Robert Ashton is a social entrepreneur, author and Quaker. Over the years he has set up a marketing agency, advised countless growing businesses, founded a social enterprise that provides apprenticeship training and successfully campaigned for the establishment of his local community foundation.
His books on starting and growing a business are accessible, practical and based on experience rather than theory. His presentation style is informal, inclusive and engaging. The stories he tells about the successful ventures he has worked with, and some of the tough lessons he learned along the way inform, inspire and help people see their own opportunity. He has also written a book about prejudice and another about homelessness and believes that everyone should have an equal chance in life.
In 2019 he took a year off to study, graduating from the University of East Anglia with a creative writing MA. His dissertation was the first three chapters of a book that explore how rural life continues to evolve. His research revealed that people are rediscovering a sense of community that had all but been lost over the past 60 years when we al became more mobile and supermarkets replaced village shops.
Climate change and the energy crisis are driving a return to ways our great grandparents would recognise. Robert enjoys helping groups see how the past is informing our future, helping group see their world a little differently.
Robert believes in leading by example and is currently seeking planning consent to build an earth sheltered, hugely energy efficient dwelling that will allow him to live without using any fossil fuels. Called Dial Corner, this new home will have south facing windows and thick walls that store warmth from the sun, releasing it back into the rooms at night. It will generate its own power from an array of solar panels and export the surplus onto the grid.
He lives in rural Norfolk with his wife of almost 40 years and a colony of feral cats.