The Tall Poppies breakfast at Pitchfest always draws a crowd, this year's Toowoomba event not being an exception. The panel, facilitated by Australia Post's Rebecca Burrows included Diana Somerville from Regional Pitchfest, Joy Taylor from Canvas Coworking and Rural Business Collective's Fleur Anderson. For Beating Around the Bush we've edited a version that concentrates on building and maintaining relationships with mentors.

Fleur's Beating Around the Bush with Central Queensland small business owner Bronwyn Reid. Bronwyn and her husband Ian Rankine are at the helm of a number of consulting businesses, born out of a desire to return to Australia after working overseas.

Settling in Emerald, Queensland, they launched 4T Consultants http://4t.com.au/

Bronwyn is candid about the learning processes and shares her depth of knowledge in being able to talk to 'big business' using a language they understand.

She highlights the importance of story telling and highlighting differences, whether that comes from your regional area or your own personal story.

It's this expertise that inspired her to launch her own business Mining for Business. http://www.miningforbusiness.com.au/

It's currently rebranding (she's not a mining business!!) and so watch this space for her new look.

This week's podcast is with Matthew Pryor from Observant https://observant.net/

Matthew spoke at the 400M AgTech forum in Toowoomba about entrepreneurism as a learned skill and working within your strengths.

He also speaks to Fleur about the issues and benefits that come up when you relinquish complete control of the business that you built. https://observant.net/news/

Matthew spent time in the Silicon Valley while Observant hit its pins on the World stage. He admits there are some cultural differences in getting business done. He highly recommends reading The Culture Map by Erin Meyer. http://erinmeyer.com/book/

He said it's always good to be improving yourself- he watched the Warren Buffet documentary on a plane recently and says he's an excellent example of a relentless self-improver. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6438096/

Sam Threthewey is the General Manager of Sprout X. http://sproutx.com.au/

The business lays claim to being Australia's first Ag Tech accelerator.

They give capital, training and support to start-ups to compete within the international venture capital community.

Meg Kummerow from Flying Ag Australia http://flyingag.com.au/ talks to Fleur Anderson about all things drone related.

She caught the drone bug after learning about the success of Flying Ag in the US. The Kummerows are based on the Darling Downs in Queensland and Meg says owning a drone business combines her two greatest passions- technology and agriculture.

Contact Meg through Facebook https://www.facebook.com/FlyingAgAustralia

Or Twitter https://twitter.com/FlyingAgAU

Or their website. http://flyingag.com.au/contact-us/

George The Farmer was born out of a creative endeavour by Hello Friday http://www.hellofriday.com.au/ , the creative powerhouse of Simone Kain and Ben Hood.

https://www.georgethefarmer.com.au/

It started as an interactive app and has blossomed into a huge retail range including toys and books, education programs, live performances and a big social media presence.

Simone and Ben have created a number of different forums including songs- this one is to celebrate the International Year of the Pulse https://soundcloud.com/user-912151459/pulse-party

Or this one learning about potatoes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmuueelyQww

Simone has also won the South Australia RIRDC Rural Women's Award. http://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2017-02-14/simone-kain-wins-rirdc-rural-womens-award-sa/8269740

This week Rural Business Collective's Fleur Anderson speaks to Brian Costello from Financial Grace. http://www.financialgrace.com.au/about-us

Brian identifies himself as bringing 'service' back into the Financial Service industry, focussing on the needs of his rural customers.

He worked as a pilot for many years and realised he got more enjoyment supporting people to get to where they were going.

Financial Grace are currently running two day 'Find Your Hidden Wealth' workshops. See here for details. http://www.financialgrace.com.au/component/ohanah/?view=events&ohanah_venue_id=19&ohanah_category_id=&filterEvents=notpast&Itemid=

Rural Business Collective's Fleur Anderson has some big questions for this week's Beating Around the Bush guests, Julia Telford and Jess Fealy.

They were together to take part in the Myriad Festival in Brisbane. What is the Myriad festival? http://www.myriad.live/

Jess Fealy runs Blue Sky Produce with her husband Matt near Mareeba in Far North Queensland. http://www.blueskyproduce.com.au/

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-01/matt-and-jess-fealy/8232704

Julia Telford is the creative engine behind Engage and Create Consulting in Goondiwindi.

http://engageandcreateconsulting.com.au/

These three engaged and inspired women took time out to talk about the big picture surrounding running businesses in regional Queensland, some of the language used in dealing with the urban/rural divide (or not so divide, as they discuss) and what's in the pipeline for Startups and Rural Business Collective.

This week, Beating Around the Bush is showcasing Mark Sowerby.

Mark Sowerby is the founder of Blue Sky- an alternative investment business http://www.blueskyfunds.com.au/people/

He's Queensland's first chief entrepreneur, as appointed by the State Government. http://advance.qld.gov.au/innovation-movement/news-events/first-chief-entrepreneur.aspx

Mark started the role, which is a new initiative from the very active Advance Queensland team and Minister Leanne Enoch,  in October and says he's been trying to take a 'stocktake' of what's going on in Queensland in terms of entrepreneurship and business ownership.

He's recently returned from a regional tour of 10 Queensland towns including Goondiwindi, Emerald Yeppoon, Rockhampton, Charters Towers, Longreach, Mount Isa, Lockhart River, Cairns and Mackay with five other inspiring entrepreneurs http://advance.qld.gov.au/our-vision/chief-entrepreneur/tour.aspx, including 2016 Young Australian of the Year Lucas Patchett, from Orange Sky Laundry, who is currently helping out with fallout from Cyclone Debbie in some regional areas. http://www.orangeskylaundry.com.au/

He said the group were really impressed with the innovation, passion and ideas coming out of regional Queensland and they ended the tour more energised than when they started. He has some great takeaways for the way ewe look at the opportunity in the rural sector and the great cuylture growing in Qld for startup businesses. 

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-10/entrepreneur-shares-top-tips-run-start-up-business-qld-regions/8344238

Sascha Estens is the founder, CEO, creative genius and jack of all trades that is Rabbit Hop Films https://www.rabbithopfilms.com/

Based out of Moree in Northern New South Wales, she studied film making and realised she loved every aspect of it, eventually making the decision to start her own business.

Sascha credits social media with a lot of her success, especially after some of the videos she made during a flood event in Moree.

What really comes across is her passion for regional Australia, the people that live there, and fun she has telling their stories.

Sascha's Rabbit Hop Films website was recently recognised as one of regional Australia's best online businesses by the Regional Australia Institute and Google. http://www.moreechampion.com.au/story/4305369/rabbit-hop-named-top-online-business/

Visit her Facebook page-  https://www.facebook.com/rabbithopfilms/

Vimeo- https://vimeo.com/user18448341

Twitter- https://twitter.com/rabbithopfilms