Sporting legend Sir Clive Woodward to run interactive course to help UK tech start-ups

Former England Rugby player and coach Sir Clive Woodward will be kicking off his ‘DNA of a Champion’ virtual course for small businesses tomorrow.

The sporting legend and seasoned business adviser will teach a live and interactive training programme on team growth and development, designed to combat the current 95 per cent failure rate for tech startup businesses in the UK. 

The classes will run  ononline learning platform Sales Impact Academy – a subscription-based tool for sales and marketing professionals within tech start-up and scale-up companies.

Sir Clive hopes to flip the staggering start-up failure statistic by addressing the ‘critical knowledge crisis’ currently affecting those in market and sales roles in tech companies worldwide. 

Using his own experience as a formidable leader during his time as a player and a coach he promises to share how he supercharged his performance during both times with course participants. 

The skills he aims to share – whether applied to sports, marketing or sales – have proven effective in achieving maximum impact in any field.

The course, which starts on 8 September, is made up of six in-depth classes which will take a deep dive into the key characteristics of high performing teams and individuals, underpinned by tools and techniques to put these into practice. 

Course topics will touch on why talent alone is not enough, the importance of being a ‘sponge’, how to build that winning mindset and culture, and the key to tackling change.  

Sir Clive said: ‘We all have talent, we all have raw skill. That’s not to say we can all be Olympic champions – but we can all achieve our goals if we know where to start from and where to aim for.

‘Especially in this time of crisis, this course will help teams in the tech community realise their full potential and maximise their output.’ 

The Sales Impact Academy played a significant role in supporting the industry through the coronavirus crisis by offering free access to its services to any company or individual from April to May.

It also extended this access to anyone that was unemployed through to July.  

The ‘DNA of a Champion’ course adds to the 500+ classes a year already on offer from Sales Impact Academy and businesses can access it by subscribing to the platform.

The cost is £500 per month for start-ups and £1,000 per month for scale-ups. Benefits include unlimited access to hundreds of live classes, a resources library and access to the community.   

Paul Fifield, chief executive and co-founder of Sales Impact Academy, said: ‘We are very excited to have one on the best sporting minds in the country share his invaluable advice for being a leader under pressure. 

‘Learning from Sir Clive and putting his approaches to team building, performance and leadership into practice will help any company to survive and thrive’.