Posts by Nick Clifford

Clifford Style and Project 1000 have joined together to take a new approach to business advice and support. Traditionally those with more experience and knowledge – the ‘experts’ – offered this wisdom to those who needed it as ‘consultants’. But is this model changing? What might a ‘different’ (rather than new) normal begin to look…

Exceptional business challenges have in recent times included uncertainties around the eventual shape of our post-Brexit trading position, the challenges of the environmental/social/governance (ESG) agendas, and the cyber threat.  Now they include Covid-19. It’s not far from a ‘perfect storm’. So how do we react? If we take the ‘perfect storm’ analogy a bit further,…

Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced last Thursday, 2nd April, that he was revising the financial support scheme to help small and medium sized firms suffering during the nationwide lock-down – the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (Or C-BILS) The original scheme promised support to the tune of £330bn. – that is 330,000…

When one word can change a conversation completely … Powerful leaders can use words highly effectively.  One that is least understood and yet really powerful is ‘And’. An Assistant Chief Executive friend of mine once told me about the thing that most irritated him.  This was when his office door opened and a staff member…

The Prime Minister has ruled out a second Scottish independence vote because people were promised it was a ‘once-in-a-generation’ event in 2014.  However the Financial Times now offers polling data suggesting an increase in the numbers believing the UK will not exist in its current form in 10 years.  The reduced confidence in the UK’s…