FastForward

Last year, Amanda Newman founded The Career Mum, a support group on Facebook for working parents. The idea for the group was born after Amanda took redundancy from Shell where she had enjoyed a successful IT career spanning more than 20 years. During that time she had four children, including twin boys.

The Career Mum has just celebrated its first birthday and over the past 12 months the group has grown to more than 3,000 members across 60 countries.

In this episode, Amanda, who’s recently re-entered the corporate world at Microsoft, talks with Patricia about her career journey. She discusses the many challenges and decisions she’s had to face and why she’s so passionate about building a support network to empower working parents to reach their full potential.

Host: Patricia Keating
Guest: Amanda Newman, founder The Career Mum www.facebook.com/groups/TheCareerMum/
Listening Time: 24 minutes

Follow Tech Manchester:
Twitter: @tecmcr
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/techmanchester/
Or visit us at www.techmanchester.co.uk

Let us know what you'd like to hear to take your business forward. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review.

Growing up, Caroline Stevenson always had a million ideas whizzing around her head. Her enterprising activities began in the playground; at 12 years old she co-founded a Fairtrade initiative and by the time she was 18, Caroline was running an import/export business on eBay.

However, she was so moved by the plight of homeless people that she decided she had to build a business for a good cause.

In 2015, at the age of 23, Caroline founded Foodinate, a sustainable meal-for-meal programme. Today Foodinate is partnered with restaurants throughout the UK and has served more than 50,000 meals to the homeless.

In this open and honest conversation, Caroline speaks with Patricia about how she built an impactful business – from receiving investment to getting to grips with technology and battling burnout to hitting momentous milestones. She shares her story and offers plenty of advice to others looking to make a difference.

Host: Patricia Keating
Guest: Caroline Stevenson, founder of Foodinate - foodinate.co.uk/
Listening Time: 44 minutes

Follow Tech Manchester:
Twitter: @tecmcr
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/techmanchester/
Or visit us at www.techmanchester.co.uk

Let us know what you'd like to hear to take your business forward. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review.

Branding is an essential part of your business. It’s much more than a logo or how your business is perceived externally. Successful companies have branding at the heart of their business, but how do you begin to create a brand that connects with people?

To answer that, Patricia is joined by Kristina McGuirk, marketing director at leading hosting and cloud firm UKFast.

They discuss:
- What a brand is and how to start building one
- How to find the personality of your brand
- What to think about when designing a logo
- The things to avoid when building your brand
- Why personal branding is important

Host: Patricia Keating
Guest: Kristina McGuirk
Listening Time: 26 minutes

Follow Tech Manchester:
Twitter: @tecmcr
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/techmanchester/
Or visit us at www.techmanchester.co.uk

Let us know what you'd like to hear to take your business forward. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review.

Marketing your business is a key ingredient for its success. You may have a fantastic product or service but without marketing, nobody will know about your business or what you are offering. However, if the idea of creating videos or writing blogs is bringing you out in a cold sweat there is help.

Karyn Bright is a marketing and communications consultant specialising in brand building and creating a digital identity.

During this discussion she debunks some of the common myths and misconceptions around marketing and shares her knowledge of how you can start getting your business noticed.

Host: Patricia Keating
Guest: Karyn Bright
Listening Time: 22 minutes

Follow Tech Manchester:
Twitter: @tecmcr
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/techmanchester/
Or visit us at www.techmanchester.co.uk

Richard Gregory is an influential figure on the UK Tech scene. He founded Latitude Digital Marketing and spent 12 years on the rollercoaster, building the business to a £59 million turnover; just twelve months later the business was in a tail spin.

Richard went on to become the director of Tech North, drawing on many of the lessons he learned at Latitude to drive the organisation forward and through its transformation to Tech Nation. He is also the driving force behind SASCon (Search, Analytics and Social Conference) and now divides his time between three exciting tech startups as a non-executive director.

In this honest interview, Richard shares his journey and the five key strategies he uses to drive a business forward. As Richard says, ‘any turkey can fly into a tornado, but what matters is what you learn when you dig deep’.

Host: Patricia Keating
Guest: Richard Gregory
Listening Time: 35 minutes

Follow Tech Manchester:
Twitter: @tecmcr
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/techmanchester/
Or visit us at www.techmanchester.co.uk

This is the brand new podcast from Tech Manchester, focusing on the challenges that keep you awake at night, whether you are a startup or looking to scale your business.

In this first episode BizzleIt, led by young entrepreneurs Jordan Ryan Madeley and Michael Lawes, share their journey from running their business from a pub to being gifted space in Tech Manchester's new accelerator space, FastForward.

Discover how collaborating with like-minded entrepreneurs is helping them to grow.

Host: Patricia Keating

Guests: Jordan Ryan Madeley and Michael Lawes, BizzleIt

Follow Tech Manchester:

Twitter: @tecmcr

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/techmanchester/

Or visit us at www.techmanchester.co.uk