While small businesses struggle to we are still doing our best to continue to grow.

Life in business hasn’t been an easy ride for myself, it all started from a passion & talent I had for Art in my younger years, where I’d spend endless hours drawing & painting. This continued in my Primary & Secondary School life where I’d always do well in Art. Next came one of the biggest decisions of my life – College!  The question was, is there an opportunity ‘to do something’ with Art. In the late 90’s it wasn’t common for an Asian lad to take up Art as his main subject in College, it was Business Studies, IT or something in a similar genre. Although my parents & my family fully supported me in choosing Art as my subject I was a bit worried as I wasn’t following the norm.

To cut the long story short I took up Graphic Design at University and did quite well, considering it was less than a year ago I first came across Photoshop & Illustrator (Graphic Design Packages).

Now came the big challenge… the big bad world of ‘Real Work’. Although I already had a part-time job as a junior Graphic Designer & free lancing too, I needed to find a full time job. I actually never saw my-self as someone that can commit long days working, as I felt my concentration levels use to wonder. So I opted to become a freelance Graphic Designer & before I knew I had a small office and was doing work for clients I didn’t know. Without even knowing I had entered the world of business.

It actually felt good knowing at the age of 23 I was a Business Owner. My company was born specialising in design for brand, print & web development. All of a sudden I was challenged to a whole new world I knew nothing. I ‘learnt on the job’ as it was & was enjoying life as a business man. For something that was outside my comfort zone, I was actually excelling at it. The journey continued, with countless barriers & positives, I changed as a person because of this, but 10 years later, I can honestly say that I am still as eager & enthusiastic to learn more, but at the same time privileged to help others.

It has been an experience with the ‘roller-coaster’ experience where we’ve expanded the company, with a Business Partner and personnel; we have a team of Designers & Web Developer, with my role changing to Business Developer. We have changed the initial business plan and have evolved with technology where we now concentrate on e-commerce, social media marketing alongside our original services. We are hoping to move into the mobile app development industry which shows the consistent growth of a business which started in my bedroom and then a makeshift office in a garage.

My role changing to Business Developer has given me the opportunity to attend a wider range of business related networking events, seminars & training sessions, where I’ve learnt new skills and tried to implement them to our company. I am more passionate about business now then when I started and love the fact that other small & medium businesses around our borough are blossoming, as it’s great for our economy and the overall persona of the towns we live in.

With the consistent development of Get Oldham Working, this is by far one of the most exciting time for Oldham, as a born & bread Oldhamer it’s an honour to be part of it. I love the fact that we get the opportunity to work with so many companies in around the Oldham/Manchester areas.

For the coming editions, I am privileged to be able to share stories of what I’ve learnt and still learning, the barriers I’ve come across and how I tackled them, the benefits and advantages of certain aspects of the business world alongside no doubt other business related topics.