I’m sure you have all had a great summer holiday despite the weather in Scotland! A good time to update you all on the developments with BAWE Scotland the last six months.
Links with other women’s groups
Over summer I have been busy forging ahead with our networking connections with other Scottish business women’s groups and have made some great friends at both SWIB (Scottish Women in Business) in Glasgow and ASB (Association on Scottish Business Women). I have also met with the Chairman of the IOD (Institute of Directors) and we had a positive chat about female directors in Scotland. I am following up with other groups and will continue to do so in an effort to make sure we provide the best connections for all female entrepreneurs in Scotland. Every member of BAWE Scotland can attend 2 SWIB events at members rates and vice versa, and all BAWE Scotland members are now associate members of ASB so can attend their events at members rate all the time. BAWE Scotland paid this membership subscription on your behalf and they have names of our paid up members on file. Any problems with these arrangements or codes required then please email me at info@bawe-scotland.org We continue to offer support to WES (Womens Enterprise Scotland) and work with WeConnect International to distribute information on their events to our members.
Website
As this has been my domain alone and I am in the middle of the busiest time of year at Labels4Kids I am aware we are missing photos from our May and June meetings and I will get on to this as soon as I can. Both events were successful and interesting but numbers were down due to summer holidays starting for some before schools broke.
I am adding a members page to our website where those who wish to may have their details listed on the site and then this gives them some publicity for their business via our website.
We have added payment by card or paypal via the new bookings pages and this is working well with 9 people using it to book for the September event and some paying for more than one event ahead. The more that pay ahead of time for events the easier this makes it for the Treasurer and I to notify the venue of numbers. We encourage you to pay ahead for all events you know you can attend please. With a month’s notice cancellation would not be a problem if this should be required. Within the fortnight then it is not possible.
Rome Congress for FCEM (Femmes chefs d’Enterprises mondiales)
Currently 3 Scottish members and 2 UK members are attending the Rome congress November 19-23rd. Tanya Hine, Fiona Macdiarmid and I will all be attending. Others are considering it. Details are at www.fcemroma.org for those members wishing to attend. There is an early September deadline for discounted attendance and places are booking up fast. Louise Oliver (our UK President) and one other committee member are attending to date from London.
Emails
Alison Melville of Greig Melville HR has kindly devoted her staff time to update email listings and send out emails for us. I hope you are finding these updates useful as I have left the colour scheme more or less in her hands and they are doing a great job. Anything to go in an email then please send information to me at info@bawe-scotland.org and I will do my best to add relevant information into the newsletters. This way I can combine everything I want to get out to members, and your news where possible, and send an email ready to write up to Alison’s team. We are particularly keen to hear of your successes and expansion.
Next event
The afternoon tea event at Cromlix should be a nice relaxed entry to the new year for BAWE Scotland, post summer. Their afternoon teas are booked our for a full YEAR! Bad luck to those of you who cannot come along to try it. We have at least 5 new faces coming along so we are delighted to get to know you all more and tell you more about what we do. This is informal networking.
The following main event will be back at Hotel du Vin in Glasgow with our national President, Louise Oliver, coming to meet you all. Book early for this as it is booking up fast.
All then best with your work and family life!
Regards,
Ann-Maree