Why I am participating in the Lenovo Mentor program
“Help I need a mentor!” I hear.
“But how best can I do this” I respond.
This is a common conversation that I have, whether it is via my email, LinkedIn and other social inboxes.
If you are in this situation then please click on this link and join me for the Lenovo Mentoring program. Do it now as entries close on 4 March!
For years I have considered how I can support Australian businesses no matter where they are. I have travelled the length of the country meeting people and sharing what I have learnt, in the hope that something that I say may support the growth aspirations of the business owners I meet. I have wondered how I could mentor people everywhere.
Some people ask – but why?
When I decided to leave corporate life decades ago, I thought I could be a freelance marketer, working with businesses to help them grow. What I discovered in those three years was what businesses wanted most was to ‘get new customers,’ in addition to the assistance with marketing and promotion too.
This situation has not changed, if anything it has become even harder. Many people start a business, or buy a business because they are an expert in one thing, and yet when they start working in their enterprise, they realise that they also need to become an expert everything! Digital Marketing, technology, and accounting are just a few of the things business owners are expected to be an expert in.
On the other end of the spectrum, there are also those who have been in business many years and with the business landscape changing so quickly, what they knew last year (or last decade) just doesn’t seem to work anymore.
RedBalloon is really a marketing company – we have given an industry a brand (consisting of 2500 small businesses throughout the whole of Australia), and our job is to create consumer demand and send customers to these businesses everywhere. In the last 20 years this has had a material difference to businesses anywhere in Australia, having sent more than five million customers to our experience supply partners in that time. I listened deeply to the lessons I learned as a consultant and seeing the results drives me to help more businesses everywhere.
Our purpose is to ‘shift the way people experience life’, and I know if I support the commercial success of business throughout Australia then I work towards to achieving my purpose.
After the summer from hell what we do is needed more than ever. We had 53 of our long-term experience partners lose their businesses through the fires. In addition, 247 experiences have been impacted commercially with people not visiting areas because of their location in fire and drought stricken areas. . We have also seen our eastern seaboard experience partners down year on year because of smoke, drought and the impact of Coronavirus. We have such a hands-on and significant role to play in rebuilding the commercial success throughout rural and regional Australia even within our own community.
Another way to do this is through my knowledge, insights (and perhaps my networks). So, apply now to be a part of the Lenovo Mentor Program.
I was glad that Lenovo approached me to do this program – it gives me the opportunity to reach communities and audiences that I wouldn’t necessarily be able to. It has also highlighted the critical importance of technology to encourage growth in Australia. Technology that is fast, efficient and reliable, together with a good internet connection means that businesses of all types can operate everywhere.
I have so much to share about business growth, so please join the program and who knows you may be the one that I get to give my time, energy and insight to.
I look forward to meeting you. (4 March is fast approaching!)
Also published on Medium.
