Yesterday’s session in at Arden University Crossways campus in Birmingham was a good reminder of something simple:

Founders don’t learn by listening — they learn by doing.

Together with Ben McClure, MBA FRSA CMgr, we ran a speed networking session for student entrepreneurs as part of the Arden Enterprise Incubator.

We had 30+ students take part (and could have filled more seats), and within minutes the room shifted:

- conversations became real - ideas were tested out loud - people started finding potential collaborators - energy picked up quickly

What stood out wasn’t just the numbers — it was the quality of interaction.

When you give founders a simple structure and a bit of pressure (short time, new person every few minutes), something interesting happens: they stop overthinking and start communicating their ideas clearly.

That’s often the first real step in building anything.

A big part of what we’re building at Arden is moving away from purely theoretical entrepreneurship towards:

real conversations, real feedback, real momentum.