The man behind London’s new bullet trains is making sure the 2012 Games run on time July 31, 2011 AS YOU travel to work, did you notice how roomy Stratford station is looking? Or that certain trains seem longer than before? Or, if you use the Jubilee Line, that more trains are running every hour? It’s all part of the way in which London’s transport system is being steadily geared up ahead of next [...]
Home working doesn’t mean less productivity July 31, 2011 WORKING from home won’t suit every company, but providing greater opportunities to staff to do so can have real business benefits. According to BT, while the Olympic Games provides a timely business case to make the leap to greater flexibility, that decision has the potential to deliver returns that outlast the summer’s sporting triumphs. And [...]
THE SECRETS OF BUSINESS AS UNUSUAL July 31, 2011 MAKING better use of flexible and home working is a key area of focus for Deloitte in the run up to 2012. Quite simply, our people cannot do their jobs if they are struggling to move around the city. It won’t help the Games organisers or London’s transport authorities either, if unnecessary journeys clog up [...]
Help to keep London running: plan around Olympic hotspots July 31, 2011 CITY: TUBE AND MAINLINE RAIL HOTSPOTS THE FOLLOWING IS PREDICTED TO HAPPEN WITHOUT ACTION BY BUSINESSES TO REDUCE THE NUMBER OF JOURNEYS Jubilee Line; Central Line; DLR; Northern Line Delays of over an hour possible, particularly at Bank for the DLR. Avoid these lines where possible. Most affected on weekdays 8-11am, 4-8pm and 10pm to [...]
Meet the men looking to corner the World market July 31, 2011 JOE Murray and Richard Tucker can sell anything. Cots, birdcages, log splitters, mattresses – you name it – these guys will have a dedicated website for it and they will be selling them by the shed load (speaking of which, they also sell sheds). With 79 of these websites and 350,000 items sold in just [...]
GROWTH PLAN NEEDS YOUNG CREATIVE TALENT July 31, 2011 ENTREPRENEURS by definition have never been fond of following a plan. But today, our economy needs a plan for growth, and a good place to start is the UK’s creative startup sector. The creative industries contribute £59.2bn to the UK economy and provide 2.3m jobs. They have a higher share of GDP in the UK [...]
ENTREPRENEURS NEWS | IN BRIEF July 31, 2011 YOUNG PEOPLE WANT TO BE ENTREPRENEURS Eight in ten young people want to become entrepreneurs. Britain is brimming with future entrepreneurs, a new study into young people’s ambitions has concluded. According to the survey of 2,000 youngsters, commissioned to support the Ambition AXA Awards, more than three-quarters of 11 to 18-year-olds (77 per cent) say [...]
Rivers, Buddhas and temples: SE Asia minus the beaches July 31, 2011 SOUTH East Asia is intimidatingly rich in temptations, fascinations and possibilities. As someone who had never been, and had ten days for the inaugural journey, I had to make some tough decisions. The first one was to steer clear of the beaches and focus on culture and rivers. This may sound a bit unsexy. But [...]
Why Google+ may save my friendships July 31, 2011 A MONTH ago I wrote a column saying Facebook shouldn’t be worried about the 6m users it lost in the US. The gist of it was that there was no chance of a serious rival emerging. Zuckerberg, I said, has the whole social network thing stitched up, and he’ll live happily ever after as king [...]
BETFAIR’S IRON LADY IS ON HER LAST LEG July 31, 2011 FOUR down and one to go. No, not the number of top-level scalps claimed by the News Corp scandal, but the feats of endurance completed by Betfair’s Susannah Gill, the Iron Lady of the City, as part of her five-part “ultimate challenge” between April and September. Gill, who is making the original iron woman Margaret [...]