Our guest speakers: Emma Jones, founder of Enterprise Nation (also co-founded Startup Britain) and Michael Jacobsen, co-founder of Dirty Dancing on Stage and serial entrepreneur.

Australian born serial entrepreneur Michael Jacobsen has started and sold numerous businesses during his entrepreneurial career which began aged 16 when he first traded on the stock market. The teen entrepreneur borrowed $20,000 from his uncle, invested in National Australia Bank shares and made a profit of $20k in the first six months. Possibly best known for having co-founded, owned and produced the theatrical production Dirty Dancing on Stage, the show grossed over $1 billion globally. Michael went on to co-found and successfully exit a $100M property company which undertakes investments in assets including Theatres, Entertainment Arenas, Convention Centres and Stadiums. Emma Jones: founded Techlocate that was sold only after 15 months to Tenon plc. In 2006 she launched Enterprise Nation as the home business website. The company has since expanded to become a small business community of over 75,000 people. In March 2011 Emma co-founded StartUp Britain, the national campaign to encourage more people to start a business and support existing businesses to grow. Over a period of 3 years, Emma led and managed the private sector campaign that facilitated mentoring, hosted Industry Weeks, toured the UK with entrepreneurs and experts, launched special projects such as PopUp Britain and had a critical role to play in record results of people becoming their own boss. In June 2012 Emma was awarded an MBE for Services to Enterprise. In August 2014 she was appointed Chair of Plotr.co.uk a digital careers platform to help young people discover their future.