Author Archives: Sam Gemmell

Sam Gemmell

About Sam Gemmell

Sam Gemmell is Managing Director of The Cool Creative Company Ltd, a UK media production company, specialising in bespoke, high quality, creative digital media products. She is also a founding director of “e-sphere US – global learning solutions”, an Anglo American e-learning company based in Delray Beach, Florida. She is currently working with US partners to build an export business that helps people and organizations to realise their full potential through innovative interactive e-learning programs. “e-sphere (Europe) Ltd” has also been established in preparation for transferring the tested US partnership model across European cultures, borders and sectors. Sam has passion for small businesses, skills and enterprise. She has spent the last seven years advising the government on SME issues and has held a number of appointments. She is a former director of Investors in People (UK), was a board member of East Midlands Development Agency, holding the skills and business support portfolios, and an original member of the Small Business Council, set up to advice the Government on policy and strategy for small businesses. She has also sat on the National Employment Panel and chaired the European Spirit of Enterprise Awards judging panel.

Shared knowledge is power, but enthusiasm pulls the switch

Bikram Yoga, for those not familiar with forms of water torture, is a series of 26 yoga positions performed in a room heated to over 140 degrees F with extreme humidity.  I’m sitting in our office in Delray Beach, Fl, … Continue reading

Uncertainty is invevitable. Worrying is optional.

I have metal in both my ankles, the legacy of a misspent youth, and it set off the security scanner at Chicago International Airport. It’s not my first time, so I deliberately travel without pockets, flaunt my ankles to anyone … Continue reading

And now for something completely different

The first leg of my US export adventure is almost over. The Kellogg School Marketing Master Class has really inspired me, and it’s worth taking some time to let the learning simmer and distill. But for now, it’s time to shift … Continue reading

The lure of a good sandwich

I can’t leave this hallowed place of learning without bemoaning the lure of twenty-four hour snacking. The idea that you have to carb up to work out, academically speaking, has caused much international debate. Clutching his new paunch, one athletic … Continue reading

Champagne cocktails at the Penthouse

We’ve been let out of the Kellogg building! I was beginning to think I would spend a week in Chicago and never see this incredible city.  UKTI had arranged for all the marketing scholars to attend a champagne reception at … Continue reading

“The future of competition is collaboration”

Its been three days and I feel like I’ve been at the Kellogg Institute a month. I have fallen prey to the British Civil Servants’ art of the understatement. I was told it was intensive, advised to complete the reading … Continue reading

Marketing – Black Art or Cold Science?

This morning my email bing-bonged with an invitation to an East Midlands international trade seminar on, wait for it…”brand essence” –   this really made me chuckle… So what’s brand essence then – a magical mist that’s carried on international trade … Continue reading

Death and Taxes

We arrived at the Kellogg Institute late and tumbled into bed, jet-lagged and exhausted. I awoke to the sun rising over Lake Michigan and decided to walk the campus to get my bearings. The first thing that always strikes me … Continue reading

Caught between the moon and New York City

Well Iceland actually, on my way to Chicago. Its 30,000 feet and my fellow passengers are gently snoozing their way across the Atlantic. The business class flat bed is a wondrous invention, although for me it feels more like lying … Continue reading