Growing the Australian Economy

I attended the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Business Leaders Summit at Parliament House in Canberra this week and the hot topic was how to maintain the continuing record of growth into twenty nine plus years for Australia.

Is the UK Still an Attractive Location for Business?

I am often asked by people who pick up on my English accent about the UK’s decision to leave the the European Union and what it means for the country as a continuing base for operations in that part of the world. This blog attends to political issues and then moves onto business – please bear with me!

Doing Business in Hong Kong: Why Geopolitics Matters

One of the main elements to consider when moving into overseas markets is the geopolitics that surround a territory. For the most part, this is often background noise as the time scales that make any problems manifest are often counted in multiple years rather than months. Sometimes, though, there is the apocryphal frog in the […]

What I learnt from my biggest international mistake …

More than a decade ago, I made an international business mistake, which cost me dearly. I want to tell you about it. I was initially so embarrassed that I couldn’t talk about how I’d stuffed up. But with hindsight, I realise how much that mistake taught me, and I’d like to share the story with […]

Can little Aussie food companies really take the world by storm?

There has been a lot of talk about Australia becoming the “food bowl” of Asia over the last few years and the trade statistics indicate that Australia’s trade with the rest of the world in food products continues to increase. Take for example, wine sales, which increased in value by 11% in 2016, reflecting increasing […]

Overwhelmed by Your International Expansion?

As I work with business owners and executives who are expanding their companies internationally, I’ve found that most of them deal with similar challenges as the project ramps up: Competing priorities – with an international business starting to grow alongside the domestic one, there are suddenly lots more things to do and priorities start to […]

Why Expanding into International Markets Is Not a Crazy Idea (Part 3)

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It’s that time of the week again … blog time. This week, I’m concluding my three-part blog on why expanding into international markets isn’t a crazy idea. In Part One, we looked at key global trends which make now the best time in history to enter international markets. In Part Two, I outlined the three […]

Going Global? Don’t start without reading this…

You’ve just received an email from a department store in China, requesting a meeting to talk about purchasing a shipment of the fantastically snazzy new shoes that your start-up company released last quarter. You’ve only ever traded in your home market before, but as you contemplate jumping online and booking a plane ticket to Shangai, […]