Entrepreneur brings business know-how to UEL
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Published
01 October 2026
For Liam Keogh, the true test of entrepreneurship is less about the big idea than what happens next: working out the numbers, finding customers, and having the resilience to keep going.
Inspiration is easy and exciting. Working out how to pay for it all is where grit is necessary.
It is a very pragmatic lesson drawn from two decades of experience at the sharp end of business. Now Liam gets to share the pain and excitement of raw commerce as the University of East London’s first Entrepreneur in Residence.
Liam works with students, graduates and local entrepreneurs through the Royal Docks School of Business and Law’s growing start-up ecosystem, which includes a Business Incubator Programme, business boot camps and Help to Grow programme. He is also a visiting lecturer in marketing at UEL.
I feel very privileged to be so involved,” he said. “I’ve always been very passionate about encouraging other people to do entrepreneurship.”
From East London entrepreneur to UEL
Liam’s connections with both business and East London run deep. The Newham resident is a business leader, investor, and communications, marketing, and PR specialist. He has been a local entrepreneur for over 15 years before moving into consultancy and non-executive roles, supporting other entrepreneurs with their companies.
He has led communications strategies for hundreds of businesses, from start-ups that went on to change their industry, to charitable enterprises and multinational conglomerates behind the biggest brands in the world.
In 2023, he was named the “Outstanding Professional” of the PR industry by the Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA), and he has also been shortlisted as the “Consultancy Head of the Year” in the PRCA National Awards.
His relationship with UEL began more informally, through guest talks on subjects including marketing, finance and the realities of running a company. That involvement grew until he became Entrepreneur in Residence in September 2025.
"I’ve always viewed myself as having two sides to my professional life,” he said.
One is being a marketing specialist and the other is being an entrepreneur. As time has gone on, I’ve learned to understand that while I enjoy the marketing side of things, the bit that I love is the entrepreneurial side.”
Turning ideas into viable businesses
That experience is now being put to work across UEL’s Startup Gateway Services, which supports students, graduates and the local business community to start and sustain ventures.
The Business Incubator is free and open to students, alumni and local early-stage businesses, offering workshops, one-to-one mentoring, networking, workspace and opportunities to showcase business ideas. It has already worked with more than 95 participants across seven cohorts and provided more than 50 hours of mentoring.
The wider results include more than £540,000 in funding secured by participating businesses. Founder Elsie Ocran, of GGlow, credits Liam’s mentoring with helping her secure new trading outlets and giving her the confidence to pursue further expansion.
Liam particularly values UEL’s willingness to work with entrepreneurs at different stages and with very different ambitions.
“What’s really nice about UEL is it draws in people who are not just from the student body; they’re outside business people as well,” he said. “That adds to the richness of the programme and the opportunities to network and learn from each other.”
At one end, he works with people who may have little more than an idea; at the other, Help to Grow supports established businesses with employees and existing revenues. “I work with a lot of universities,” he added. “So I know that UEL does it well.”
Doing the boring stuff first
Liam knows what new entrepreneurs often want to talk about: launching, marketing, branding and pitching.
His job is sometimes to steer the conversation towards something rather less glamorous.
“I spend most of my time trying to explain to them that really you’ve got to do the boring stuff before you think about the exciting stuff,” he said. “The stuff they’re least interested in is probably finance, but that’s the thing that I really, really focus on with them as much as possible.”
His advice is grounded in experience rather than entrepreneurial mythology. A successful founder, he argues, does not necessarily need to create the next global tech giant.
Vaulting ambition is great, but not essential.
We’re trying to support people becoming entrepreneurs and sometimes being an entrepreneur might mean running a nail salon or a sandwich shop. Those can be great, brilliant, hugely profitable, long-term businesses; just look at Pret! It doesn’t just have to be some tech start-up that’s going to change the world.”
The qualities that matter most, he believes, are independence, self-belief and persistence.
“The thing that determines success as an entrepreneur is your ability to carry on when things go wrong,” he said. “When you run a business, essentially all you end up doing is just dealing with problems. Every day there’s a problem; you just have to fix it.”
Giving something back
Underlying Liam’s role is a strong belief that successful entrepreneurship has an impact far beyond the individual founder.
“Entrepreneurship is one of the greatest forces for good in the world. Entrepreneurs produce the businesses that employ people, give individuals purpose and a livelihood, and generate the wealth that supports the public services we all rely on,” he said.
That makes helping new founders succeed more than simply an exercise in business coaching.
The enjoyment I get from it is helping people who want to be entrepreneurs genuinely become entrepreneurs and then to start businesses that go on to benefit society.
It’s a really fulfilling, enjoyable thing to do. I love it. I’m really genuinely very fortunate that I get to do this as part of my professional life.”
Find out more about the Startup Gateway Services from the Royal Docks School of Business and Law.