Free Business Networking - Global Entrepreneurship Week

To celebrate Global Entrepreneurs Week 2025, we invite you to our free event.

FREE ✔️ Workshops ✔️ Speakers ✔️ Networking

Agenda:

10:00 Arrive and open networking

10:30 Welcome

10:35 Key Note Speaker - Ian Beighton, So What's Your Story

11:00 Workshop - Oliver Johnson, Oliver Johnson Coaching

11:30 Break

11:45 Speaker - Danielle Cudjoe-Michalski, Thinking Light Coach

12:10 Workshop - Anna Bates, Room 11 Coaching and Amy Fowles, Elev8

12:55 Wrap Up Meeting

13:00 End

Key Note Speaker - Ian Beighton, So What's Your Story

Oliver Johnson, Oliver Johnson Coaching - Workshop Facilitator

The Power of Listening: Why Great Business Starts with Hearing, Not Talking

In this practical and interactive 30-minute session, Oliver Johnson will show why listening is the most undervalued and most profitable skill in business. You will learn simple but powerful techniques such as mirroring, summarising, and labelling (inspired by Chris Voss’ tactical empathy) that instantly build trust and uncover what customers really need. Expect real-world examples, quick exercises, and tools you can use in your next conversation to create stronger relationships, win more opportunities, and make your clients feel truly heard.

Oliver Johnson, known as The Business Enabler, is a Business Coach, Sales Trainer, and Keynote Speaker with over 20 years’ experience helping SMEs and corporates grow, thrive, and succeed. After building and selling his own washroom services business, Oliver has gone on to coach and train sales teams across multiple sectors, blending psychology, practical frameworks, and field-tested strategies. He is also the 2025 Regional President of the Professional Speaking Association in Staffordshire.

Speaker - Danielle Cudjoe-Michalski, Thinking Light Coach

The Inclusive Entrepreneur: Communicating Effectively with Neurodivergent Clients

This 25-minute session equips entrepreneurs with practical, inclusive strategies to communicate more effectively with neurodivergent clients, including those with ADHD, Autism, Dyslexia and more. Discover how to reduce ghosting, improve clarity, and create stronger client relationships with simple, low-effort shifts. No jargon, just real talk, real examples, and real results.

Danielle Cudjoe-Michalski is a seasoned Project Manager, founder of Thinking Light Coach, and co-founder and former co-lead of the Neurodiversity Network (NDN) at GSK. She championed initiatives to empower neurodiverse employees and advance inclusion.

With 20 years of success in corporate STEM roles and lived experience as a neurodiverse individual, Danielle combines deep expertise with personal insight. As a certified coach, consultant, trainer, and TEDx speaker, she supports individuals and organisations in navigating the evolving neurodiversity landscape, offering practical strategies to create a neuro-inclusive culture and empower individuals to leverage their unique cognitive strengths.

Anna Bates and Amy Fowles - Workshop Facilitators

Shifting Unhelpful Behaviours into Positive Responses- Holding ourselves and others accountable

In business — and in life — we often slip into unhelpful patterns of behaviour without even realising it. In this interactive workshop, Anna Bates (Founder of Room 11 Coaching) and Amy Fowles (Education & Leadership Specialist) will guide you through two powerful models — the Drama Triangle and the Winner’s Triangle.

You’ll explore real-world scenarios, recognise your own default responses, and literally “step into” different perspectives as part of the session. Along the way, you’ll discover how these tools can help you stay accountable for your own actions and hold others accountable for theirs — kindly and with positive intent. Expect lively discussion, practical insights, and simple tools you can take back into your workplace to choose more helpful responses and improve how you communicate, lead, and collaborate.

Anna Bates – Sales Specialist & Transformational Coach

Anna Bates is an experienced coach, trainer, and business transformation specialist with more than 20 years’ expertise in leadership, sales, and performance development. As the Founder of Room 11 Coaching, she works with leaders, managers, and frontline teams to deliver measurable improvements in sales confidence, business growth, and team culture.

Anna is EMCC-accredited, PTLLS-qualified, and known for her ability to blend psychology-led coaching with structured training that equips people to think differently, sell brilliantly, and build cultures that thrive. Having scaled and exited a successful franchise herself, she brings real-world experience of leading teams, driving sales, and embedding cultural transformation.

Amy Fowles – Education & Leadership Specialist

Amy Fowles is an experienced educator and leader with over 15 years’ expertise in driving quality, progression, and culture across schools and training organisations. With a background as an Operations Director for a national training provider, Amy has led large-scale improvement projects, embedded compliance frameworks, and supported leadership teams to deliver sustainable results.

A skilled facilitator with a creative and people-focused approach, Amy specialises in helping individuals and teams unlock potential, strengthen collaboration, and lead with confidence. Her work bridges the worlds of education and business, bringing clarity, accountability, and a passion for developing people at every level.