It was like the first day back at school after the summer holidays. Our temporary residence is Hutton Cricket Club and as a result of the efforts of Paul Booth Scott Griffiths and Neil Bellham we were all ready to go complete with breakfast by 6:30 AM. We managed 20 members including 5 Baby Zoomers. We started in the dark but finished with bright sunshine and the meeting seemed to live up to everyone’s expectations which was perhaps inevitable given the length of the lockdown. If we get more members next week it will be tight on space but we can fit everyone in and it would be nice to engage more members in a real live meeting.
The Performance League
The figures so far this month were passed round by hand. No on screen viewing’s I have no idea who was top of the league this week but given the business that was passed at the end of the meeting there will be more people with more points jostling for position.
Education Presentation
Paul Dulieu was this week’s contributor and he picked up on the cricketing theme. A mind-numbing rehearsal of when you can be in and when you can be out softened us all up ready for an extended metaphor of how business mirrored sport that would have done Toby Acton proud. Come back Toby……please!!
The 60 Second Round
Sarah Steel was undaunted and kicked off proceedings as she was this week’s Oscar judge.
Jane Malyon’s theme was her hampers and she was able to pass round leaflets advertising these wares.
Mike Rogers was challenged to make mortgage finance interesting so he concentrated on interest rates.
Stuart Smallcombe once again was championing the benefits of VOIP and in a rather Big Brotherish sort of way explained how, if making telephone calls represents productivity it can monitor productivity.
William Verner declared that everyone needs to borrow whether you are rich or poor. It’s just that the richer you are the easier it is to cope with servicing loans. It was something of a shorthand explanation of capitalism.
Simon Essex brought more spider plants to the meeting than you could shake a stick at and invited donations for the SNAP charity and spider plants to be taken away. They were all separately named but you didn’t have to match the name to yours. A lot of spider plants found new homes.
Vincent Goode delivered his 60 seconds in French because he could. More impressive than this however was Stuart Smallcombe’ translation which seemed on the face of it to be a linguistic feat beyond compare. You couldn’t help but get the feeling however that this had been prearranged by the Mayor of Gants Hill Village who should seriously consider becoming mayor of one of the channel ports like Calais. It would do great things for Anglo-French relations which probably needs a Vince at the moment.
Colin O’Connor had been invited by Essex County Council to apply for a grant. He did and it was forthcoming. Its purpose is development training in his business.
Alan Moller appeared relieved to be delivering his 60 seconds from a location other than a van.
Paul Dulieu described his guidance of businesses through blogs and the written word generally, This amounted to guiding you as to who, what, where, why and how you present yourself.
Brian Painter was back from his hols in the Canary Islands looking bronzed but also looking for people with a fear of flying. This is something eminently curable by him.
Sarah Steel finally delivered her judgement on the offerings that had been placed before her and settled on Neil Bellham, if for no other reason than he produced an excellent breakfast, but also his description of the current business that is on his books. Armies march on their stomachs; Oscar adjudicators appear to be influenced by them.
This weeks statistics and points of note
Because we are actually exchanging paper at our live meeting Scott Griffiths had been performing mathematical calculations to enable him to declare that we passed 22 referrals and in excess of £17,000 worth of business. A good haul for our first meeting back.
£
0
+
Business Passed Between All Members This Week
0
Referral Opportunies Passed Between Members This Week
Membership Matters
Terry Maylin explained about the new questionnaire that has been created in order to deal with renewals and that we would be seeing this shortly.
Synergy Team Meeting
Paul Booth reported on the business to business synergy team meeting that took place on Tuesday and had an attendance of six members. Watch out for next week’s Business to Consumer synergy team meeting.
10-minute presentation by Scott Griffiths
Scott Griffiths used this 10 minutes slot to engage the members on how the new website that is to be designed will relate to them and their businesses. He received good feedback and it appeared to be a useful exercise from Scott’s point of view as he embarks on the redesign. Several references to videos bodes well for Mike Skinner.
Referrals & Testimonials
This is where the difference between the zoom meeting and the real live one is most pronounced. Scott made the most of the cramped conditions to run around energetically passing on peoples referrals and it re-emerged as the really important part of the meeting which is where it should be.
So great to be back at physical meetings once again and to properly meet many of our members for the first time.
Well done to Neil for providing a splendid breakfast, and I look forward to seeing you all again next week.
Just to echo Scotts comments it was great to be back and well done to him, Paul Booth and Neil who worked incredibly hard to make it happen.
looking forward to seeing even more faces next week and really getting to know those new members !
It was absolutely brilliant to be “in-person” again. Well done to everyone involved in pulling it together (especially Neil and Nephew for the breakfast!) and everyone who attended and made it such an excellent meeting.
Looking forward to next week already!
I had a great time, even though I was scolded for helping myself to the breakfast before the official announcement. Merci beaucoup to Stuart for helping translate the French to Estuary English. Fantastic to be back with you all (well most of you)
And so, I now know, you EXIST in person. Some were taller than I’d imagined (eg Aidan) and some not so….but it was grand to meet you in the flesh, m’dears! 😀
So good to be back in person. A wonderful ed slot that really bowled me over! Great ten minutes from Scott as well – he’s always the first on the team sheet to open the batting for any dev work we have – a real top-order player!
Ain’t it good to be back!
I echo with what everyone has said – it was great seeing everyone well mostly everyone in person, a big thank you to Neil and his nephew for breakfast. Great ed slot Paul (still don’t like cricket). and 10 minutes Scott. See you all next week.
I can’t say how good it was to be flesh pressing again so I won’t. Well done Paul the younger for explaining the intricacies of cricket and what about Jane the galleon for knowing that an incoming batsman can be deemed out if he does not arrive at the crease within two minutes! When we return to the Barnyard the cook will have to go some to top Neil’s brekker. Good ed slot Scott. More flesh pressing next week.
Great blog as always. And I have to say it was so good to be back to a face to face meeting. It was very well organised and if I wore a hat, I would take if off to the committee for doing such as great job. Special thanks too to Neil for the brilliant breakfast.
Sounds like a great meeting! Sorry I was not able to be there – looking forward to the next one!