So, you can imagine how thrilled I was to have the privilege of presenting the award for Most Innovative Company at the Cheshire & Warrington finals, Young Enterprise North West. And such talent – look out Richard Branson, look out Simon Cowell – Asra Shakoor and her board of directors at Open IT from Wilmslow High School will be hot on your tails.

The Young Enterprise Company Programme is all about young people learning ‘hands on’. Students set up and run their own company over the course of an academic year. They elect a board of directors amongst their peers, raise share capital and market and finance a product or service of their own choice. At the end of the year they liquidate the company and present a report and accounts.

On 6th May, Asra and her team – Ruth Woodhead (Marketing Director), Katy Taylor (Sales Director), Katie Wrainright ( Finance Director), Gearge Dixon (Ops Director), Brian McArlisse (IT Director) and Corinne Goode (HR Director) swept the board. I think I was as excited as they were.

Their product was a highly innovative IT training package for the 'silver surfer' marketplace.

They stood out from the rest with their product, brand, style , methodologies, creativity and innovation. Much more than just a product – a real culture ran through the veins of their company, right down to how they used colour and how they used psychometric profiling to analyse the strengths and weaknesses of the team when setting up. I was so, so impressed.

I wish them every success in June – their next hurdle before becoming world leaders!

Great work from a great bunch of young people.