James Layfield, founder of Central Working, offers his predictions and hopes for the year ahead:
I’ll remember 2011 as… the year of the rise of the entrepreneur as an acceptable mainstream career choice. Created by a loss of faith in Big Business, a need to control one’s own destiny, technological leaps in cloud-based IT, access devices such as the iPhone, and let’s not forget the media frenzy around entrepreneurial content. We have gone back to our roots. We’ve always been a nation of shopkeepers, which by this new all-encompassing definition, makes us fundamentally a nation of entrepreneurs. The nation is now re-embracing this approach to business, choosing their own destiny and life, becoming independent.
2012 will be great because… this shift in outlook will make 2012 a very exciting place to be. We will see the creation of some of the amazing companies of the future as people embrace this change and begin to change the way they work to facilitate it. We hope to be at the heart of this, helping facilitate and support the growth and creation of these businesses.
One company we’ll hear a lot from next year will be… Josh March’s Conversocial. If you have not heard of him yet, you will soon. Facebook is now the de facto key media and engagement channel for brands and consumers. Conversocial makes this world manageable for brands to have meaningful relationships with consumers in this new world of deep brand relationships.
The one thing that would help me grow my business in 2012 would be… for the government to embrace the use of entrepreneurial suppliers, which they support rather than always looking to big business to solve things.
My New Year’s resolution for 2012 is… to live more in the moment; it’s very easy to end up living in the future as an entrepreneur.
Real Business will be running the “My 2012” series for the next month, bringing you top entrepreneurs’ views and predictions of the year ahead.
