I take the view that what I do with this carcass of mine is my own affair so long as I do not actually do anyone else any harm. “In the beginning, like everyone else, I was convinced that this was a law and order issue, and that we had the resources to enforce our will and the law,” he said. When he retired last year, he was a senior member of the Greater Manchester Drugs Squad, one of the biggest in Britain. Mr Clarke strongly believes that the first step towards reforming our approach to the developing drugs problem should be to decriminalise the use of cannabis.

“You could save an absolute fortune in police time and money at a stroke, and that money could better spent on health awareness and education programmes,” said Mr Clarke, who lives near Oldham in Lancashire.
It was his experience on city streets that led to Mr Clarke’s change of attitude towards tackling the drug issue. For More than 20 years Detective Chief Inspector Ron Clarke was in the front line in what has become known as the war against drugs. The company calculated that his project would save it about pounds 12,000 this year.The project, which was awarded the top prize of pounds 1,000 in the Shell Technology Enterprise Programme (Step) that came to a climax this month, was one of more than 1,500 projects of this sort that took place over the summer.. According to the company he was “sharp and resourceful” with a business prowess that shone through and was widely admired. The task he was set centred on the ink stored at places in a factory producing flexible packaging materials.
Bringing a fresh approach to the work, he proposed forming a new relationship with the supplier of the ink under which management of the ink would be subcontracted with the result that there would be less waste and increased efficiency.In doing so, not only did he gain valuable work experience of the type that employers of all kinds are increasingly seeking, but he also made a significant impact on the company. Mr Jones, who is studying astrophysics at University College London, won the award while working for Clear View in Hornsey, London, on an eight- week placement in the summer.

But, as Mr Wombwell and his colleagues say, if you can sell something internally, selling it outside the company is easier.. Finding an innovative approach to dealing with five tons of ink has led to Christopher Jones, 21, winning the top prize in this year’s competition to win “The UK’s Most Enterprising Student”, writes Roger Trapp. Refinements have been sought to make the products as cost-effective as possible.But the trickiest task was winning over the executives who juggle various interests in spending a research and development budget of $1bn a year They are effectively 3M’s bankers, or venture capitalists With rigorous prioritisation, that is unlikely to change. The complexities of this market have also shown the company’s willingness to set up alliances and partnerships to achieve its goal.

“This approach has changed the basis of who our competitors are,” says Mr Wombwell. It began in the screens of overhead projectors, and has since been applied to a range of products, from nappy fasteners to computer mouse pads and, most recently, a new abrasive called Trizact, which takes the company back to its roots.In the fibre-optics case, the stakes are higher. If it succeeds the project stands to put 3M’s operation in Austin, Texas, on the map. Though now spread throughout the world, the $14bn turnover company is still largely associated with the first part of its original name – Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing.The Texas facility was set up in the 1980s as a deliberate attempt to stay close to the electronics customers in an area now known as Silicon Hills and also to diversify the workforce of the company by attracting – from colleges such as the University of Texas that specialise in high technology – recruits who were different from the mid-Westerners traditionally hired.Although the project is based in Texas it is a prime example of how 3M draws people from different operations around the world as required.

Such programmes – there are about 25, with another 25 identified – form part of the “Pacing Plus” initiative launched early last year to pep up the company’s innovative record after a sluggish period. To qualify, a technology should be felt capable of delivering hundreds of millions of dollars of sales as well as fundamentally alter the industries to which it is being applied.One of the most successful of these technologies is “microreplication”, a method of coating materials with raised surfaces. As Daen Wombwell, the Briton who as global development manager of the project is charged with making it happen, says: “If we only get 10 per cent of that it will be okay.”
But with the January launch approaching, it is clear there is little room for complacency. The project is under intense scrutiny from 3M executives, who were convinced by those working on it that it should be one of a few programmes allocated extra resources on account of their potential benefit to the company.