Nikki Hesford is an extraordinary businesswoman who has achieved a great deal in a short space of time. Nikki managed to make over £80,000 from savvy property investments with her student loans whilst bringing up her child as a single Mum.

Beryl Vertue set up Hartswood Films over 20 years ago and the company has been responsible for producing Sherlock, Men Behaving Badly and Coupling amongst many other TV hits.

Carly Read is an incredible business woman who retired in 2012 after building her third business to a turnover of £89 million.

Rosie Freshwater set up digital marketing agency Leapfrogg.co.uk, when she was pregnant, at the age of twenty-seven. The company has now grown into a thriving £1 million business.

Lara Morgan was born in Germany, raised in Hong Kong and educated in Scotland. She has a passion for business, in particular early stage business. Lara sold her 99% share of Pacific Direct for a life-changing £20 million in 2008, seventeen years after she had set up the company.Despite this success, she is still busy working for several small businesses – including Gate8 – and building Company Shortcuts into a business that will ‘change Britain in terms of its sales competence’. Most recently Kitbrix the best in triathlon organiser bags.
Lara is a straight-talking, intuitive, ballsy, self-made multi-millionaire, with a huge heart and a soft underbelly.

New Year is a good time to reflect, plan and perhaps employ some fresh thinking about your business. Are there areas in which you have become stuck? Nine times out of ten, all you need to do is go back to the basics and focus on getting them right.

Last month I went on a one-day conference with Michael Neill – creator of Supercoach and author of The Inside Out Revolution. He explained that by the end of the workshop we would either leave saying ‘thank you, that was helpful’, or feel ‘wow, that has had a real impact on me’, or possibly leave transformed, picturing the world in an entirely different way.

Aviatrix was recently invited to become the ‘female conscience’ of a hospitality business. We have been asked to help a well-known chain of bars give a female customer focus to the rebranding of their company.

Last week I returned from the Languedoc Roussillon region of France. Our family holiday was filled with some great moments as well as some challenging ones – particularly with my teenage daughter – and plenty of wine, cheese and sun!

Two nights ago I dreamt that I went running through the streets naked. Several fully dressed friends were with me, actively encouraging me to do it. Surprisingly my friends’ enthusiasm was not for a cheap laugh but because they felt that it would be good for me. Reflecting on the nightmare now, I can feel the deep discomfort of being exposed, having nowhere to hide and a pressure to carry on even though I really did not want to.

It is a well known fact that women love their cocktails and enjoy tapas but do you know why?

I understand that this is stating the blindingly obvious, however, very few articles written about the first female leader of our country regard her gender as being the key principle to her success as Prime Minister.