Judging By The …What Do Judges Look For in Award Entries?

While getting to the second round in an awards scheme is certainly something to celebrate, knowing how to go about the next stage can be tricky. How best can you present your case to the panel? Which supplementary information should you take along? Which case studies or testimonials should you refer to? The list can seem endless. What would really help is a peak into the minds of the competition judges, to see inside their heads and find out what they believe constitutes a winning entry.

The Grampian Awards for Business Enterprise 2007 closed for entries on Friday 9 March. Judging of the finalists will take place on Wednesday 18 April and the panel will include Chris Travis, Chief Executive of Enterprise North East Trust (ENET), Stuart Heslop, Director of Commercial Banking Aberdeen at The Royal Bank of Scotland, Steve Cook, Chairman of ENET and Colin Donald, Director of Finance and Competitive Business, SE Grampian.

Chris Travis and Stuart Heslop provide some insights into what the judges look for in the finalists:

• Category awareness

"The key thing is firstly that they know the category criteria," says Chris. "For example, if you're entering the award for Business Growth, you should make sure that your company can demonstrate business growth."

• Down to Business

It then comes down to the business itself and the management team, according to Stuart. "We look at the strength of the team and the mix of skills present. We check to see if they have the right kind of people and/or skills in place, in terms of expertise from technical and commercial to sales and finance."

• Success rates

"We also look at the trading performance of the business and are keen to understand the business plan and future prospects," adds Chris. "One of the key aspects is that we are awarding successful businesses, or that we can see that their business model and pipeline of business will lead to them being successful in the future."

• Standing out from the crowd

An entry stands out by demonstrating that it is innovative and different and has a unique selling point, explains Stuart. "I would advise those entrants that reach the second stage of the awards process to make an effort to find out about the other two finalists and look at ways that they can differentiate themselves from them."

• Preparation is key

"The day of presentations, when the three finalists present their case to the judges, can be quite intense," comments Stuart. "They only have 30 minutes to present and if they over-run, they will be stopped. It's always obvious if they're not prepared and my advice to those who have entered more than one category at this stage would be to make sure they are telling the right story to the right people; in other words, they should talk about the innovative nature of the business for the Innovation category and the growth of the business for the Business Growth category."

"I think they could do well to think of the presentation as though they were pitching for funding, in a similar way to Dragon's Den," adds Chris. "This will give them more of an incentive to perform and really tell us why they should win an award, which is what we want to be hearing."

The awards ceremony will take place on 7^th June at Ardoe House Hotel, by Aberdeen.

The Business Gateway service in Grampian is delivered on behalf of Scottish Enterprise Grampian by Enterprise North East Trust. For more information telephone 01224 289725 or visit www.bgateway.com.

Picture caption: Chris Travis, Chief Executive of Enterprise North East Trust, gives the low down on what judges are looking for in entries for the Grampian Awards for Business Enterprise 2007.

Sally Wallis

Tricker PR

Tel 01224 646401

Fax 01224 646492

Email swallis@trickerpr.com