Enterprising Solutions (Kirkintilloch)

Alex Smith is a management and personal development trainer with wide experience across the private, public and third (social economy and charity) sectors.

He has worked as a front-line public servant, in sales and in general management. His career included managing the Scottish area for Shell Livewire, the now international programme to assist young people to enter business for themselves. Alex had to manage a group of several hundred volunteer co-ordinators and advisors where he had to learn to lead people who were giving of their own time and for whom the usual "carrot and stick" approach by management was inappropriate.

After almost 10 years of helping others to form their own companies, in 1994 Alex formed Enterprise Solutions (Kirkintilloch) to gain greater control over his own working life. He is in demand as a facilitator in the areas of general management, sales and marketing, creativity and innovation and personal development and motivation.

As a former salesman, and authority in creative thinking techniques, he specialises in helping small businesses to find inexpensive ways of identifying and reaching potential customers. He has carried out several assignments to assist companies to identify their markets and the most appropriate ways of reaching them.

He has had two papers published, one on social entrepreneurship (with Robert Sullivan) and one on support for new and small businesses in areas of social deprivation. He is presently working on two further publications, one humorous and the other on creativity for small businesses. He has spoken at many conferences, most recently at the International Council for Small Business conference in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in June 2003.

In 1999 as part of the Scottish Executive's drive to increase the number of new businesses in Scotland, Alex became involved in the pilot of a new training programme for young people to increase/improve their entrepreneurial skills. Alex has taken the material and adapted it for use with a much wider audience, as a result of which he was invited to the University of West Georgia, Atlanta In April 2003 to train a group of business people and schoolteachers in using the material in the southern United States of America. He is also demand in Scotland as a trainer of trainers to use this programme.

Alex is a guest lecturer at the University of Paisley Business School on the MSc in Entrepreneurship programme and on the MBA programme. He has also lectured on the MSC in Entrepreneurial studies programme at the University of Glasgow Business School.

Alex specialises in motivation, leadership, sales, customer care and service, innovation and creativity.