UNLESS you’re quite dull, the chances are that you’ve had a few bright ideas in your time. The skill is knowing which ones are worth fuelling and which ones aren’t.

The key to success is “fit”, according to Professor Barend van der Vorm, a professor of entrepreneurship at the International University of Monaco. “When people start thinking about doing their own thing the first question I ask is, ‘What fits for you?’ If it fits, it just feels right, you get a kick out of it, and rationally it makes sense to you,” he says.

You can research market niches and business opportunities all you like, but if it doesn’t spark some passion then you’re on to a loser. Van der Vorm says: “You can see the energy in their eyes and you know that person is going to do it no matter what.”

Entrepreneurs have a passion — often inspired by those close to them — which when coupled with a sound business idea drives them to succeed.

Sion Dafydd and Alwyn Thomas set up a design consult- ancy, Cynllun Kutchibok, after graduation: “A lot of the inspiration for the business came from wanting to retain our artistic freedom and be true to ourselves,” Dafydd says. He is deeply inspired by his family’s artistic history — his grandfather and mother were both artists — and his Welsh and Romany background: Cynllun is Welsh for design and Kutchibok is Romany for good luck.

Dafydd’s sources of inspiration are close to home, like those of Mayank Patel, the chairman and CEO of Currencies Direct. “My inspiration comes from successful people, in particular my father, who was a banker and businessman. He was a big driving force in my life.” As a futures and options trader in the City, Patel spotted a gap in the derivatives market to provide financial services to small and medium-sized businesses. “It was a gap I could identify with, it was understandable. It made perfect sense,” he says.

It is not just family who fan the flames of success, though, friends do too. Rebecca Jordan and Kirsty Weir set up GapWork Ltd, a website on gap-year jobs, in 1999 after Jordan spotted a hole in the market. “It was a meeting of minds. There was a chemistry. Without Kirsty I wouldn’t have done anything with the idea. She was the catalyst.” The two now run PDC Education, an educational publisher.

Philippa Dickenson, who set up the Thinking Partnership, a management consultancy, was inspired to turn her background as an MBA-holding McKinsey consultant into her own business after going on a course run by Nancy Kline, who wrote Time to Think. Dickenson says: “I was inspired by Nancy’s ideas and really interested in how I might apply her work. Her story was inspirational and she really held out a beacon for people knowing the answers to their own problems which struck a chord.”

Ideas or inspiration are not enough on their own, you need both to spark success.

BRIGHT SPARKS

MOST of us crave the excitement of a varied career, including a stint working for ourselves. How we do this varies: from entrepreneurs eager to exploit a niche in the market to freelance contractors taking charge of their working lives.

Over the coming weeks we will talk to entrepreneurs to learn about the skills you’ll need for an entrepreneurial future. This week we spoke to: the International University of Monaco (www.monaco.edu); Cynllun Kutchibok (www.kutchibok.co.uk); Currencies Direct (www.currenciesdirect.com); the Thinking Partnership (www.thethinkingpartnership.com); GapWork (www.gapwork.com ); the Make Your Mark campaign (www.starttalkingideas.org ); and Sainsbury’s Management Fellowship (www.smf.org.uk ).

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