Final Day

Today I fly home from my month long adventure to the States. The time has flown by and I have had a ball, met the most interesting people and have been warmly welcomed by all.

A massive thank you to all............

Thank you to The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust for giving me this opportunity http://www.wcmt.org.uk/

Thank you to Josephine & Charlie for making it the best trip.

Thank you to Karen, who is my children's March Mum for a month, the gift of this to us all is very special.

And thank you to all the lovely people over here and back home who have helped me with my travels.

My sincere gratitude to you all

Lou x

A Gathering of Interesting Women

The last event I attended was Monday evening, entitled as above. There were over 100 women there and I experienced a whole new concept in networking. This concept was created by Carolyn Fausnaugh who is a professor of Entrepreneurship at Florida Institute of Technology. I also had the pleasure of a brief meeting with Carolyn, what an amazing person. Thanks to Donn and Renee for organising this event and inviting me, Renee, can I clone you please? If you want to experience the new concept in networking then watch this space.................!

The lovely Donn and Renee!

Looking After Their Own

I took these photographs at Lake Eola, Orlando. Here there is a high level of respect for the military, whether in service or retired.

There is a funding and support mechanism for Veteran Military who wish to start and continue in business. I was privileged to be invited to a Vet Net Meeting where I met approximately 70 retired Military Business Owners.

It's all about attitude!

Girlie Stuff

Well even I enjoyed a couple of hours shopping at the Millenia Mall! I am one of a minority of females that I know that really do NOT like shopping. Even I was blown away by this. They have valet parking!!! And the photo on the right is for my daughters to prove that I will be bringing presents home and they are from Abercrombie & Fitch, and no they aren't paying to advertise here. Seriously, I mention them because whilst here I have been impressed by the level of customer service I am receiving. At the Washington Mutual Bank in Melbourne the teller remembered my name when I went in a second time to change travellers cheques!

However, the sales assistant in Abercrombie & Fitch took service to a whole new height. I was working out what sizes to buy for my daughters and she came over to help. She was approx an English size 8, the same as my daughters and offered to try the clothes on in order for me to determine sizes. Hey, we could learn alot from this attitude!

Talking of Attitude....................I went into Anthropology, amazing store, I could have spent a fortune in there. Lots of lovely house and gift stuff. It was whilst in there I remembered that the same store in New York was the inspiration behind the company 'Lello' setting up their first business. Lello is one of the businesses that has owners with a fabulous attitude featured in our book. I completely understand where the inspiration came from, thank goodness I can adorn my home in their goods over the internet! Not bad from someone who isn't into shopping x

Disney Entrepreneur Center

Wednesday was a trip to Downtown Orlando to meet Joshua and Jerry at the Disney Entrepreneur Center. The center has been open for only 6 years and houses all of the 'not for profit' business agencies to assist pre-start, start up, fledgling and established businesses. Jerry explained that it took a long time to etablish and knows that all the hard work was worth it. Jerry is responsible for attracting the mix of public and private funding that ensure the service exists. Disney being one of the private funders, prides itself in being able to help the business community of Orlando. The idea of having a true 'one stop shop' for business support in my opinion is invaluable as in England there are all sorts of agencies with different support packages available to help businesses and it's an absolute lottery as to whether the business finds them. Sometimes they are that hard to find that business owners give up trying as they are too busy running their businesses to spend the amount of time it takes to search.

I spend time updating myself with what support is available for businesses in the geographical areas in which our business 'Making It' operates and I find it difficult to keep up and it is the arena in which we work, so how the business owners feel, I don't know!

Here at the center, as a client makes an enquiry they are seen by the incredibly personable Joshua. Joshua will then establish their needs and refer them to the most applicable agency. Some businesses may be eligible for support with more than one agency. In this case after each intervention the business owner will meet again with Joshua who is the client interface and brokers the relationship. As everyone is in the same building there are shared facilities such as training and conference rooms, also shared is the receptionist Pam who clearly makes a difference on a daily basis and of course this benefits from shared costs.

There is also a charge made for some of the seminars on offer for business owners. Again in England there are so many publicly funded seminars that are 'free'. Of course they are not free, they are paid for by the taxpayer and unfortunately the fact that they are free devalues the service. Frequently the agencies that we supply trainers for have to book up to 35 people onto a seminar in order to achieve an attendance of 18-20.

For businesses that are high growth at the Disney Entrepreneur Center they are offered a volunteer board to assist them through the growth period at no cost. The volunteers are usually business owners that have successfully been through the programme themselves and are now more experienced and achieving a high turnover and good profitability. The nuturing of business in this way has proven to be invaluable for them.

A huge thank you to Jerry, Joshua and Pam for your time and hospitality, definitely a highlight of my trip!

Learn Something New

In response to the last posting re: the law of attraction I received an email from my sister Angela in Cheshire who has always had a passion for riding horses and she told me an interesting fact: The law of attraction is similar to what horses do naturally. If turned out in a field with a large herd of all breeds and colours they pair up with the ones most like themself.

On Tuesday evening I went to the Crowne Plaza Hotel which has an oceanfront restaurant, for a seminar on marketing with small business owners, Floridians certainly know how to do this in style! The evening began with networking, something most people hate to do. We were invited to be seated in a conference room with a main facilitator. We were given a time limit of 30 seconds each using a microphone to introduce ourselves to the 70 or so people that attended so that people could connect with someone they wanted to speak to and sit with over dinner, which was set up in the next room. I thought this was a good idea and taught you how to be succinct in explaining your business to others, although I wondered how people felt that didn't get invited. It reminded me of school PE lessons and the picking of the Netball and Hockey teams, where the same girls were always the last to be picked. I was always a softie and when I was Captain always picked these girls first, which is probably why we didn't win!

The dinner was lovely and the speakers were all local business owners who gave their own marketing tips and yet again that day I learnt a few new things, particularly how to market your products and services for nothing. The organisers have promised to email me the presentation slides so that I and anyone else who is interested can have those tips too.

My favourite thing I learnt that day was completely useless to me but cool! If you download google earth and want to look at certain places on the globe and you depress ctrl, alt A, then the cursor turns into a flight simulator. When I arrived home Charlie (who loves gadgets) and I spent ages flying to friends and families homes, it made us smile anyway!

Vibrant Woman's Conference

Firstly, Happy English Mothers Day. Feels odd not seeing my daughters and own Mum today. Luckily I'm able to share Josephine's Mum Beth, we will be taking her for dinner this evening.

The Vibrant Woman's Conference has been the working highlight of the trip so far. There were approx 300 women in attendance and 6 great speakers, my favourites were Sonia Ricotti and Monica Wofford.

Sonia a Canadian, came over to the audience as genuine and sincere and had a very interesting story to tell about her own life and how the Law of Attraction works for her. For those of you that haven't read the bestselling book or watched the film 'The Secret', the universal law of attraction of like attracts like is what it is all about. Sonia was inspired to write a book explaining the law of attraction in an 11 step, simple format after watching the film. Sonia went on to tell stories of the law of attraction working in all areas of hers and other peoples lives. A particularly poignant moment was the reading of a letter from Samantha which moved everyone present.

I read 'The Secret' myself approx 2 years ago and another Law of Attraction book, I have also read the Diana Cooper Universal Laws of Life book and I do believe in it as I have been amazed at the coincidences that have happened in my life and the lovely people I have met by chance that have made a difference to me particularly in the past 2 years. Of course I don't believe in chance or coincidence any more, simply that some stuff is just meant to be. Oh that sounds all a bit deep! Anyway, Sonia, thanks for signing my copy of your book, I have almost finished it!

Monica Wofford, by contrast has a group of 'contagious companies', her keynote was about contagious confidence. Interestingly, there were technical problems and Monica's microphone failed. Monica continued to bound around the room delivering her keynote absolutely brimming with confidence without a mike, she simply made large gestures and talked louder. The content of the keynote was pretty similar to the stuff Allison and I deliver on confidence and helped to validate the direction our business has taken. I also made a connection with the lovely Bernice, Monica's personal assistant, a fellow Brit from Oxford originally and who now lives in Orlando. Again I loved Monica's style of delivery and her sense of fun and her personality shone through. Thanks to Monica for the tips you gave me, signing your books and as discussed with Monica and Bernice, we would love to meet up in England soon. If we can work together all the better!

I have a whole array of books and CD's to read and listen to from yesterday, so I must dash and do just that, in the sunshine of course, sunny smiles Lou x

Speed Queens

Enough of the fun times! I spent the day yesterday looking into the technology required to deliver training sessions using the best technology available, even as a self confessed technophobe I found this really interesting. Back in England Allison (my business partner) and I are working on a couple of high volume training contracts and this information will be more than useful I'm sure!

Looking forward to the Vibrant Women's Conference at the Hilton Rialto tomorrow, meanwhile I will be sampling the delights of Melbourne this evening! Have a great weekend everyone Lou x

Florida Institute of Technology

Oh Happy Days

The show was amazing, the standard of the advanced students was high, of particular note was the elevation, strength and the fouettes were royal ballet standard! Working with this small company also showed me that dance unites people. I have been welcomed into the Viera dance community with open arms, I'm sure it helps being an ex dance teacher and having a shared love of dance.

The shuttle launch did happen on Sunday, people congregated on Satellite Beach to watch this spectacular sight, it's a shame the pictures of way less than David Bailey quality I know, aren't able to convey the noise and the atmosphere created.

Back to work! I am attending a seminar on Saturday and one of the speakers Monica Wofford has agreed to meet with me personally. For this alone I am already excited as Monica works alongside my own heroes of the training and personal development industry..........Steven Covey, Jack Canfield and Ken Blanchard and is a successful business woman in her own right. The local SBA (Small Business Administration) whose purpose is to help the start up and small business community is only a 25 min walk away from where I am staying, I went along last night and participated in a seminar which was delivered by a really inspirational guy Bill and again had some good ideas for the training that I deliver, I also survived the 'car dodge' on the walk home. No-one seems to walk here!

There is another story going on here too. My friend Karen is staying in my house as 'Mum for a Month' looking after my three daughters. This has caused much hilarity among her colleagues at work as Karen is a focussed and excellent business woman, Karen has brought her organisational skills to my home and is behaving like 'Supermum' from what I can gather, I have very big boots to fill when I arrive home! Karen is also great fun and has already thrown a party, rumours of my daughters getting tattoos and clubbing all night are all a joke, or so I hope! Anyway, poor Karen did have to deal with a ground floor sewage leak last week. I did feel guilty then, not guilty enough to not go Jet Skiing though!

a>Some good news too....... Josephine and Beth (her Mum) went into one of the large Barnes & Noble book stores to buy a copy of our book 'Making It' and it is sold out!!! I did sneak off to the beach for a couple of hours this morning too, when I checked my emails later our publishers have got us a translation deal, to translate 'Making It' into Russian.....................making money whilst on the beach, that is my idea of business!!! Happy Days to you all, Lou x

11 days in

Well it's 11 days since I arrived here and I can't believe how fast the time is going. I'm staying in Melbourne, Florida with my lifelong friend Josephine and her hubby Charlie, which is great in itself. I've met many of their fabulous friends and also spent time with Jo's Mum who lives nearby. So socially life out here is good.............we've been jetskiing, to the gym, out for dinner, to the beach and later I shall experience Ice Hockey for the first time, this is just at the weekend! I'm also hoping that the shuttle gets to go up on Sun/Mon as the first attempt was cancelled and we are near The Kennedy Space Center, so can view from the beach.



Now to the reason I came here 'entrepreneurship', everyone here is so helpful to me. I've been into the Florida Institute of Technology University which houses it's own Business Centre, also encompassing the WBC, Women's Business Centre. I've taken part in a course, met many likeminded entrepreneurs, had a meeting with the director..........who would like to do some work with us! That's me, business development to the end. I've got lots of meetings scheduled and a conference I'm booked onto with many people teaching lots of the subjects I do, so I'm sure I will learn a lot and have lots of ideas.



I've also met a lovely lady Bonnie who I will be interviewing next week, she's a busy lady right now as she owns her own creative industry, teaching the youth of Florida the joy of dance. Her school 'Viera Dance Conservatory', were at competitions last weekend........they won all the trophies available, and it is their recital tomorrow evening which I have a ticket for. I was also privileged to watch 5 hours of classes last week and noticed that the children are taught to take responsibility for themselves, also that there is no exam structure out here, although the technique is still superb, the emphasis is on performance. I'm looking forward to watching their evening performance tomorrow and experiencing it for myself. Bye for now Lou