Stuart Broad knows just how lonely owning a small business can be, so the England cricket legend is confident that Sage’s Small Business XI can transform that experience.
Along with former Nottinghamshire teammate Harry Gurney, Broad co-owns two pubs in the Midlands, which has given him an insight into the challenges faced by small business owners.
And that is the reason he was keen to partner up with Sage to launch the Sage Small Business XI competition, which offers a total of £50,000 in business grants to 10 small businesses across the UK.
Broad explained: “As a small business owner myself, I have a big interest in how other small businesses do. With the Small Business XI with Sage, what really appealed to me was how we could create a little community ourselves.
“I’m actually in the XI, it’s 10 other small businesses who can win a grant of £5,000, in and around the Hundred, they can win some prizes throughout that.
“For me, most importantly it was about coming together as a community, as an XI, helping to grow and sharing ideas. I have in my mind that we can be watching the cricket at the Hundred and say, ‘I’m just going through this little tricky patch at the moment, have you ever been through that?’
“Someone in charge of a small business might say I did that a couple of months ago; you need to do this or that.
“Ultimately as a small business owner, one thing that Harry and I found is that it can be quite hard to have different sounding boards. Which way do you go with that?
“If you can get 10 other business owners who you can create a sounding board off, and also you have the Sage experts, the insights, the information they can put together that is so unique, you don’t get that as a small business owner. It can be quite a lonely place.”
Broad brought the curtain down on his international career last summer, retiring as England’s second most capped Test cricketer of all time.
And having been used to listening to feedback and criticism during his sporting career, Broad believes that insight from this new venture could prove invaluable in his business life.
He added: “It’s about encouraging people to be open and honest and share things you are slightly doubtful about or don’t know about.
“That is what you get from sport, you get immediate feedback, from fans, teammates, the media, you are very open to information from analysts and people who work in stats because that can help you develop and get better.
“You train your mindset to soak in information all the time. Ultimately in sport, if you are not continuously getting better, you get left behind by the sport. The pace increases, the skill increases, and you’re gone.
“I think that is very similar in business. You can’t go into business too stubborn and too stuck in your ways because it’s always evolving. Technology is moving forward and that is why creating a team of small businesses to help you move forward is something that really appealed to me.”
International cricket legend Stuart Broad has teamed up with Sage, Official Insights Partner of The Hundred, to launch the Sage Small Business XI competition which offers ten small businesses a chance to win a share of £50k plus tickets to The Hundred Final. Enter now at sage.com/TheHundred
Featured Image Credit: Sage/Beat Media Group
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