This is my column that will feature in Saturday's Financial Times, which can be found in the entrepreneurship pages of the Money section. You can also find my columns on the FT web site here: http://www.ft.com/mikesouthon
Toby Perkins, the shadow business and enterprise minister, is one of those rare examples of a politician with genuine entrepreneurship credentials.
The rugby products business he created was not set up to be a global multinational, but had the very sensible objective to provide a revenue stream while enabling him to pursue his main ambition to build a career in Westminster.
So far Perkins has been successful in politics. He was the only Labour politician to win a seat from the Liberal Democrats in the last election and he has been able to quickly secure a significant job in Ed Miliband's shadow government team.
It is said that being an opposition politician is much more fun than actually being in government. There is the disappointment of being out of office, but once you have got over this your job is a relatively easy one, picking holes in government policy and latching onto any specific mistakes until you next find yourself in government again. Then, the process reverses, and the pressure starts.
I interviewed Perkins recently in front of an audience at the Business Startup Show in London, and there was one specific proposal he made, which resonated both with the audience and myself and was clearly being overlooked by the current administration: an initiative to help entrepreneurs and small businesses learn how to sell.
This idea is based on Perkins's own business experience. His first job was on the Youth Training Scheme, the programme created in 1980 to ease school leavers into the workplace, which led him into roles in the information technology sector and then recruitment sales. These two very competitive industries place great value on proper training in sales techniques, a key skill Perkins has since used various times, not least when he needed to persuade the voters of Chesterfield to elect him.
Sales is a basic skill and a fundamental element in any business career, not just entrepreneurship, which is why it is so sad it is not taught in schools. It is a very different story in countries like the US. It is often said that Americans learn how to sell at school via the simple device of "show and tell" sessions in the classroom.
I could not agree with Perkins more. My only role in every start-up was in frontline sales and I now spend a significant part of my time in explaining basic sales techniques to non-salespeople.
I can spend all day long inspiring people to start businesses, find mentors and build basic teams, but sooner or later the rubber hits the road and they have to ask real people for real money for their products and services. The most fundamental definition of a viable business idea is one where people will hand over real money.
So my suggestion for Perkins is that he extends the Labour Party's long-standing support for apprentices to include those who could be salespeople, and do what he can to promote the job title "sales apprentice" as a valued and respected epithet.
Tax breaks and incentives are useful tools, and these should be offered to those who provide sales training to entrepreneurs and small businesses. Those entrepreneurs who do sell successfully should be as cherished and rewarded.
This is not to suggest that I am looking to create a nation of extrovert, new business oriented salespeople like myself, often called "hunters". Just as valuable are those who deal with existing customers, looking for incremental revenue, often called "farmers", and the sales process itself needs to be carefully monitored by those known as "managers".
There is therefore a sales role for everyone in an organisation, regardless of their personal attributes, from the most assiduous networker, through more shy delivery people to those who are good with numbers and systems.
Every entrepreneurial venture needs at least one motivated, well-trained, and well-managed individual to explain clearly the benefits of the organisation's products and services; someone like Toby Perkins.
