Chairman’s Blog Thursday 4th April 2013
Reasonable turnout, 25 members and one guest, Stewart Roberts for the second week.
March’s performance league was won by Kevin Brooks with 240 points. Well done to Kevin.
This weeks education slot was delivered by the man himself, David Plumley. He posed the question, “how well do we know each other?” And then drew our attention to all the ways in which we can get to know one another. 1-2-1’s and power groups are obvious ways of getting to know more about each other in detail but at the heart of things is the weekly reminder to everyone that is the 60 second round. It is a short period of time and David emphasised the importance of doing something different to draw people’s attention to precisely what you do. I was with him up to that point. It was when he suggested that we do a silly dance that I parted company with him…. fortunately nobody took him up on the suggestion in this particular 60 second round.
What particularly characterised this 60 second round was the request by Scott that we all give details of our birthdays so that anniversary greetings can be given in some way or another. So comfortable are we with each other that nobody seemed to mind giving their actual date of birth, although Brian Painter gave the year of his birth in Roman Numerals. Of course, they were in use at the time. Kevin Radford also gave the date of his conception….too much information!
So to the 60 second round itself. Michael Adelizzi, as Adrian Crossdale described it, gave us a virtual walk through in relation to the bathroom that he had recently installed for a customer who has a large dog. There seemed to be some correlation between this fact and the design requirements although I have to say I failed to fully understand the connection.
Jaimie Harrison had previously given her apologies for absence. So it seemed that we were to miss out upon being regaled with the ways in which the sun and wind could be turned into power. Nothing could have been further from the truth, up jumped Alan Shaw and promptly and magnanimously described a recent lecture he had attended upon the very subject of renewable energy; heat pumps and solar panels etc. He seemed to think they were a good thing! It just goes to show how, even with the best preparation, you can miss a fundamental point. David Plumley’s education slot, whilst very helpful in relation to the delivery of the 60 seconds, did not remind everybody to talk about their own business. He presumably thought it to be unnecessary.
Talking about knowing other people’s business, Nick Morgan explained about various processes including wrap-arounds. In recent weeks I have become something of an expert on this, boring my wife as we drive in the car on vehicles that I spy that have received this treatment.
Nick Cooke, resplendent with sun tan, declared he was glad to be back. Just when the people selling houses with dodgy foundations thought it was safe..!!
Dawn was somewhat coy about her precise age but declared that she had been 20 years “with” the print. I was sitting close enough to her to observe that her hands were remarkably clean under all the circumstances.
Two people had not been to bed from the previous night, Chris Sadler and Chris Holmes. They looked remarkably lively under all the circumstances although Kevin Radford severely tested their ability to stay awake with a long list of what we all should have been looking for to refer to him and an almost equally long list of the referrals that he had received from this list. He did retrieve matters somewhat with a little ditty at the end.
David Plumley brought a router with him and proceeded to play with it. A possible synergy was missed totally by Geoff Todd not turning up and therefore not being able to talk about a rooter from his end of the business world.
Ed Crocker who earlier had been inducted as our newest member gave hints of what was to come slogan wise. Deliveries, “same day, every day” and “I love Peat”…
As befitting a man whose age can be best appreciated in Roman Numerals, a hush came over the meeting when Brian Painter rose to his feet. He talked of reincarnation and a man in mortal fear of drowning who he regressed beyond his own birth to that of an ancestor who had died two hundred years ago from drowning. Maybe it’s the length of time that has passed since his own children were very young but my recollection, which is probably almost as dim, is that both of my children had a mortal fear of water. I assumed that this was normal with small grubby children, …perhaps I was wrong.
Suffice it to say that to Jason awarded the Oscar to Nick Morgan, not because he probably remembered all the various things that you can do with a vehicle by way of signage but more because of a declaration by Nick at the end of his 60 seconds that he had no friends. For a Bank Manager I did not have him down as such a soft touch.
The rest of this Blog might appear to be grounded more in fiction that fact, largely because it was at the end of the 60 second round that I had to depart leaving the meeting to the tender mercies of Scott the Web.
It was Jason’s 10 minutes and I was sorry that I missed it. It seems that if we are looking for names to coincide with their business Jason could qualify as Jason “Ping it” Nortey.
The stats from the referrals round were, 20 referrals and in excess of £11,000 worth of business passed and recorded.
The final good news story arising from the meeting is that Stewart Roberts expressed the urgent desire to join and all being well we should be in a position to welcome him into the fold next week.
Until then…..
I think just now and then I ought to be able to mention insurance in a sombre fashion without being labelled boring -i dont want to be labelled as not being specific about what referrals I want so i thought it better to get it over and done with in one go rather than have to talk about insurance each week – remember you cant have your Kayak and heat it
Yet another good meeting guys even after us all missing a couple of days work due to the Easter break.The numbers should be up next week.
With age memory tends to fade a little and so I find the blog very useful to remind what I said in my 60 seconds.
Assuming that the blog is strictly accurate I sometimes wonder if it safe to let me out every day.
Many thanks,
Brian.