SME Focus: When government moves to stabilise the banking system were followed by yet more stock market gyrations this week, the supposed �Cool Hand Lukes� of the City looked ever more like headless chickens who were petrified by the risks they are paid a fortune to assess.

When government moves to stabilise the banking system were followed by yet more stock market gyrations this week, the supposed "Cool Hand Lukes" of the City looked ever more like headless chickens who were petrified by the risks they are paid a fortune to assess.

As the banking rescue left many executives who had failed so spectacularly to manage the risks entailed by their complex money market dealings in place, small and medium-sized businesses have plenty of reasons to give the plan a very guarded welcome. But, as this week's SME Focus shows, many smaller players have plenty of experience of succeeding despite unhelpful behaviour by lenders.

Name: Jamie Smith.

Age: 39

What is your business called? The Ice Factor.

Where is it based? Kinlochleven - between Glencoe and Fort William.

What does it produce, what services does it offer? We are home to the world's biggest indoor ice climbing walls and the UK's highest, state-of-the-art rock climbing walls.

We provide what we believe is top-quality guiding and instruction on our rock and ice walls, new outdoor adventure course and bespoke training and guided mountain courses. The core activities are supported by retail, coffee shop and bar bistro.

To whom does it sell? Climbers and mountaineers remain our core market, but over the last five years we have increasingly attracted visitors looking for a day with multiple activities. Last year, we had 138,000 recorded visitors.

What is its turnover? It's £3.8m.

How many employees? There are 38 permanent and up to 46 seasonal.

When was it formed? In 2003.

Why did you take the plunge? I'd planned a major mountain adventure centre years previously while in the Royal Air Force, but the catalyst was my daughter getting meningitis. I was spending my life on planes, trains and airports and was an absentee father. I wanted a business that could use all my skills, located in the Highlands which would allow me to be around my children as they grew.

After my daughter got meningitis, I thought "right, lets stop planning and make this happen".

What were you doing before you took the plunge? I was the youngest sales and marketing director in the British healthcare industry. I went through a traditional apprenticeship of life science degree, sales job, marketing job, MBA, training, management and finally into the boardroom.

I moved from corporate sector to start ups, I love the buzz and energy from entrepreneurs.

How did you raise the start-up funding? I got nowhere with my first series of discussions in Scotland, so I lobbied the EU for funding to help establish the business, as it was, and remains, a fragile economic environment.

Getting little progress, I went to Brussels and asked them to visit and see what we could do. The 38 commissioners attended and were impressed enough to provide over £600,000 in ERDF funding. I applied for National Lottery Funding but still had a major funding gap. My business partner and I secured Small Firms Loan Guarantee funding and provided over £638,000 in investment, which came from the sale of my home, boats, cars and other toys.

My wife and I worked very long hours for the first three years, for subsistence levels of pay.

What was your biggest break? When the full throes of the seasonality bit hard - in our first year - I secured a £100,000 contract for consultancy. Since then I've consulted on adventure projects, big and small, across the world. This has taken me from the north west of Lewis to South Island New Zealand, North America, Dubai and all across Europe.

What was your worst moment? We made a huge loss in the second year and could see a raft of aged creditors and little prospect of a major lift in sales. At the same time, our bank decided not to provide overdraft facilities.

My partner - Paul Hammond - and I used our credit cards, our personal overdrafts and any other source of personal cash to nurse us through that quarter. It was hair-raising stuff, but has instilled a very lean business model, which placed us really well for the future. We broke even in year three and have achieved profit in years four and five.

What do you most enjoy about running the business? The people, both customers and staff. On busy days the whole place is crammed and there is a palpable air of excitement and enjoyment.

What do you least enjoy?The vagaries of the tourism season. We have bucked the trend over the last five years and maintained a year round business, but it is painful watching your hard won revenues being eaten up in operating costs during the quiet months, when there can be more staff than customers.

What is your biggest bugbear? Hearing all the time about government and quango plans for increasing the value of tourism by 50% over the next decade. There is an almost total absence of joined up efforts in this regard, so you have passionate, committed and skilled operators eking out an existence with very little support.

In Vermont, to encourage year-round tourism business, the state dropped rates during the off-season months, encouraged preferential overdraft rates while at the same time providing direct funding to local marketing groups to get the most impact in their areas.

In the Highlands there are funds available, but the process of accessing them is highly bureaucratic and takes months, businesses need a rapid response. A government administered overdraft would be sufficient for most and would negate the unbelievable operating costs that many of the enterprise companies file each year.

The other key bugbear is the constant talk about encouraging entrepreneurship and innovation. If you compare our model in Scotland and the UK to the US, we are decades behind. In the US, I was able to secure $9m from investors in a couple of weeks. Their attitude is totally predicated on the execution of a great idea by a highly-skilled management team, likely to achieve first mover advantage or have barriers to entry.

They bought into the fact I'd made a completely novel type of business thrive in a Highland backwater with an excellent balance sheet: ergo I could achieve the same in major metropolitan areas in the states. US investors examine lots of proposals, but when they stick on one, they invest deeply.

The UK model could not be more different - where the pattern is invest the smallest amount of cash in return for a dominant position - this is exploitation. Television programmes like Dragons Den perpetuate this - where entrepreneurs are told to vest 50% in return for paltry amounts of money.

Our nation talks all the time about fostering entrepreneurship, but our banks, enterprise companies and even many of the small angel investment groups have an incredibly lazy attitude to new ideas.

What are your ambitions for the firm? We plan to open our second facility in Aviemore, and work has started in the US on our first major centre. We plan to have six facilities and then get acquired.

What are your five top priorities? Achieving revenue objectives and budget limitations; constant improvement of the business model to keep ahead of the curve; expansion of the concept to maintain first mover advantage; sell the business, get a new Aston Martin and a wagonload of cash and start something else; be a great daddy and husband.

What single thing would most help? A passionate, knowledgeable investment group, committed for the journey adding not just capital but expertise.

What could the Westminster and/or Scottish governments do that would help? Stop talking about entrepreneurship/innovation and start acting. Expand the Small Firms Loan Guarantee Scheme, replace some of the grant subsidies with overdraft facilities.

Replace the faceless quangos who administer hundreds of millions of public sector funds, with regional panels (these should be selected from Scottish Council Development and Industry, Chambers of Commerce, Fusion and Business Schools with proven track records) that operate as venture capitalists with public funding, providing not only cash but expertise and input.

This would provide a rock solid basis for future investment capital as funds come back into the chest from successful companies and would negate this begging bowl culture that successive governments insist on.

What was the most valuable lesson that you learned? Work in a team. Only one in four companies will make it, your chances of success increase enormously if you are part of a team of committed people.

How do you relax? Playing the guitar and singing songs about people hung for things they didn't really do ...

Jamie Smith won the Gleaner Oil and Gas Award for excellence in entrepreneurship in the recent SCDI Highlands & Islands business excellence awards