Dear Sir,

So what is missing from the Bermuda formula for businesses and individuals to further help and nurture the many existing initiatives that already exist to help to grow opportunities for all?

As a young businessman, Elmore Warren was one of the first to introduce me to some commonsense but truly relevant thinking. There are many ideas to consider. Again, I encourage input and discussion.

Here are some initial ideas related to yesterday’s list, including Elmore’s ideas, regarding how business people can immediately assist the “best opportunity for all” cause.

Ideas to help grow access to opportunities:

a, For those that have achieved financial and spiritual success in life, be willing to openly and regularly share life and career experiences and offer personal encouragement to individuals, schools and structured gatherings

b, Be a village elder. Be very willing to mentor others to enable them to follow in your footsteps or make new paths to success on their own

c, Require all management and all employees to provide certain number of hours per month to mentoring our next generations. Some companies already do this

d, Be willing to provide employee’s children with development support and structure to share your company’s employee and enterprise knowledge of how to progress. Maybe let children be the boss for a day to open their minds to what business and career opportunities looks like

e, Provide many more financial needs-based scholarships than merit-based scholarships for those that cannot afford a quality education

f, Enhance the activities of the small business development agencies with even more supportive bank lending practices and access to networking opportunities.

g, Offer very open and honest and continually “blunt” one on one mentoring conversations with employees regarding strengths, weaknesses and opportunities to help them to improve and grow as an individual and as an employee looking to progress

h, Be willing to nurture raw, upcoming talent to understand what is required to have the best chance of career success; ie, furthering education, engaging in communication, how to dress, attitude, manners

i, Get out of our comfort zone. Expand the sphere of inclusion and public accessibility

j, Open new horizons and dialogue with others. Invite raw talent to your home and business. Engage in meaningful discussion regarding business, economics, politics, religion and the implications of daily global developments

k, Host think-tanks and opportunity forums with networking

l, Explain how economic growth propels opportunities and leverage international talent more broadly, as this knowledge and experience is critical to Bermuda’s success

m, Possibly encourage our government to extend the school day, as they do in Japan, to enable every student the opportunity to complete a quality education, while providing the structured environment to learn until working parents return home from work

n, Business leaders may consider gathering collectively to provide regular input to the Government, suggesting ideas that will help to enable the growth of Bermuda’s opportunities and the meaningful jobs that result

In closing, more than ever opportunities need to be encouraged, found, developed, nurtured, grown and shared to help to grow Bermuda’s economy.

Business can be an important catalyst to further encourage the creation of meaningful opportunities for future generations.

Please consider engaging your company and peers by discussing what is possible and publicly offer further ideas and suggested actions.

BERMUDA BUSINESSMAN