83% of business leaders have reported an increase in business resilience thanks to the positive impact of peer-to-peer support, according to new research from leading business support provider, BizSmart®.

The research, which surveyed business leaders who participate in BizSmart®’s dedicated ‘Flight Academy’ programme, also revealed that in spite of the challenging climate, participants had increased profits on average by 19% compared with the year before. This comes on the back of previous research showing 43% had more than doubled their turnover over the last three years.

Founded in 2012, BizSmart® is fast becoming the business support provider of choice, where its ‘Flight Academy’ programme has attracted thousands of business leaders since launch.

Developed to help business owners spread their wings through a rock solid, proven system for scaling up and building value, the programme is underpinned by educational resources and monthly peer-to-peer meetings or ‘smart boards’, which provide members with the opportunity to learn, network and grow.

Additional take outs from the research include:

• 100% of business leaders have increased confidence and leadership capacity as a result of the ‘Flight Academy’ programme
• 100% of business leaders have increased their goals and ambitions
• 100% have developed new or significantly improved processes
• 78% have developed new or significantly improved products or services

The research comes a year after BizSmart® became the first and only business support franchisor to receive full endorsement from the Scale-Up Institute – with the data provided to demonstrate the impact of its support programme.

Discussing the research, Kevin Brent, Founder and MD of BizSmart®, said: “The last few years have proven quite challenging for business leaders across the UK, including BizSmart® clients. So, in conducting this research, we not only wanted to provide the data to back up our position as leading business support provider, but to also demonstrate the positive impact both the Flight Academy and peer-to-peer working has had on hundreds of business leaders who have faced and continue to battle through adversity.

The team, our franchisees and I are all delighted with the results and believe this provides us with an excellent benchmark to build on, as we continue to help business leaders escape the owner-manager trap and drive scalable and profitable growth.”

With a clear objective to become the UK’s ‘go to’ business support provider, BizSmart® launched its own franchise model in November 2020 to give proven professionals the opportunity to establish their own business support offering under the BizSmart® umbrella. Since this time, BizSmart® Gloucestershire and BizSmart® Birmingham and Solihull have successfully launched, with additional franchisees due to be announced in coming months.