be brilliant at. It’s a staggering statistic that 85% of autistic adults are unemployed or under-employed. This has to change.

Sir Richard Branson

Gemma North is a researcher and consultant from North Consultancy with expertise in neurodiversity, mental health and wellbeing.

Making adjustments and supporting disabled people at work makes the whole workforce feel welcome and engaged

Dr Nancy Doyle Founder and chief research officer of Genius Within CIC

Time to split: Talking about tax around a divorce

Splitting

up with your spouse or civil partner is one of the most difficult events you can face, and is certainly not a time when you’d welcome interfer ence from other parties – least of all, the taxman. Unfortunately, though, there are significant tax implications to splitting your assets, as everything must be divided in the right way.

But this is no bad thing. Divorce can be a particularly bumpy road for women – with divorced women’s median pension wealth at re tirement just 25% of that of their male counterparts1 – so being tax savvy is essential in making sure you get what’s due to you.

Here are four things to think about:

PENSIONS

Pensions are often overlooked, but they can be one of your most valuable as sets. There are three ways pensions can be split: earmarking, offsetting against other assets, or sharing. The latter means the pension is split between the spouses or civil partners into two pots – so each person runs their pension the way they want to and aren’t relying on their ex-partner to do things the right way.

CAPITAL GAINS TAX (CGT)

Currently, spouses splitting chargeable assets have up to 12 months to complete the transfer from the point at which they ceased living together – not from the point that the divorce is granted – to avoid Capital Gains Tax. However, from April 6th 2023, these rules are chang ing – the ‘no gain, no loss’ window is set to be extended, giving separating spouses and civil partners up to three years to make the dispos als they need to from the point at which they separate.

PRIVATE RESIDENCE RELIEF

There’s an additional change that allows any spouse or civil partner who retains an interest in the couple’s former matrimonial home to have the option to claim Private Residence Relief when it’s sold. The spouse or civil partner who transferred their interest in the marital home to their ex will also be able to apply the same tax treatment to any proceeds they’re entitled to receive from the eventual sale.

SAMANTHA KAYE from Wellesley discusses why it’s important to consider the tax implications when dividing your assets upon divorce

Getting the best advice you can – both legal and financial –will help you ensure that all aspects of the divorce settlement are covered

SPOUSAL MAINTENANCE AND CHILD BENEFIT

If you’re paying maintenance to your former spouse or civil partner, it’s possible to claim tax relief against this, which will help to reduce your tax bill. What’s more, if you split from a higher-earning spouse or civil partner, you may be able to claim child benefit. Your fi nancial adviser can talk you through all the options available to you.

Getting the best advice you can – both legal and fi nancial – will help you ensure that all aspects of the divorce settlement are covered, for that all-important peace of mind as you plan for a secure future.

If you have any questions about divorce or pensions planning, please contact me today.

Sources:

1 NOW: Pensions, 2020

2 Chartered Insurance Institute, 2019

Samantha Kaye

Chartered Adviser, Wellesley E: samantha.kaye@sjpp.co.uk www.wellesleywa.co.uk

The levels and bases of taxation and reliefs from taxation can change at any time. The value of any tax relief depends on individual circumstances.

St. James’s Place guarantees the suitability of advice offered by Wellesley when recommending any of the services and products available from companies in the Group. More details of the Guarantee are set out on the Group’s website www.sjp.co.uk/products

Wellesley is a trading name of Wellesley Investment Management Ltd. The Partner Practice is an Appointed Representative of and represents only St. James’s Place Wealth Management plc (which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority) for the purpose of advising solely on the Group’s wealth management products and services, more details of which are set out on the Group’s website www.sjp.co.uk/about-st-james-place/our-business/ our-products-andservices. The ‘St. James’s Place partnership’ and the titles ‘Partner’ and ‘Partner Practice’ are marketing terms used to describe St. James’s Place representatives. Wellesley Investment Management Ltd: Registered Office: 44 The Pantiles, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, England, TN2 5TN. Registered in England & Wales, Company No. 06530147.

Nearly three quarters of divorcing couples fail to consider their legal right to share pensions

In our brand new Spotlight feature, we highlight women who are doing good things in their community. They’re not always seen but we think they should be.

SP OTLIGH T

Louise Poffley

Dynamic chats with Louise Poffley, founder and CEO of the charity Project Eileen, to hear what it does and what motivated her to start this fantastic organisation. Here she is in her own words…

“At school in the 1970s, when my close friend was orphaned, I realised I hadn’t got a clue what to say or do to support her. Around the same time, a girl in the year below me died suddenly from a brain haemorrhage. The next morning, we received just a brief announcement in assembly. Years later, when my father died, it was apparent many people still didn’t know what to say or do, and I felt compelled to do something to change the status quo.

“The charity, Project Eileen, is the result of my drive and determination to achieve a vision of developing a way to proactively help young people cope with bereavement,

death and grief by giving them the tools and life skills to help themselves and others. Its multimedia programme of lessons took shape.

“With a multifarious career background, including a spell as a funeral arranger, I believed my writing would be the best starting point upon which the programme could be built. I spent 2017 writing and rewriting Eileen, a fictional but true-to-life story about a bunch of teenagers who have to cope with the death of their friend.

The story almost has a story of its own. Sir Tony Robinson narrated it, Nina Pfeifenberger animated it, the programme’s lessons reference it, it’s the springboard for class discussion, and students can even develop their own improvisations from it.

“I believe collaboration is key to success. Never shy of approaching someone I’d like to involve, and needing music, I leapt onto the stage at the end of a concert to fi nd out who’d written the ska songs. That led to a great working partnership with the composer, Alex D Hay, who wrote the music to accompany my lyrics.

“Yet, none of this would have happened without former teacher, Annabelle Shaw. Following her experience of bereavement, she felt as strongly as I did that something had to be done, and leapt at the opportunity to establish the charity and devise the lessons.

“Commended for my enormous enthusiasm, I sometimes worry I talk nonstop about Project Eileen. Fortunately for me, I have very patient friends and family.”

Project Eileen CIO, Community Base, 113 Queens Road, Brighton BN1 3XG  E: info@projecteileen.co.uk T: 01273 894757 www.projecteileen.co.uk

Project Eileen is the result of my drive and determination to achieve a vision of developing a way to proactively help young people cope with bereavement

Left to right: Louise Poffley, Patron, Andrew Barton and Annabelle Shaw, Programme Director

Hannah Blackwell

Dynamic caught up with the lauded, up-andcoming chef, Hannah Blackwell. She used to be in the kitchen at Etch in Brighton and is now doing a work placement at The Fat Duck in Bray

Congratulations on securing a work placement at Heston Blumenthal’s The Fat Duck. That’s no easy feat! Who has helped you on your way and perhaps inspired you as well?

“I wouldn’t be where I am right now if it wasn’t for a lot of people. One of them is Matt Tilt who was the head chef and owner of the fi rst restaurant I ever worked in. He taught me a lot of skills and pushed me to try new things. George Boarer and Steven Edwards at Etch also mentored me and made me more confident in myself. Another inspiration is Clare Smyth. She is a very good role model for young female chefs like me.”

Female chefs do seem far and few between.

Do you feel that there is bias in the industry?

“It has always been heavily populated by men and you notice that massively when you step into a kitchen and you are the only woman to about seven men. Sadly, I don’t think this will ever change. Saying this, every work environment I have been in personally has been incredible and I have been welcomed with open arms, which is why I love the job and have continued to do it.”

Do you think that women are perhaps less interested in the job? Why?

“I think the main reason is the long hours because either women have children or want a job that is more flexible. You see women more in café/ bakeries because it allows them to have evenings off and socialise more. Another reason could be because of the pay. After hours of stress, hard work and dedication you put in, the pay packet doesn’t necessarily represent that for most people.”

What are your three favourite dishes that you cook at home?

“My favourite dish savoury-wise is fish pie, just because this is something I would always make with my dad when I was younger. For sweet I would choose a meringue roulade as this was something Mum and I would make for dinner parties or celebrations. My other choice would be a double chocolate brownie. Who doesn’t love a bit of chocolate as a treat every now and again?”

Any advice for aspiring female chefs?

“My advice is enjoy it! Just go for it and aim as high as possible. You won’t regret it. My recipe for being around a lot of male chefs is to add an extra bit of sass. It shows that you mean business and that you won’t be walked over - but in a polite and jokey way.”

In 2017, community-owned Lewes FC caught the headlines by becoming the world’s first football club to pay the men’s and women’s playing staff equal salaries.

Maggie Murphy, CEO of Lewes FC tells Dynamic about her journey to the top of the club she has come to admire.

HEAD OF THE PACK

I never meant to be the CEO of a football club.

To this day, I don’t think I would be here if, as a girl, and later as a young woman, it was as easy for me to play the most popular game in the world as it was for my brothers.

I’m only here because I got angry.

No matter how hard I try, when I look back on the brilliant memories I have from playing, I can’t help but feel a sense of loss or frustration.

At fi rst there were no girls’ teams. Then when there was a team, it had terrible coaches, hand-me-down kit and muddy bogs for pitches. We had to travel so much further. Our parents had to pay so much more.

Boys would line the pitch laughing or catcalling. Our games were cancelled so the guys could use our pitch and let theirs rest. Our referees didn’t know the rules. Our universities didn’t pay for a coach so we had to train the team between us.

“WOMEN ARE SUCH AN AFTERTHOUGHT”

My career in global advocacy, tackling corruption and promoting human rights took me overseas. I worked for organisations lobbying the UN and G20 to adopt better laws.

When the latest in a series of FIFA corruption scandals hit – almost ten years ago – I was tired, angry, frustrated, but now knew a lot more about good governance. Budget lines were being stolen for votes to hold prestigious tournaments and yet there was nothing for women’s football.

Wherever I looked, the people in decision-making roles seemed to care very little about growing the game, encouraging participation, debate and discussion or creating inclusive environments. Women were an afterthought – and they were never in these roles. I was getting angry.

I found I wasn’t alone. In all my travels I had picked up quite an international group of friends and colleagues. Th rough a chance meeting I found myself involved with a crew of like-minded women from more than 20 countries;

Mexico to Canada to Tanzania to France to Saudi Arabia to Nepal. From elite players who had played in World Cups to grassroots players in Nepal or Mexico. All were asking the same questions.

We decided to do something that would demand respect that we could use as a rallying call and that nobody could take away from us.

And so together, over six days, we climbed to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro, in the ice, and rock and ash. There were some days and nights where it was difficult to breathe, and we all had that fear that we wouldn’t make it. Because we weren’t there just to climb a mountain.

At the end of the fi nal night of climbing, we laid a full-size pitch, put up our FIFA regulation goalposts, and set about a 90-minute match, barely able to breathe, barely able to run.

When the fi nal whistle went, we were Guinness World Record holders.

HEADING DOWN THE PAN

About a month after climbing down the mountain I saw an announcement on Twitter from a small community club that I couldn’t place on a map.

Th is small club was a tiny part of the problem but seeking to be a big part of the solution. They announced that they were bringing in pay parity for the men’s and women’s teams and had become the fi rst club in the world to do so.

I immediately clicked three times and became an owner – it was 100% fan-owned and only costs £50. Aside from getting to own a football club, I fi nally felt like there was a football club out there that cared for and valued me, and if I showed up one day, might even greet me with a smile and make me feel welcome.

My path started to cross with those of Lewes FC, and in 2019 I was asked to consider coming on board as the

I don’t think we will stop climate change or end people trafficking unless there are angry people trying to make it happen

General Manager. Football had always been just a side story for me but I was now being asked to put this front and centre.

Th is club was special.

Lewes FC is trying to take all the bad things that people hate about football and turn them around. I don’t blame you if you don’t like football. A lot of the time there’s lots to dislike about it.

But now I was being asked to put my money where my mouth was.

Is it possible to create a transparent, accountable, equitable football club that listens to and serves its local community and global community of supporters? Is it possible to reconnect football with purpose and social impact? Is it possible to create a football club dedicated to results on and off the pitch?

LEWES FC – CHANGING THE WORLD

It was a challenge too great to turn down. We’re Lewes FC, an exceptional club trying to change the world.

Football is more than a game. It’s about our social fabric. And how we relate to each other. And if women are not part of that conversation, then we are being sidelined from society as a whole.

And I don’t want to be on the sidelines.

So yes, I’m a CEO because I got angry. And I’ve learned it’s OK to get angry. In fact, I don’t think we will stop climate change or end people trafficking unless there are angry people trying to make it happen. You just need to use that anger in a really smart way – and fi nd some allies and teammates to work with you.

I’ve now found these allies and teammates, and we are dedicated to the best possible type of football club, on and off the pitch. We hope you join us.

Lewes FC is a community-owned football club.

To purchase your shares, go to www.lewesfc.com/owners

For match tickets, go to www.tickettailor.com/events/lewesfootballclub2/ Lewes FC, The Dripping Pan, Mountfield Road, Lewes. BN7 2XA

I’m only here because I got angry

The menopause

One thing we know for certain about the phases of menopause is that the experience varies widely from individual to individual

it odd that so many female references are a derivation of men - feMALE, woM AN, MENopause, whereby none of these subjects have any relation to men. I see from the news section this month that the Italians are changing their entire dictionary to finally publish the feminine forms of nouns and adjectives due to the bias embedded in their lan guage - and ours! Anyway, l digress.

Ifind

The menopause is a subject that we will all have to deal with at some point whether we like it or not. The menopause is a perfectly natural part of a woman’s life and occurs when your pe riods stop due to the decreasing hormone levels in your body and this is usually between 45 and 50 years but that is a vast generalisation. The pe rimenopause is where you might have symptoms before your period have actually stopped.

Menopause and perimenopause symptoms can have a big impact on your daily life, in cluding relationships, social life, family life and work. It can feel different for everyone. You may have a number of symptoms or none. Symptoms usually start months or years before your periods stop. This is called the perimenopause.

The first sign of the perimenopause is usually, but not always, a change in the normal pattern

of your periods, for example they become irreg ular and eventually you’ll stop having periods altogether.

Common mental health symptoms of men opause and perimenopause include changes to your mood, anxiety, mood swings and low self-esteem, problems with memory or con centration (brain fog). Physical symptoms can be hot flushes, difficulty sleeping, palpitations, headaches and migraines that are worse than usual, muscle aches and joint pains, changed body shape and weight gain, skin changes in cluding dry and itchy skin, reduced sex drive, vaginal dryness and pain, itching or discomfort during sex and recurrent urinary tract infections (UTIs).

The point to make here is that we are all different. Some women suffer and some don’t even know it has happened. Some suffer all the symptoms and some just a few. The menopause is as different as we are as individuals.

To gain some perspective on this, we asked several leading business women about their ex perience and, as you will see, the response are as different as women can be.

Continued over >

Tess de Klerk

“I’m 40 years old and in all honesty, sim ply don’t want to hear about the meno pause! I’m not there yet and feel that I would prefer to not have to think about it until the time comes when I absolutely have to. Yes, I see the irony having de cided on, and edited, this article.

“Obviously I recognise that any inkling of a taboo around the subject must dissipate, that workplaces must accommo date and support women through it and that sharing experi ences and knowledge empowers us all… but still, I just don’t want to have to think about it – not yet.”

Fiona Shafer

In 2018, the MDHUB ran a peer group to explore ‘The Menopause and The Andropause’.

The latter being the less publicly ac knowledged diagnosis for men of a collection of symptoms, including hot flushes, loss of libido and depression, ex perienced by some middle-aged to older men and attributed to a decline in testosterone levels.

Sadly, often joked about as a ‘midlife crisis and a time to buy a Harley Davison’, it is a subject that we hope will one day have an equal acceptance and acknowledgement.

My menopause quite literally arrived like a massive tidal wave in the midst of the global pandemic. This made it even harder to pinpoint what was happening in and amongst the ridiculously long hours that we were all working to support businesses through the crisis. The combination of adrena line and exhaustion masked many symptoms.

After what I can only describe as clockwork history of menstruation with no spear throwing side effects at all, the good karma fairy passed the baton to the bad karma fairy in July 2019, and changed direction, heading into the depths of my body and brain.

14 months later, my body full of the alternative route of Ginseng, Red Clover and Black Cohosh, there was no let up from the night sweats, sleep deprivation (a deep sleep

So many women I’ve talked to see menopause as an ending. But I’ve discovered this is your moment to reinvent yourself after years of focusing on the needs of everyone else. It’s your opportunity to get clear about what matters to you and then to pursue that with all of your energy, time and talent

OPRAH WINFREY, CHAT SHOW HOST

formerly being my super power), sweat running down my back in meetings, glasses steaming up during ZOOM calls, irritability and feeling at times like I did when I was 15 with hormones running amok.

The defining moment came when the classic ‘brain fog‘ started to appear. As someone who has been blessed with an excellent memory and has to keep a huge amount of info stored in my brain, this was a terrifying moment at a very deep level and became the key moment that changed my approach to the menopause.

Thanks to the incredible support of four amazing women with whom I share a peer group as part of my own support and development , they all recommended HRT ( and gently suggested why had I taken so long to do so…).

It was a massive turning point.

Rosemary French OBE

“I think I am having a heart attack,” I spluttered to my male Business Development Director, while de scending in our work lift. It was late and we had been working hard on a key contract renewal.

I collapsed on our reception sofa panting for breath. Within minutes I was in our nearest A&E, but I was discharged later with no medical view on what had just happened. I was so spooked that I even paid a private heart consultant to check over my heart.

There then followed a ten-year period of repeated panic attacks in the oddest of plac es; no rhyme or reason, although the scariest were those when driving, or when I would jump up in the middle of night insisting that I was dying! My husband was brilliant at calming me down, but we put it all down to my stressful job.

I also had the most awful headaches which I did mention to my doctor. Extraordinarily, I was given an expensive brain scan and yet no mention was made of hormonal changes! I never had hot flushes, the only menopausal symptom that I had ever heard of.

It was hard pretending to my business colleagues, friends and family that all was well, while trying to suppress an approaching panic attack. I would make a quick exit to suffer alone in some private corner until it passed.

During all those years, I concluded that it was just one of those work stress related things I had to put up with. Frankly, I am embarrassed to say that it just never crossed my mind until the recent menopausal aware ness campaign started by Davina McCall. The Daily Telegraph featured celebrities’ stories and I realised that I was just like them!

I do feel bitter that I was not offered HRT. However, with my new learning, I was able to advise my younger sister-in-law that her panic attacks were menopausal, and she needed to get on HRT right away. She tells me that it has made a huge difference. I just wish I’d had that opportunity.

If you deal with it in a healthy fashion then I think you come out the other side a better person. I’ve got so much more energy now than I ever had in my early 50s before the menopause

JULIE WALTERS, ACTRESS

MENOPAUSE

Joanna Williams

I don’t want to upset anyone but l have to say l hardly noticed that the menopause was upon me.

The first signs occurred when l was 52. Of course, my periods stopped which was a delight to be honest and l did no tice that l was generally hotter at night than usual but once that stopped, l had no further symptoms then or since, and l am now 61.

I feel pretty awful saying this as l know some women suf fer dreadfully but l understand that HRT generally works very well and l would certainly have taken it had it of been needed. I read that women who have not had children tend to get the menopause earlier and might be prone to more dramatic symptoms but l am delighted Dynamic is tackling this subject as there seems to be ten contradictory answers to every question you ask and it can be very confusing.

The internet has certainly benefitted society in many ways but the downside is there are thousands of sites for every subject and with so many contradicting the last one, it can lead to mass confusion. Your doctor and anecdotal views from your friends is surely the best way to gain the information needed.

Alison Jones

It is so brilliant to see that the menopause is no longer a taboo word and there is now a better understanding of the issues fac ing almost half of the population. That said, I think there is a still a long way to go before there is a more balanced conversation.

Before you throw up your arms in dismay let me explain more.

At the moment, the majority of the conversation is about the wonders of HRT, and there is very little discussion or research into alternatives.

Unfortunately, not everyone is fortunate enough t o be able to take HRT. Those of us unlucky enough to have high blood pressure, heart problems, breast cancer or are at a higher risk of breast cancer, for example, are unable to take HRT.

Our options are very limited, and NHS guidelines suggest a change in lifestyle including eating well, exercising and staying cool at night! They also suggest stopping smoking and cutting out alcohol and caffeine.

All of which is of course sensible advice but I am not convinced that any of this really helps deal with the significant impact of the change in your hormone levels that the menopause creates. They also suggest taking anti-depressants but is the menopause depression?

There are a variety of herbal supplements available, all of which suggest that they will cure all symptoms, none of which in my experience made any difference. They are not supported by medical evidence and you do have to be extra careful as some of the ingredients can cause side effects if taken with other medicines.

So, just like our mothers and their mothers before them, sadly, we just have to grin and bear it. My advice would be to enlist the support of your family. For me, air conditioning was the only way to deal with the night sweats which I have had for more than 10 years now.

I see menopause as the start of the next fabulous phase of life as a woman. Now is a time to ‘tune in’ to our bodies and embrace this new chapter. If anything, I feel more myself and love my body more now, at 58 years old, than ever before KIM CATTRALL, ACTRESS

I’ve just come back from a holiday in Canada and what a time to have been away, writes ALISON JONES of Kreston Reeves

ALL CHANGE

Notonly did we have a new Prime Minister, (we now need another new one) but sadly we lost our Queen. Although the news was all over Canadian TV, being eight hours behind it did feel like we were spectators to all that was changing back at home with little opportunity to join in. Life at home seemed to have radically changed in a blink of an eye as Charles became our King.

And then, just over a week later, and as I write this piece, the markets have gone crazy in terms of the value of the pound against the dollar following the recent emergency budget and interest rates look to rise again. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as Black Wednesday on September 16th 1992.

You might not remember it but interest rates jumped from 10% at 10.30am then to 12% and 15% before returning to 10% the following day as the UK left the ERM (Exchange Rate Mechanism). Turbulent times indeed as the UK fell into a deep recession, many businesses failed and the housing market crashed. It is difficult to imagine now having spent so many years with interest rates at under 1%. Hopefully, by the time you read this, the markets will have steadied, but we might need to wait until the next announcement on interest rates in November for that.

And in this complicated picture is the current situation in Ukraine, following the Russian invasion. Th is has had a significant impact on the price of energy and basic food supplies resulting in the current cost of living crisis which is impacting all households and businesses.

However, history shows us that even after the bleakest of times, an economy does recover, businesses become profitable again and many new opportunities do arise.

Just think about the changes we’ve seen since 1992 and how they’ve shaped how we do business; the emergence of the internet and mobile phones having the greatest impact. And since the pandemic, Zoom and Teams have, in just two years, become everyday means of communication for us all. Real time data continues to provide better business insight thanks to online banking and accounting systems such as Xero, allowing for more confident and timely decision making.

There is always a rainbow after a storm and there will be better times ahead for us all. It’s not easy, it might not be the same type of business as it was before but it’s important that you stay calm.

So, what can you do? Firstly evaluate both your business and your personal budget and what you need to continue.

■ Talk to your accountant as not only can they provide you with a good sounding board to discuss issues, but they can also help you monitor your business and start raising fl ags when things appear to be going wrong, or indeed give you the good news when things improve

■ Increase your prices. One of my clients recently phoned all their clients and explained in detail why they needed to increase their prices by being transparent about the increase in the costs they were facing. As a result, they were able to increase their prices and only lost one customer

■ Don’t hide away. In a recession you shouldn’t stop marketing as you don’t want to be forgotten

■ Talk to your team. They will be worrying about how the cost of living rises and potential increase in mortgage rates are going to impact them, they may also be worrying about their jobs. In some instances redundancies may end up being your only option, but keeping in touch with your staff is key and they might have some good ideas on how you can improve your business

■ Keep talking to your suppliers, banks and HMRC. From my experience they are far more likely to be supportive and to help you if you are open and honest with them and less likely if you bury your head in the sand. Don’t be afraid of making new arrangements with them

My fi nal piece of advice is remember that you are not alone in this, and you don’t need to manage everything by yourself. It’s better to talk to your friends, family or business partners, as a problem shared always becomes a smaller problem once it has been voiced. There is a huge network of support available to you both from a business and personal point of view and don’t be afraid to use it.

So, in the same way that the UK recovered from the crash back in 1992, try to remain positive, we will recover again soon.

Alison Jones is a Partner at Kreston Reeves and can be contacted by email at alison.jones@krestonreeves.com or call 0330 124 1399. www.krestonreeves.com

The markets have gone crazy in terms of the value of the pound against the dollar following the recent emergency budget

this

is a bit like

nding a Yoda

There’s no doubt about it – leadership can be lonely! Being in business has many highs, and often just as many lows, especially if we feel that there is no one to turn to.

By DESIREE ANDERSON, Crest Coaching & HR

COACHING COULD BE A LIGHTSABER

Statisticsshow that remote leadership has accentuated feelings of isolation, akin to being adrift in the business galaxy. Additionally, you might also often expect yourself to know all the answers. These expectations of oneself may accentuate feelings of rising panic about what to do next, either strategically or operationally. You may have concerns about how to motivate your teams to be productive, committed, loyal etc.

There’s also a lot of emphasis right now on mental health – but there usually aren’t quick fi xes. We may struggle with balancing our own worries with the needs of others and the inevitable pressures that running a successful business in this global universe brings.

In truth, all sorts of issues can prevent us from being the great leader we aspire to be. Fear of success or failure, comparison with others, procrastination, perfectionism and people-pleasing can cruelly prevent us from shining our lightsaber.

It’s no wonder that, with all these issues to overcome, we are frequently perplexed.

In our attempt to solve our problems, we either tend to hide our feelings and pretend to know it all or reach out desperately to a coach or mentor for help. If any of the adverts are true, will they wave a magic wand and increase turnover? Will the incessant people issues cease? Will I fi nally be recognised as the leader I dream of being?

STOP! You are already good enough; you have amazing unique skills and abilities that are already a success.

Appointing someone as a coach/ mentor doesn’t make you a failure – nobody knows everything, including the coach. If we reach out to someone through a feeling of ‘lack’, things are bound to come unstuck. But if we recognise that a coach/mentor is someone who either has specific expertise that we need and can give us specific guidance (usually a mentor), or someone who can help with our development by challenging us and encouraging us to come up with the answers (usually a coach) - then we may be off to a good start.

Let’s pause for a minute to remember that many great leaders throughout business history have had coaches or mentors. We have Richard Branson, Oprah Winfrey and Elon Musk to name but a few (dare I sneak in that Luke Skywalker had Yoda). Great leaders and entrepreneurs have

shown us that they can elevate and develop faster by having a trusted person to guide them. And if we see what these leaders have achieved, then the whole aspect of coaching sounds like a no-brainer.

There are some vital prerequisites before embarking on this mission.

• A good coach/mentor should be in partnership with you but allow you to take centre stage. You may be hiring them to be your trusted confidante, to help you via a mastermind, a batch of coaching sessions or for a longer-term journey through stages of your business or career.

• There should always be a relationship of mutual respect and boundaries agreed upon between both parties from the offset. A contract setting out mutual roles, behaviour and responsibilities should be drawn up. Having this looked over by a solicitor is always a good idea.

• Your coach should be someone with values congruent to yours - a role model of sorts who leaves you feeling educated, inspired or sometimes a bit uncomfortable, but in a way that constructively develops and elevates you to do better next time.

Finding this great person is a bit like fi nding a Yoda in a haystack! To make it easier, you should be clear on what your end goals for coaching are, what your budget is, and what the going rate is for this service (tip: conduct a comparison analysis). You may fi nd an appropriate person from within your network, from previous clients or a coaching association.

Whether you are aspiring Jedi or you’re in charge of a fleet of star ships, Mentoring and Coaching is a great way to help guide you in reaching for the stars in the realm of your career! But before you go ahead with it I recommend that you take a look at yourself in the mirror and acknowledge the infi nite potential that already exists within you.

Desiree is a Level 7 Advanced Coach & Mentor, an International Bestselling Author, Mental Health First Aider and owner of Crest Coaching & HR. Contact her at info@crestcoachingandhr.com

Let’s pause for a minute to remember that many great leaders throughout business history have had coaches or mentors

MENTORING

Even if you have a technical skill or vision that could form the basis of a successful business, the whole ’how to run a business’ side of things can seem quite daunting. Not surprisingly, therefore, numerous mentors offer their business experience to new entrepreneurs.

By JAMES O’CONNELL

WHEN MENTORS TURN NASTY

At their best, mentors can be a phenomenally useful resource. Regrettably, I often get to see those who have gone over to the dark side and used their superior knowledge of business processes to grab a slice of a promising business before their clients outgrow them. Too often, I see 20-40% of a business given away in return for vague mentoring ‘promises’ with few tangible outcomes and invariably no measurable ones.

At worst, dark-side mentors demand a shareholders’ agreement containing technical or arcane legal points that slyly elevate them to equal control of somebody else’s business (but leaving the original founders to do all the work

and take all the risks). Clients are always shocked to fi nd themselves in an unwanted but unbreakable partnership with a mentor because of clever legal wording.

Mentors are often in a unique position of trust. Clients assume that their mentors act, if not in their best interests, at least fair and reasonably. Learning otherwise is a huge business lesson, but it comes at one hell of a price.

So, what do you do if you have a mentor demanding not only payment but a stake in your business?:

• Buyer beware! It may be a fantastic offer, or it may be the start of your business imploding.

• If you are already paying the mentor, then ask yourself what extra value will you get?

Too often, I see 20%40% of a business given away in return for vague mentoring ‘promises’ with few tangible outcomes

• Put a cash value on the shares demanded. If you would reject a cash offer from an investor at that price, then the mentor’s offer had better be something truly amazing.

• Make any shares conditional upon targets met.

• Don’t automatically throw in a directorship with the shareholding; they are separate things.

• Understand the total reward. Monthly payments and capital value of shares and dividends and director status and a say in your business?

• Watch out for a ‘land-grab’. Under the guise of ‘I just want to protect my shares,’ the greedy mentor may demand to be treated as an equal ‘partner’ with the same right of veto as the owners. Again, if someone offered to buy, say, 13% of your company, would you give them all the rights of influence, disclosure and veto over crucial aspects of your business as if they had 51%? If (hopefully!) not, why would you give it to a mentor?

• Make sure you can sack them if a director, and that you can buy back their shares (at fair value) if they are a shareholder.

There are many great mentors, and this article is not trying to dissuade you from using them. But equally, you may encounter a mentor who sees you as an exploitable opportunity. So make sure any deal makes hard commercial sense.

James O’Connell, Partner

E: joconnell@mayowynnebaxter.co.uk

T: 01273 223209

Mayo Wynne Baxter www.mayowynnebaxter.co.uk

Clients are always shocked to fi nd themselves in an unwanted but unbreakable partnership with a mentor because of clever legal wording

MENTORING

By ELLIOTT WISE, founder of Limitless Mentoring

BUSINESS MENTORS

Are they worth it andhow to fi nd the right one for you?

Iwill come straight out and confi rm my bias on this topic. I run a business skills mentoring programme called Limitless Mentoring, so if you couldn’t guess, I am pretty “pro mentoring”. However, I will say that while mentoring is worth it, not all mentors are. And this is a crucial distinction to make, but let’s start with why I believe mentoring is worth it.

While ‘mentoring’ seems to be undergoing a resurgence in recent years, the principle has been in practice forever. The passing of knowledge gathered through experience has been an incredible driving force for human progression.

Take ancient Greek philosophy as the perfect example. Socrates mentored Plato, who mentored Aristotle, who mentored Alexander the Great. Each refi ned, developed and furthered the work of the predecessors to create some of the most timeless, insightful knowledge that has remained relevant for over 2,000 years.

Th is example works so well because it perfectly explains the premise of mentoring (as opposed to teaching). Mentors guide an individual’s growth instead of lecturing them from a theoretical point of view. Each of the philosophers mentioned above had lifelong relationships with their mentors. They didn’t just attend a couple of talks at the local amphitheatre. They spent their lives learning from and growing alongside their mentors.

To bring it back to a business mentoring perspective, unless you are willing to commit a sizeable length of time to a mentor, don’t bother. A mentor should be there to help and guide you through your business life or a particular time in your business journey. So, if you think you’ll get all the wisdom and answers you need in four weeks – think again.

With the right mentor, you will get much further ahead, faster than if you muddled through by yourself. Sure, there are plenty of examples of ‘self-made’ business owners – but if you asked any of them if they wished they could have done it in half the time – they’d all say yes. It’s a no-brainer.

For this reason, mentors should have been there and done it, and can now use their business and life experience to help you navigate your own journey. As such, mentoring should be a deeply personal relationship between the mentor and

the mentee. A mentor should be able to understand and relate with their mentees life on a holistic level.

Th is is why the ‘group session’ model that many business ‘mentors’ apply frustrates me. How well can you truly understand your mentee’s needs, problems, hopes and aspirations to connect with them and help them grow if your only contact with them is in a group setting?

That is teaching, not mentoring – which, don’t get me wrong, has its place. But, when you’re trying to fi nd the right mentor, it should be something you think long and hard about. If you want business coaching or business lessons, group sessions will likely do you just fi ne. But if you want someone to take the time to understand you and your business completely, this can only be achieved at a one-onone level. If it’s not one-on-one, it’s not mentoring as far as I’m concerned.

When you’re looking for a mentor, I would recommend fi nding one that has the battle scars, and lived to tell the tale. I would always choose a mentor who had it all, lost it and got it all back rather than someone who has never experienced this sort of hardship.

No business journey is going to be without difficulty and having a mentor who has stood precisely where you are in that moment can be invaluable. A good mentor will even be able to give you an early warning signal and help you avoid making the same mistakes as them altogether.

So, in summary, I do believe that business mentors are worth it. They can help guide you through your business journey and avoid the pitfalls and mistakes that they made themselves. If you want to grow a business, it will become your life. So, when fi nding a mentor of your own, remember that real mentoring will be a deeply personal service that will guide you in life, not just business – because ultimately, both will go hand in hand.

Elliot Wise is a self-made serial entrepreneur, business growth expert and mentor. He is the founder of Limitless Mentoring –an entrepreneurial skills programme for aspiring business leaders.

Unless you are willing to commit a sizeable length of time to a mentor, don’t bother

When you’re looking for a mentor, I would recommend finding one that has the battle scars, and lived to tell the tale

Platinum was delighted to sponsor the Sussex Contemporary art exhibition and attend the private view on October 7th at the British Airways i360 in support of many of the highly talented artists we have the in the region

Sussex ContemporaryArt Exhibition

The Sussex Contemporary Open Call, or ‘The Sussex’ for short, is the fi rst major art exhibition to celebrate the rich creativity in the county which has a strong heritage of art. Over 400 artists registered their interest. Joanna Myles, artist and co-founder of The Sussex, who appeared on Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year 2021, says “It can be difficult for new and emerging artists to fi nd ways to show their work. Sussex has such a vibrant art community, and we want to showcase this amazing talent.”

The exhibition of the selected work ran from October 8th to 22nd. The exhibition drew visitors from London and across the South East and was free to the public to visit. All the work will be available for sale. A percentage of each sale will be donated to Table Talk Foundation, a charity that supports food education and the hospitality sector in Sussex.

Over the two weeks there were also several additional fundraising events that combine art and culinary arts. www.thesussexcontemporary.co.uk

On the back of so many topics covered in this issue of Dynamic, here is some suggested reading if you wish to delve deeper into each subject

FURTHER READING…

How to spot the different forms of discrimination that might be happening in your workplace…

Human beings face a fundamental paradox. We are inherently social and wired to connect. Co-operating with each other is crucial for our survival. Yet we are also hardwired to spot and react to differences, and we do so without really being aware of it or how it informs our initial perceptions of each other. These are our unconscious biases at work.

Cognitive scientists have named several biases that frequently occur in all of us. For example, apparently the fi rst two things we generally notice when we meet someone new is their skin colour and gender.

DISCRIMINATION AT WORK

This edited book brings together in one volume a review of the scholarly work on discrimination based on race, age, sexual orientation, gender, physical appearance, disability, and personality. The focus is on prejudice, stereotyping, and discrimination in the workplace.

Discrimination at Work: The Psychological and Organizational Bases edited by Robert L. Dipboye and Adrienne Colella (Psychology Press, 2013)

‘INSTINCTIVE’ VS ‘LEARNED’ BIASES

The way decisions are made, selective invitations to meetings, in-groups and out-groups, the same faces on high profi le projects are a sign that bias is at play in a system

TECHNIQUES FOR TACKLING RACISM

It is not a book of anti-racist theory but anti-racist tactics – tactics that anyone, of any race, can use to strike a blow against injustice. Anti-racism is not about what we feel but what we do, and there are specific techniques we can use to create a just world.

Tactics for Racial Justice: Building an Antiracist Organization and Community by Shannon Joyce Prince (Routledge, 2021)

Th is instinctive evolutionary bias is linked to our survival and whether or not we are in any danger. The brain is designed to keep us safe. However, we also have learned bias which we absorb throughout our lives from society, media, education, family, friends and so on. We have a tendency to discount or disregard information that disagrees with our assumptions, even if there are well-proven facts to the contrary and in spite of any risks associated with doing so. Th is is confi rmation bias, and one of the most challenging ones as it takes time and commitment to overturn.

In the workplace we need to be aware and mindful of both our instinctive and learned biases. Most people aren’t aware of their own biases. However, there are many clues which point to the existence of bias in the workplace. Bias can be experienced at an individual level; it can also be rooted in the wider systems in an organisation. Behaviours, processes and ways of working that lead to excluding others, stereotyping and discrimination.

The way decisions are made, selective invitations to meetings, in-groups and out-groups, the same faces on high profi le projects are a sign that bias is at play in a system. Other examples are where people are insistent on sticking to a plan regardless of the right outcome. Or where there is strong loyalty and conversation stuck in the past instead of moving to the future. Where ideas matter less than the person who is sharing and there is a resistance to changing rules and implementing new ways of doing things.

Intense hurry up cultures, overloaded and overwhelmed teams can lead to subtle destructive behaviour and triggering biased behaviour, especially if challenging this way of working would be construed as weak, underperformance and lacking in resilience.

Salma Shah is an Accredited Coach, the founder of coach training and leadership development platform Mastering Your Power.

Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging in Coaching: A Practical Guide by Salma Shah (Kogan Page, 2022)

THE EFFECTS OF RACISM

The Trauma of Racism: Lessons from the Therapeutic Encounter is a pioneering reflection on the psychology of racism and its impact on us all. With the intimacy of personal experience and depth of analytic exposition, the authors expose racism’s searing effects on personal, clinical, and community interactions while providing pathways for change.

The Trauma of Racism: Lessons from the Therapeutic Encounter edited By Beverly J. Stoute, Michael Slevin (Routledge, 2022)

DAME HILARY MANTEL

Booker Prize-winning novelist passed away ‘suddenly yet peacefully’

The acclaimed author, celebrated for her Wolf Hall trilogy, has died at the age of 70. Hilary Mantel broke records as the fi rst woman to win the Booker Prize twice and the fi rst author to win with a sequel – ‘Bring Up the Bodies’.

In a statement Mantel’s publisher, 4th Estate Books, said: “We are heartbroken at the death of our beloved author, Dame Hilary Mantel, and our thoughts are with her friends and family, especially her husband, Gerald. Th is is a devastating loss and we can only be grateful she left us with such a magnificent body of work.”

Charlie Redmayne, the CEO of her publisher HarperCollins said: “Th is is terrible, tragic news and we are fi lled with sorrow for Hilary’s family and friends, especially her devoted husband Gerald.

“We are so proud that 4th Estate and HarperCollins were Hilary’s publisher, and for such a peerless body of work.

“A writer to the core, Hilary was one of the greatest of her generation – a serious, fearless novelist with huge empathy for her subjects. Who else could have brought Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII and the huge cast of The Wolf Hall Trilogy to life with such insight, frailty and humanity but her?

“We will all miss Hilary’s company, her wisdom, her humour, and treasure her incredible literary legacy – she will be read as long as people are still reading.”

This is a devastating loss and we can only be grateful she left us with such a magnificent body of work

TANYA BOROWSKI is a highly experienced nutritional therapist and functional medicine practitioner, specialising in hormones and women’s health. This includes PMS, heavy or painful menstrual bleeding, endometriosis, PCOS, menopause/ perimenopause and thyroid conditions. She is passionate about improving knowledge and awareness of the benefits of a whole-body integrated approach to perimenopause and menopause.

Can better gut health improve your menopause symptoms?

In this article, Tanya introduces us to looking after our gut health in aid of reducing symptoms associated with perimenopause and menopause

O

ur overall health is hugely influenced by our gut microbiome, a collection of bacteria and their genetic material housed in the large bowel. The function of this microbiome relates to everything from energy production to immune system education and modulation.

Within the microbiome exists the estrobolome, consisting of approximately 60 types of bacteria and fungi, whose sole function is the regulation of our oestrogen levels. The estrobolome bacteria are somewhat superheroes with superpowers; they transform used oestrogens, taken from the large bowel, back into an active, usable form. Th is now active oestrogen can re-enter the bloodstream and subsequently act on oestrogen receptors.

Your estrobolome can only function properly if your overall microbiome is healthy, containing the right type and diversity of microorganisms. It is an ecosystem, and as

such needs an abundance of microorganisms. A comparison might be another ecosystem - the Great Barrier Reef - which is lush and full of different species working together to create a vibrant and energetic ecosystem. Similarly to the Great Barrier Reef, the microbiome ecosystem can also be disrupted. Unfortunately, numerous dietary and lifestyle factors can disrupt the gut microbiome, knocking microbes out of balance. Th is is termed dysbiosis.

As it pertains to our estrobolome, dysbiosis can result in an overabundance of this community, and beta-glucuronidase activity elevating circulating oestrogen levels excessively, which could contribute to heavier periods, painful cramps, PCOS, endometriosis or uterine fibroids. On the fl ip side, a low microbial diversity, estrobolome and beta-glucuronidase activity mean your estrobolome isn’t able to adequately convert our own oestrogen to its active form and also can’t convert and use those protective plantbased oestrogens.

Your microbiome is an ecosystem , and as such needs an abundance of microorganisms

OESTROGEN FROM PLANTS FOR MENOPAUSE

There are three major sex hormones that change during menopause: oestrogen, progesterone and testosterone. Progesterone and testosterone steadily decline from our early 40s. Oestrogen levels, however, are more erratic, peaking and troughing, causing symptoms of anxiety, irritability, anger, and hot flushes before they eventually decline.

Certain plant-based foods contain compounds called phytoestrogens, naturally-occuring plant compounds that are structurally very similar to our own hormones.

These compounds are found in a wide variety of foods and herbs that fall into three main categories of phytoestrogens:

• Isofl avones: Legumes (soya beans, kidney beans, lima beans, chickpeas, lentils) and soy products (such as milk, tofu, tempeh, miso)

• Lignans: Fruit, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, nuts and seeds, especially linseeds

• Coumestans: Sprouting seeds like alfalfa and soybean sprouts

These ‘dietary oestrogens’, similar in structure to oestrogen, can impact the body by attaching to oestrogen receptors. The beauty of these compounds is they can either enhance the oestrogenic effect or slow it down. Th is is especially helpful for premenopausal and postmenopausal women compensating for the peaks and troughs of perimenopause. It is important to note that different people will react differently to phytoestrogens. Work with your healthcare practitioner to determine the best approach for you.

Tanya Borowski is a holistic health practitioner. E: admin@tanyaborowski.com

Numerous dietary and lifestyle factors can disrupt the gut microbiome, knocking microbes out of balance

The vast array of alternative therapies can be confusing. TESS DE KLERK demystifies some of the lesser-known methods currently being put into practice

Demystifying complementary and alternative therapies

BIOFEEDBACK THERAPY

The aim of biofeedback techniques is to allow people to control bodily processes that normally happen involuntarily.such as heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, and skin temperature. Th is is in order to improve conditions exacerbated by stress including high blood pressure, headaches and chronic pain.

Patients work with a biofeedback therapist to learn relaxation techniques and mental exercises. In initial sessions, electrodes are attached to the skin to measure bodily states. Eventually the techniques can be practiced without a therapist or equipment.

Researchers still aren’t sure how or why biofeedback works, but a lot of research suggests it does.

BODYTALK

BodyTalk is essentially a practice of energy healing grounded in the belief that living organisms have the innate capability to heal themselves.

It is based on the premise that the body communicates via energetic circuitry, and that the chronic breakdown of communication and interaction within the ‘bodymind’ complex creates disease and disorder. Practitioners of BodyTalk strive to connect these broken lines and facilitate open communication between all of the elements of the body in order to promote healing from within.

During a session, patients lie fully-clothed and relaxed while the practitioner uses light pressing, tapping or lifting of the arm to diagnose and address areas of the body in need of balancing. The therapy is safe and non-invasive.

BodyTalk is a relatively new treatment and there is a scarcity of reliable published evidence regarding its efficiency. It is, however, a popular practice in Australia, New Zealand and Germany.

TRE

TENSION AND TRAUMA RELEASING EXERCISES

It is widely understood that humans store stress in their muscles. It is a natural reaction, and part of our ‘fight, fl ight or freeze’ instinct. The TRE programme works by focusing on deep muscle memory to release deep muscular patterns of stress, tension and trauma. Th is therapy consists of learning a series of seven simple exercises that activates the body’s natural reflex mechanism of shaking and vibrating. The shaking releases muscular tension and calms the nervous system.

The technique was formulated by Dr David Berceli, who is highly respected in the international field of trauma intervention and confl ict resolution. Dr Berceli based this programme on his experience of working with people with PTSD during a career that involved delivering trauma relief workshops and recovery support in countries such as Israel/ Palestine, Uganda, Sudan, Kenya, Yemen and Lebanon.

TRE is an effective tool in managing stress, tension and trauma, both psychological and physical. Anecdotal evidence suggests that it is also helpful in managing other conditions, especially those connected to muscle health such as arthritis and fibromyalgia.

Th is practice can be learnt in a day, and is designed to be a self-help tool that, once learned, can be used independently as needed throughout one’s life, thereby continuously supporting and promoting personal health and wellness.

REIKI

Proponents say that Reiki works with the energy fields around the body and involves the transfer of universal energy from the practitioner’s palms to the client. It aims to help the flow of energy to remove blockages which are believed to cause dysfunction in mind and body.

In its simplest form, it is similar to what a parent might do to their child when they’re in pain; place a hand over the area to make it feel better. Reiki practitioners explain that an energy transfer has taken place. Similarly, one might place a hand on your own aching stomach.

The treatment can take place anywhere. Patients remain fully clothed while the practitioner places their hands lightly on or over specific areas of the body.

Some limited studies have drawn links between Reiki and a reduction in feelings of pain and anxiety but for the most part clinical research has not proven is effectiveness. Nonetheless, many people who receive Reiki claim to experience positive outcomes, particularly for pain relief, anxiety, depression and wound healing. Interestingly, over 800 hospitals in the United States currently offer Reiki services for patients.

GERSON THERAPY

Gerson Therapy is based on the belief that disease is caused by the accumulation of toxins as well as nutritional deficiency. Therefore, one attempts to treat disease by prescribing a restricted, predominantly vegetarian diet including hourly glasses of organic juice and various dietary supplements. In addition, patients receive enemas of coffee, castor oil and sometimes hydrogen peroxide or ozone.

It purports to be an effective treatment for various cancers, but there is no valid nor independent evidence in support of these claims. All major cancer support organisations advise against the use of Gerson as a treatment. It can be especially dangerous as the majority of Gerson practitioners strongly discourage patients from undergoing conventional cancer treatments.

TRE is an effective tool in managing stress, tension and trauma, both psychological and physical

Hove’s Float Spa is more health & wellbeing centre than spa. TESS DE KLERK & JASMIN JETCHEV decided to try them out

THE FLOAT SPA

The spa offers a wide variety of options to aid us in feeling good – yoga, infrared sauna and osteopathy to name but a few. Of course, the floatation pods are the main attraction.

The fi rst thing that struck me was the quiet calm. There were plenty of shoes on the shoe racks but the atmosphere was so zen that we could have mistaken ourselves for the only clients. Camille, the lovely owner, explained that the rooms are soundproofed as the floatation pods are all about sensory deprivation.

Sensory deprivation – the deliberate reduction or removal of stimuli – has been proven to aid in muscle recovery, reduce anxiety, pain and help with various stress-related conditions such as insomnia and hypertension.

The pods are fi lled with water and massive amounts of magnesium-based Epsom salts to create the same floating conditions as in the Dead Sea. Each pod is in its own room, and clients are asked to use the shower before entering the pod. The water is maintained at skin temperature which we found to be the ideal temperature and found the pods easy to use.

Once inside and lid closed there really was sensory deprivation - complete silence, absolutely no light (there is a light

switch as well as call button inside the pod if needed) and the sensation of floating. It took both of us some time to get used to this environment. We are all so used to constantly being ‘on’ and stimulated but we both got to a point of total relaxation within our hour session.

Camille suggests three sessions in order to really get used to the unusual environment; I can see the wisdom in that. I, for one, can see how during a second session I would fully relax faster.

We left the pods feeling very calm as well as rejuvenated. My back muscles most defi nitely felt happier than they had in some time and we know that magnesium is magic nectar for achy muscles.

Jasmin said it best, I think, “I feel as if I have woken from a nap but not the type that leaves you groggy; the kind that you wake up from feeling rested and rejuvenated.”

The Float Spa, 8 Th ird Avenue, Hove www.thefloatspa.co.uk T: 01273 933680

Once inside and lid closed there really was sensory deprivation –complete silence, absolutely no light and the sensation of floating

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE HIGHLANDS

I was looking forward to our summer escape in Scotland. I had heard that the rain gets warmer in August, so off we set on our million-mile road trip staycation (yes, my publisher said Scotland is, at least for now, still considered a staycation)

BY TESS DE KLERK

After our long trek across country we found ourselves on a sinewy single-track road through the Scottish wilds, which eventually gave way to an oasis that felt like the end of the world. Loch Awe stretched into the distance.

We had arrived in brooding weather; it was drizzly – exactly as one might expect of the Scottish lochs. Ordinarily I would add ‘dreary’ to my drizzle but not this time. No, the weather was just so fittingly beautiful that I might have been disappointed had it been anything but soulfully doleful. Brooding hills and eagles soaring overhead - Scotland writ large.

ARDANAISEIG HOTEL

The windy path opened up for us weary travellers and there stood the gothic looking country pile that is Ardanaiseig, our accommodation for the night. It has been standing on the shores of Loch Awe since 1834, which is when the then-owner commissioned the leading architect of the time, William Burn, to build the house. It has changed ownership a few times since but it is now Grade II listed and has thankfully retained much character.

The current owner, London antique owner Bennie Gray, has fi lled it with an eclectic array of quirky antiques including a Victorian painting in the dining room... at fi rst it looks old-fashioned but look again! The mafia boss who procured it became bored with the dining scene therefore had it altered to suit his modern tastes, turning the previous dinner guests into Mick Jagger and other famous faces.

The 16 rooms at Ardanaiseig are all unique. We stayed in the Master Bedroom Loch View which was a bit dated but still lovely, with its antique four-poster bed and beautiful view across the gardens and loch. Rose Cottage, a self-catering cottage on the hotel’s grounds, is ideal for families or groups of friends as it accommodates up to four guests. Alternatively, you can choose complete privacy with the modern Boatshed, Ardanaiseig’s luxury honeymoon suite, situated on the banks of the Loch.

One can lounge in front of the roaring fi re, enjoy a whisky-tasting session or try a tinkle on the piano but do pull on a pair of the hotel supplied wellies too and explore the stunning woodlands and meadows. Trout fishing, horse riding, clay pigeon shooting and archery can also be arranged, or simply take your crumpets and croquet on Ardanaiseig’s sprawling lawns.

From £185 prpn inc breakfast www.ardanaiseig.com

Rannoch Train Station

Our departure from Ardanaiseig wasn’t without a touch of wistfulness but it soon dissipated as we weaved our way along the breathtaking roads of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park on our way to Ben Nevis. It’s the highest mountain in the UK, and was stunning, even though we didn’t manage to see the mountain peak as it was shrouded in a heavy cloud.

Why didn’t we hike up, you ask? I fully intended to until I read that the hike takes 6-8 hours. In hindsight, that makes sense, so do schedule a full day trip if you are planning to reach the mountain top. You cannot drive up there and the mountain won’t come to you or Mohammed.

LOCH RANNOCH HOTEL AND SPA

Th is hotel estate reminded me slightly of American holiday lake resorts in movies like Dirty Dancing. Its refurbishment in 2021 focussed on enhancing many of the traditional features and included reinstating the original fi replaces and pairing Victorian-inspired fittings with a modern twist throughout the hotel.

It worked well and we particularly enjoyed the Wild Brownie Bar with its outside terrace overlooking the loch. The only road around the loch is nearly part of the hotel complex, which felt a bit odd but hardly a car passed and it soon didn’t matter. Unfortunately, the swimming pool area was a letdown but I believe that modernising is in the plans.

What makes Loch Rannoch Hotel special is its location at the heart of the Central Highlands, a fantastic base to experience the Scottish Highlands with an abundance of scenery, wildlife, activities and sports. The hotel has its own marina and School of Adventure, offering kayaking, sailing, paddle boarding, wild swimming, bicycle hire, squash court, indoor climbing wall, guided hill walking and fly fishing as well as a fitness studio.

From £110 prpn inc breakfast www.lochrannochhotel.com

The ruins of Kilchurn castle on Loch Awe, the longest fresh water loch in Scotland

“The famous Harry Potter train station is just around the corner from the hotel” said the wee boy, so off we went in search of a photo that would impress the kids. We drove and we drove and we drove some more. The scenery was magnificent but there was not another human nor vehicle in sight for miles, and the road had long since turned into something more akin to a path.

We were defi nitely in the middle of nowhere, about to turn round when all of a sudden a sign read Rannoch Station! We got out. It wasn’t the Harry Potter station, and yet this tiny train station was abuzz with people!

I cannot stress enough how remote this little place was, so naturally we expected that all these people must be waiting on a train. I asked the very busy proprietor of the tea shop operating on the platform about the train schedule; three trains a week pass through she said, and one is due. That made sense, all these people must be waiting for the train. But the train arrived and not a single person boarded! Two girls got off the train and walked out of the station without meeting anyone.

The next train was due in two days, there were hardly any vehicles parked outside the station. The majority of people there were most defi nitely not in hiking gear, and no coaches pass here, I was informed. I half expected the soundtrack from X Files to start playing! I still ponder the tanned man with his LA drawl, the elderly lady with her cut glass English accent and high heels, the leather-clad lovebirds – all there for reasons unfathomable.

Next stop... Edinburgh. >>

Why didn’t we hike up Ben Nevis , you ask? I fully intended to until I read that the hike takes 6-8 hours…

TRAVEL

THE BONHAM HOTEL

The Bonham Hotel is swoon-worthy! My oh my, how lovely! It’s a true 5-star experience, set in a quiet leafy crescent in the exclusive West End of Edinburgh, only minutes from the main attractions of the Scottish capital. It is gorgeous with its original Victorian architectural features having been painstakingly restored, and an impressive art collection on display across the hotel.

It’s pure luxury here, with heavenly Hypnos mattresses and beautiful fabrics in airy rooms and suites. Many rooms offer stunning views either over Drumsheugh Gardens, or towards the Firth of Forth and the Kingdom of Fife.

Save time for a drink (or afternoon tea) in the sumptuously styled bar before heading to the elegant No 35 restaurant for dinner. Head Chef, Marco Drummond Nobrega offers a creative menu of European cuisine with Scottish twists. Breakfast is a fancy affair with a full Scottish breakfast as well as a continental spread.

I can only praise The Bonham for its service and staff whose passion for their hotel was unmistakable and knowledge of its fascinating history and splendid art collection was vast. I asked copious questions and was answered with delight. And no, they did not realise that I was reviewing! We thoroughly enjoyed our stay and can fully recommend The Bonham for your next stay in the striking Scottish capital.

From £165 prpn inc breakfast https://thebonham.com/

And with that, my shamefully short whistle-stop tour of central Scotland - the wilds and the cities - came to an end, and it was time to head back. Everything I had heard about Scotland, from its romantic lochs, breathtaking scenery, amazing architecture and more besides were dazzlingly true. I will be back - and soon.

View from Calton Hill

Baden-Baden is a spa town so good, they named it twice – and so exceptional it was recently listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site alongside 10 other standout European spa towns

BATHING IN BADEN-BADEN’S DELIGHTS

Tucked away in Germany’s Black Forest, this ancient town was built atop nearly thirty natural springs known for their healing qualities. The main tree-lined promenade hugs the River Oos while Neoclassical and Belle Époque masterpieces rise up beyond the foliage.

Michelin-starred dining and high-rolling at the stately and storied Casino Baden-Baden can be followed by days of peacefully luxuriating in gorgeous famed spas and scenic walks through a historic town that has always been about unplugging and recharging.

WHERE TO STAY

Brenners Park-Hotel & Spa

Th is upmarket grande dame hotel is set in a leafy central spot - with a large to-die-for spa and Michellin-starred dining. From £351 prpn

Hotel Belle Epoque

Th is 19th-century villa is a belle époque beauty in its own right, set in gardens near Baden-Lichtentaler Baden’s Allee, a world-class festival hall, casino, and curative thermal baths. From £165 prpn

Villa Stephanie at Brenners Park-Hotel & Spa

The historic and luxurious Villa Stéphanie boasts expertise in health and wellbeing dating as far back as 1872. They are known for their comprehensive treatments and dedication to rejuvenation. From £351 prpn

Roomers Baden-Baden

Stylish, upmarket, professionally run and boasting friendly staff, this is arguably the German spa town’s top hotel. From £151 prpn

WINING & DINING

The region’s cuisine is considered some of the best in Germany, with fertile soils providing fresh ingredients. The Michelin Guide recommends 36 restaurants in BadenBaden. Here are some of our picks.

Le Jardin de France Im Sthalbad

Set in a beautiful building offering classic, gourmet French cuisine, a fantastic wine list and family-run hospitality.

Weinstube Baldreit

Th is lovely little wine bar may be a little out of the way but it is well worth seeking out, especially in the summer when the interior courtyard really comes into its own. The food is traditional, ranging from steak tartar to fl ammekueche and braised pig’s cheeks.

Wintergarten

In the tasteful winter garden of the grand Brenners hotel, you get a wonderful view of the spa gardens while you dine. Quality ingredients are used in their great choice of contemporary dishes.

Maltes Hidden Kitchen

Th is interesting kitchen is a coffee shop during the day, serving hot drinks and cake, while the evening sees a change to creative cuisine for dinner. The team skilfully pare things down to the essentials, making the ingredients the focus of the set menu. A pleasant, cosy little restaurant with a charm all of its own – dining here makes for a really fun experience!

HOW TO GET THERE

Return fl ights from Gatwick to Strasbourg from £222 Baden-Baden is a 1h journey by car or train from Strasbourg.

The region’s cuisine is considered some of the best in Germany, with fertile soils providing fresh ingredients

Having nagged Maarten to organise a very small car for me to review, mainly so I could check out the tall person in small city car scenario, this experience got off to an inauspicious start for both of us. Be careful what you wish for in life.

By Fiona Shafer – CEO of MD HUB

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FOB STORY

Pouring myself into the Fiat, never in my wildest dreams did I think I would spend the best part of an hour trying to start the bloody thing. Having turned it on, I could not release the parking brake to drive away. And then I couldn’t turn the car off.

A key symbol warning sign appeared and being quite determined to fathom out what on earth was going on, I read the very small and frankly sparse manual. I had to Google ‘how to start a new electric Fiat 500’, before fi nally watching some You Tube video reviews. After all that, I was still none the wiser.

I reluctantly called Maarten, who arrived jokingly saying he was coming to rescue me (and oh, what copy that would have made), only to fi nd that he couldn’t work out what on earth was going on either (to my slight satisfaction).

So, picture this, two 6ft plus motoring journalists in a tiny car going nowhere any time soon.

The irony was not lost on either of us. Several calls later to various people who should know what is going on and a recommendation to press the SOS call button in the Fiat, resulting in an immediate response from Fire or Ambulance, neither of which we needed, to which we gave our profound apologies.

Maarten unhelpfully suggested we order a pizza.

A local Fiat dealership pretty quickly asked us where exactly we had placed the key fob? Transpires that you must not place “The Fob” under any circumstances in the depths of the central console as it deactivates the key resulting in a call out from an engineer to reset it.

So, let’s start again… literally.

If looks are important to you as you pootle around town, then this cool, stylish Italian car should be high up on your shopping list. I drove the very lovely Rose Gold Icon edition which, whilst the paint job will set you back an additional £600, is really rather gorgeous. And if you ever wish to match your car with your outfits, then I would suggest that this one will go with most of one’s wardrobe.

It has lots of lovely design and eco-friendly touches including a motif of the original iconic Fiat design and ‘Made in Torino’ inside the door handle, little triangle signal indicators, Vegan-friendly fake leather on the steering wheel and seats are made from 20% recycled materials.

But, like most thing’s characteristically Italian, it does not go through life quietly.

The car produces a very strange, tinkling sound rather like an ice cream van siren when you turn it off, it bings and bongs when you open the door and then the horn beeps loudly and irritatingly every time you lock the car.

That said, if you are hurtling around narrow Sicilian streets imagining you are in an episode of Montalbano, it will make itself known. But be mindful that very same sound might just get a British neighbour’s teeth gnashing.

It has three driving modes – Normal, Range and Sherpa mode (read Eco mode) – which reduces output from the electric motor and gives you a top speed of 50 mph, turns off climate control and will make sure that you get to your destination.

It is great for zipping around town but I found the ride on country roads frankly unnerving as the steering is so light that the car vacillated over every bump and camber

A good friend who is a die-hard convertible fan, has a Prima Fiat Convertible version which cost £30,000 and says that whilst fun to drive, it is like a ‘souped-up golf cart’ when in one pedal mode. And that she has never got 200 miles on a charge – the best she has got is 167miles.

I think that sums it all up rather well.

The offending item

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MODEL TESTED: Fiat 500e Icon ENGINE: Electric 42kwh

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GLOW WILD

Wakehurst, West Sussex

The enchanting winter lantern trail is back at Wakehurst, Kew’s wild botanic garden, for its ninth year. It’s packed full of surprises, including a brand-new route. As darkness falls, the gardens are brought to life with beautifully hand-crafted lanterns and captivating light installations created by leading artists. This year, Glow Wild celebrates the spectrum of colours in nature, inviting you to explore how we see colour and the role it plays in our daily lives. Looking for a heart-warming date night or a fun evening out with friends? Adultsonly sessions are available.

November 24th 2022 2022January 1st 2023

www.kew.org/wakehurst/whats-on

WHAT’S ON...

A brief snapshot of art and culture in Sussex and Surrey

TREE WALKS LEONARDSLEE GARDENS

Near Horsham

Join the knowledgeable and enthusiastic wildlife expert, Elliot Chandler, and discover the history, uniqueness and beauty of some of our oldest and most interesting trees.

November 16th 2022

www.leonardsleegardens.co.uk

CRAWLEY COMEDY NIGHTS

Crawley

Support stand-up comedy in Crawley. Comedy Beats hosts standup evenings each first Friday of the month at The Grasshopper pub. November sees a fantastic line-up of 4 top-class UK circuit comedians: Russell Hicks (Compere); Stephen K Amos; Chris McCausland; Boothby Graffoe November 11th 2022 https://comedybeats.com/upcoming-shows

BRIGHTON GIN TASTING FLIGHT

British Airways i360, Brighton

Join members of the Brighton Gin team at the South Coast’s Highest Bar to learn about the history of craft gin and the process and botanicals behind Brighton’s favourite tipple, before getting the chance to taste four of Brighton Gin’s delicious products.

November 17th 2022 https://britishairwaysi360.com/tickets/ brighton-gin-tasting-flight

WINTER COMETS & CURRY FORBIDDEN NIGHTS

The Observatory Science Centre, Herstmonceux

November brings the prolific Leonids meteor shower. Spot Leonids shooting stars and possibly Taurids meteors too as Earth passes through the tail end of the Taurids meteor shower. Learn from the knowledgeable staff on hand at The Observatory Science Centre who will endeavour to invite you to look at some other interesting celestial objects through the large telescopes. An interesting evening – with a curry thrown in for good measure!

November 12th 2022 https://www.the-observatory.org

Brighton

Think Cirque du Soleil meets Magic Mike. Abandon your inhibitions at the door as the cast of acrobats, live male vocalists, fire acts, aerial artists and world-renowned circus performers flip and spin across the stage in this high-octane show.

November 5th, 12th, 19th, 26th 2022

The Arch Brighton www.forbidden-nights.co.uk/ brighton-show

BUBBLES & BOTANICALS

South Lodge , Horsham Bubbles & Botanicals is the brand-new Sussex sparkling wine event, being held at stunning South Lodge. Meet local producers and taste superb local sparkling wine and gins while learning more about the vineyards, distillers, sparkling wines and craft gins of Sussex. A fantastic line-up of industry professionals will be giving insightful talks and demonstrations throughout the day.

There will also be the opportunity to sample the award-winning Cuvee 58, Cuvee Rosé and the very popular, Joie de Vivre, from the Streeter family’s Benguela Cove Lagoon Wine Estate in South Africa.

November 19th 2022 www.bubblesandbotanicals.net

WATTS GALLERY, GUILDFORD

Watts Gallery - Artists’ Village is a unique Arts & Crafts gem nestled in the Surrey Hills. Discover their permanent exhibition of Victorian paintings and sculptures before treating yourself to lunch or a cream tea. Wander to the nearby Grade I listed Watts Chapel, taking in the beautiful woodlands and grounds, or find out more about the lives of G.F. and Mary Watts at Watts Studios before taking a tour of the artists’ home, Limnerslease. Plenty of makers’ classes on offer too plus lots to keep the little ones entertained.

Current exhibitions include:

• Faces of Fame (Contemporary) Photos from Simon Frederick’s portrait series Black is the New Black alongside paintings from G.F. Watts’s Hall of Fame. The display re-examines the representation of celebrity, race, gender, class, power, and empire, allowing a critical re-evaluation of Watts and exploring what a Hall of Fame might look like today.

Until March 26th 2023

• De Morgan Exhibition Husband and wife artists, William and Evelyn De Morgan were anything but ordinary. They defied the stereotypes of their time to create beautiful art which supported their liberal, socialist political viewpoint, their feminism, and their pacifist outlook on war.

Until December 31st 2022 www.wattsgallery.org.uk

I love O’shio - absolutely love it. So much so that I’ve been back twice since I was asked to review this restaurant for Dynamic.

By CLAIRE REEVES

O’SHIO

Authentic Japanese and Korean cuisine tucked away in Brighton

O’shio offers an authentic dining experience. Owner and chef, Min, is Korean-trained and Japanese-qualified, and was creating dishes in the open kitchen each time we visited. He spent years honing his skills in the restaurants of Korea, Japan, London and Brighton before opening O’Shio in 2016.

The restaurant is small, intimate and friendly and I believe the hostess to be Min’s wife, whose name I regrettably didn’t ask for.

The kimchi is homemade by her too and defi nitely not to be missed. The menu is quite extensive, ranging from wellknown Japanese and Korean dishes, such as sushi, udon and bibimbap to the little more unusual where chef Min has fused the purity of Japanese ingredients with the heat of Korean cuisine. There is defi nitely something for everyone!

Each time I dined at O’shio I took along a different friend and each time we had nothing but praise. Th is review is allocated too few words for me to wax lyrically about each dish but I must suggest the Sweet Soy Sauce Fried Chicken, the White Prawn Tempura Roll and any of the Korean Stews for those looking for something with a kickall washed down with smooth Sayuri Nigori sake.

Prices are reasonable and bookings are essential.

O’Shio, 87-88 Trafalgar Street, Brighton BN1 4ER T: 01273 694814, www.oshio.co.uk

The restaurant is small, intimate and friendly

Wining & DINING

CERADELLO PROSECCO

ORGANIC BRUT NV

Italy, 2022 £12.95

An organic Prosecco that has soft and delicate fruit and floral aromas that give way to peach notes on the palate, with an appealing texture and fresh finish. A perfect aperitif wine, to serve with starters or even to make great cocktails. Vegetarian, vegan, organic and sparkling. https://tilleys-wines.com

CASTILLO PERELADA CAVA

Spain, 2018 £11.49

As so often with Cava, you get good bang for your buck here. Made by the Champagne method, this is Brut in style, with 8g/L residual sugar. Its delicate, fresh, citrus fruitiness is complemented by a subtle bready character and a lingering, complex finish. A perfect celebratory Cava for serving with fish dishes or canapés. www.waitrose.com

DOMAINE FOIVOS, NAUTILUS

Greece, 2020 £12.99

This is a blend of muscat, muscatel, tsaousi and vostilidi from 80-year-old pre-phylloxera vines on the Greek island of Cephalonia. Unusually the bottles are aged in fresh water tanks in the winery, providing constant temperatures, darkness and lack of oxygen. Ripe citrus aromas with hints of peach and nuts. A textured floral and herbal palate; bone dry with fresh, focused acidity that ends in a crisp lingering finish with notes of honeyed lemon and grapefruit pith. Lovely! www.allaboutwine.co.uk

CATENA MALBEC

Argentina, 2015 £10.49

Malbec is a favourite for red wine enthusiasts, and this tasty treat is a Decanter award winner. It offers a rich, soft plum and blackcurrant flavour infusions paired with a satisfying finish and smooth tannins.

www.waitrose.com

The Christmas party season is nearly upon us as we look for tipples that punch above their pricing weight - great wines at prices that won’t break the bank