News

30th April 2008 - The Biggie!

“Don’t ask me anything about business”, said Janet Street Porter as she arrived in Barnsley to speak at the Women in Business Event 2008.

The event, which brings together business women from all over South Yorkshire, was held in Barnsley at The Metrodome Complex yesterday.

Ms Street-Porter, a successful journalist and TV personality, took to the stage to deliver a speech to inspire women climbing their way up the career ladder.

Download the Podcast (right click this link and "save as" to save it to your computer) - Warning, contains strong language!

Podcast kindly provided by Talk With Rhythm.

 “I am here to give women one message: believe in yourself. There’s no such thing as luck. Everything is down to hard work. I hate the word luck, it makes me feel nauseous. You get what you work for, and women have to work for it twice as hard as men”.

“Unfortunately, business in the UK is a pyramid of power, with men at the top. Why? Doing business the male way usually means endless meetings that are not needed. We don’t want to do things the way men do. We’re better at multi-tasking and listening. We have so much more to offer that men don’t have. That’s the reason women set up businesses.”

Ms Street-Porter said that in Spain, half of the political cabinet is female.

“As much as we go on about modern ideas and moving forward, we’re stuck in a rut in this country. Until we get more women in Parliament and on councils, we’re not going to get anywhere”.

When asked who had been an inspiration to her throughout her 41-year media career, she said, “No-one. I inspired myself. I want to say to all of you; I’m 6 foot tall with big frilly teeth. If I can do it, so can you”.

She also had plenty of practical advice for her fellow business-women, taken from her new book, ‘Life’s Too F***ing Short’.

“When you wake up in the morning, instead of thinking ‘Why did I have that bottle of wine last night?’ or ‘How am I going to fit into those trousers?’, say to yourself ‘I am brilliant’. You have to believe in yourself, because nobody else will”.

Among the words of wisdom were a few snippets of more unorthodox advice.

“Always lie on your CV. Put down that you’ve got 10 A-Levels if that will get you the job. Who’s going to check that, anyway?”   

As former editor of The Independent and regular columnist for Marie Claire, she is famous for speaking her mind, and yesterday proved no exception.

Even her fellow celebrities did not escape criticism.

“There’s nobody else my age on TV really. There’s Joanna Lumley, who’s still telling people she’s younger than I am, which is not true. There’s Germaine Greer, who’s always cross, and then there’s Joan Bakewell, who’s a little bit ‘Saga’. And then there’s the men. Gordon Ramsay’s hair is a bit of a worry isn’t it? He always tells me I remind him of his mother. I think ‘I look amazing. Look at her’”.

Ms Street-Porter’s appearance was the focus of quite a few questions from the audience.

At 61, she is plastic surgery-free, and maintains a matter-of-fact attitude towards ageing.

“What you see is what you get. I’m never going to look like Demi Moore because I haven’t spent a quarter of a million quid sorting the backs of my knees out. I did go and see a plastic surgeon about having the bags under my eyes done, but he was so patronising and repulsive. I thought “You know what? For £7000, I could get my garden re-landscaped”.

Despite the feminist viewpoint, Ms Street-Porter has been married four times.

“I have a very short attention span. I call my first marriage ‘1A’. I’m the dumper rather than the dumpee if you know what I mean”.

However, she claims she will never marry again, as it’s “too embarrassing”, despite being with her current partner for 10 years.

“When you’re young, you go out thinking ‘Oooh, I’m going to meet Mr 70 percent’. Then, as you get older, you think ‘I’ll settle for Mr 20 percent who will shut up’”.

Being in South Yorkshire is nothing new to Janet, who took part in a reality TV programme last year where she had to work as a midwife at Barnsley District General Hospital. 

“It’s lovely to be back here. I do know Barnsley already, but thank God I had a map”. She added, “I hope nobody here had a baby delivered by me”.

The event is the biggest of its kind in the UK, last year attracting over 600 women from all over the country.

Last year’s event was held at Magna in Rotherham. Then, the guest speaker was Ruth Badger, runner-up in The Apprentice in 2006.

 Niky Brazier (CORR), Events Executive for the Barnsley and Rotherham Chamber of Commerce, said, “Janet was absolutely fantastic. Everybody here has really enjoyed it and we are hoping to continue the success of the Women in Business event next year in Doncaster or Sheffield”.    

By Sian Gregory