8-12-business-bulletin-V2 11/12/09 15:52 Page 12
~BUSINESS BULLETIN~
Economic insight Rising star
Mariana Mazzucato, professor of economics at The Open University, believes
Colin Wilkinson
the state plays a greater role in entrepreneurship than it gets credit for
co-founded Three Sixty
Entertainment at the
G
overnments weigh the possible benefits of any beginning of 2009 and
normally get innovation against the dent in their profits. raised £2.75 million for
characterised as Venture capitalists (VCs) often claim his show Peter Pan in
bureaucratic and inertial, to be driving innovation. But they fund Kensington Gardens, ending a fairy tale
while it’s assumed that the companies very late in the day, after the investment story
private sector takes on the uncertainty has gone. If you look at who is
real risks in bringing new products and taking the real risk in the early stages, it is Where did you get the idea from?
technologies to market. actually the government. When you look at patterns in the
However, if you look at where the really This is not to say that smaller companies, entertainment industry, you can see that
radical innovation comes from, say in the larger companies and VCs don’t all play re-imagining classic children’s texts in a
pharmaceutical industry, you’ll find that most important roles in bringing innovations to way that adults can appreciate is an
new molecular entities (as opposed to ‘me market. But there is a real issue over who is increasingly successful genre – for
too’ drug launches) originate from research appropriating the returns. If the biggest example, the success of War Horse by
in state-funded laboratories. risks are being taken by the state, then why Michael Morpurgo. So I felt this was a
Although small companies can be more is it the pharmaceutical companies are real investment gem.
nimble and are naturally entrepreneurial, they charging such high prices?
often lack the resources to fund really radical When we ask governments to slash research How did you raise the money?
innovation. Larger corporates have the big funding in the name of entrepreneurship, we We managed to get 58 investors on board
research labs, but they are also more likely to have no idea where that entrepreneurship is in the space of three and a half months.
be wedded to the status quo, and they will coming from. ■ I don’t want to make it sound easy, as the
first two months were actually very
difficult. But we were able to make a case
What I’m reading now
for a scalable, international business.
What’s new about your idea?
Leading in Times of Crisis, by David L Dotlich, Peter C Cairo and
We wanted to make a really big theatrical
Stephen H Rhinesmith
spectacle – using a screen three times the
Jacqueline Davies, head of talent, Lloyds Banking Group
surface area of an Imax, with virtual
scenery and a live theatre production
housed in a £1 million purpose-built
L
eadership is leaders review their approach to uncertainty, tented pavilion.
reaching an backing this up with fascinating insights
almost impossible from business and politics, notably from the How have you marketed the show?
level of complexity, and Obama election campaign. The key for us was to find an arresting
recent economic events Their guidance is simple: be clear about image. We kept turning down different
have created the perfect what you have the courage to be known for, designs until we found the one that really
storm for leaders out there prioritise relationships and lead everyone, hit the mark. We also managed to
trying to make businesses work. not just those who report directly to you. persuade Visit London to choose the
That’s the central message of the latest They revisit the idea of enterprise leadership, show as their pet project for 2009, and
book from management consultancy group in particular the need to bring diversity into having a PR agent who got us a page
Oliver Wyman, whose authors argue that the leadership population: their rationale is three in the Evening Standard has helped.
even our most accomplished leaders are that a broad range of leaders widens the
exhausted and confused by the challenges organisation’s capacity to roll with change. Where next?
of these turbulent times. Crucially, the authors challenge us to We will be taking the production to San
The key to riding the storm is leadership revisit our own leadership agendas – being Francisco in April. After that, we want to
style and, in particular, the need to be a clear about what’s important to us and do a series of shows, using London as
whole leader: ‘head, heart and guts’. The addressing those ‘mind bugs’, or unconscious the springboard for world tours. The next
authors provide useful questions to help biases, that limit our thinking. ■ one is scheduled for 2011.
12 BUSINESS XL
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