Elevation

William Kirk • 10 May 2018

Working as an 'agitator'/mentor for Elevate UK

Elevator® is a social enterprise with the mission to support the leaders of today and tomorrow and encourage entrepreneurship, business start-up and growth. It is linked in with Scottish Enterprise and Business Gateway and operates mainly in Perth, Dundee and Aberdeen. The programme runs in intensive 12 week programmes about twice to three times per year. The programme is designed to continually build and refine the start-up ideas to give them the best chance of being a successful and sustainable business.

I am privileged to be providing business mentoring ('agitation') to about 10 highly innovative, enthusiastic and energetic start-ups. This includes businesses from software tech through to jewellery design. Not only do i feel that i am giving something back from my long years of experience, but i feel that some of the enthusiasm is rubbing off. It is also quite valuable to keep up with the new ideas and trends.

This coming week, we will be at the grand event, the finally, where each start-up will get a chance to provide their refined pitch and show off the results of 12 hard weeks. Good luck! For more information check out http://www.elevatoruk.com/about/.

Dundee 

by William Kirk • 1 October 2018
Yep Dundee has a growing reputation for technology and innovation building on major developments in gaming and arts including Grand Theft Auto/Lemmings and the new V&A museum. Dundee offers the spark and conditions for innovation. So, it seemed appropriate to find and join an innovation hub in Dundee and create a new office environment. Access Environment now has an additional home at Brouhaha, Chambers Building, Dundee DD1 1DU which is located behind the Macmanus in an ornate Flemmish style architectural building. Look forward to meeting you here...

Reality

by William Kirk • 6 April 2018
There are a growing number of realities. We have the real, the world you live in. We have a virtual reality where we can create your world. We have augmented reality, where we can add virtual objects to your real world. Then we have mixed reality where we can model your real world and then add virtual objects to this. Essentially, this is fifty shades of grey. The technology is now becoming much more advanced and slowly becoming more accessible. Imagine a scenario where i can have a skype call using mixed reality - every caller has an avatar, we set a table in the middle of the room and add a screen on the wall. We show a powerpoint on the virtual screen and add some holograms on the real table. Virtually we can walk round the table or spin the hologram. The hologram view changes depending on where you are sitting. I can then add spreadsheets, word documents on the table too. I can have the meeting on the beach or on a space station, i can add weather. While this is actually available today, just imagine what the technology could do to your business.

10 Reasons You Should Love Blogging

by William Kirk • 6 April 2018
Anyone can make one: For better or worse, anyone can write a blog post about anything they want. Everyone has a voice and the best voices will rise to the top. The writer can show their personality: In blog posts, the writer has more leeway to add in their voice and personality than other types of writing. Blogs are a great form of mass communication: You can help people, learn new things, entertain your audience-the possibilities are endless and amazing. Blogging opens up all of these to a very wide audience. You can make money: Get the right blog going and you can make a lot of money through advertising and sponsored posts. It allows people to craft better thoughts: Instead of reading haphazard, uneducated Facebook statuses, it's much better to see people's thought process in a well-written blog post. You can establish a community: Blogging allows you to connect with other individuals who share the same interests. Sharing ideas and opinions within your community helps establish yourself as a thought leader. Good for SEO: Keeping content on your site fresh and relevant, you can use your blog to boost the search engine ranking (SEO) of your site and your business. It brings people back to your site: If your blog is strong enough and updated regularly, people will come back looking for more and bring traffic back to your site as well. It's free: It costs you a grand total of zero dollars to post to the blog, so if you have something to say, there's nothing to stop you. You can establish yourself as a thought leader: A blog is a great place for your original thoughts, and it can be a wonderful way to show off your individuality. If people like your ideas, you can become a thought leader in your industry! What else do you love about blogs? Let me know!