Fraser Hurrell, Author at Whangarei Accountants - Elevate CA - Tax, Xero, Business Development, Accounting

The Art of Networking

This will be the last Business Owners Forum event for 2009 – and we have brought the date forward from the usual third Thursday of the month to avoid the worst (and the best!) of the silly season. The December Business Owners’ Forum will feature a panel discussion on “The Art of Networking”.

This event will be hosted at the ElevateCA offices on 3 December from 5:30pm (sharp) to 7:00pm.

As always with BOF events, discussion will be driven by those who attend on the night – and the panelists will keep things moving along quickly. This time we have three great panelists, and here’s what you can expect to be covered over the hour and a half:

Fraser Hurrell, a director of ElevateCA Limited will talk about his experience with using social media tools such as twitter, facebook and blogs to drive leads and sales. He has some good practical advice from the coalface on how to get results networking online without letting these tools become couterproductive and consume your time.

Geoff Grigg didn’t follow the more usual banker’s career path from the bottom up through the ranks – he joined the BNZ as a Business Relationship Manager without the benefit of a banking network built up over the years. Luckily Geoff’s past life as a Sales Manager meant that he knew exactly how to build his business network from scratch. Geoff will share some insights and practical tips from this journey.

Sarah Lochead-MacMillan, author of “The Naked Networker” says that entering a networking event for the first time can generate the equivalent feelings as attempting to socialise naked. She will give some tools and techniques to get past these feelings – and enable you to form and drive a sustainable network. *Spoiler: There will be no naked networking at this event*.

Format is casual over pizza, beer and wine – and Business Owners Forums are always lively events! These events are targeted to owners of businesses with $1 million turnover and more.

Business Owners Forums are supported by ElevateCA Limited, BNZ, The Bottom Line Expense Reduction, The ICEHOUSE and Webb Ross Lawyers.

The ethos of the Business Owners’ Forum supporters is to give back to the business communities which support us. In line with this ethos, Business Owners’ Forum events are always free of charge.

If you would like to be invited to this event, please contact ElevateCA.

Employment Issues

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Business Owners’ Forum at The ICEHOUSE yesterday. There was some quality discussion around employment issues from the panel and the participants. The panelists tonight were:

Paul Diver, a lawyer, employment specialist and HR Partner at the ICEHOUSE, who shared some of the latest and emerging legal issues relating to employment in New Zealand – particularly around bargaining and dismissal. Paul raised some interesting issues such as the risks of those “without prejudice” discussions with employees – and some of the pragmatic solutions to exiting certain employees.

Rebecca Brennan, a director of ElevateCA Limited, discussed some good practical strategies around performance management and performance measurement. Rebecca drove home the importance of communication and measurement, and got down to the real “how to” nuts and bolts of the subject. Rebecca’s presentation was packed full of useful content.

Michael Masterson, a former CEO of a large Asia Pacific contact centre, shared some practical and amusing anecdotes to make his points about keeping your team fully engaged in their work. He advocates what he calls the three f’s – fun, focus and fulfilment – in the workplace, and talked about leading from the front and the little things that make a huge difference.

As always, format was casual over pizza, beer and wine – and the event was attended by business owners who got plenty of tips and points to take away from the evening.

Business Owners Forums are supported by ElevateCA, The Bottom Line Expense Reduction, BNZ, The ICEHOUSE and Webb Ross Lawyers. The ethos of all the supporters is to give back to the business communities that support us, so these sessions are always free of charge and are open to business owners – particularly of businesses of $1m plus turnover. There is never a sell from the supporters – that’s not what these sessions are about at all.

Business Owners Forums are held monthly – alternating between Auckland and Whangarei venues.

If you would like to be invited to the next event, which is on 3 December at ElevateCA in Whangarei, fire us a quick email.

Fraser Hurrell is one of three directors of Elevate CA Limited, Chartered Accountants & Business Advisors in Whangarei, New Zealand.

Leave something on the table

Can one measure the skill of a negotiator based on what they leave – or don’t leave – on the table? I think so. The person who negotiates a deal extracting maximum value without leaving anything on the table is indeed a skilled negotiator, right? I’d say “wrong”. [Read more…]

Finland vs New Zealand

Here’s a question: What do New Zealand and Finland have in common? Both have a similar population. They are similar in size. Both have a single large city which accounts for a big chunk of the population – Helsinki is similar in size to Auckland with something over 1 million population. And neither Finland nor New Zealand is blessed with significant mineral riches. So what? [Read more…]

Employment Issues

The November Business Owners’ Forum will feature a panel discussion on employment issues. It will be hosted by The ICEHOUSE, Level 2, The Textile Centre, 117 to 125 St Georges Bay Road, Parnell – and will be held on 19 November from 5:30pm (sharp) to 7:00pm. As always with BOF events, discussion will ultimately be driven by those who attend on the night – and the panelists will keep discussions moving along quickly. We have three great panelists, and here’s what you can expect to be covered over the hour and a half:

Rebecca Brennan, a director of ElevateCA Limited will discuss the use of tools for performance management and performance measurement – and some great pragmatic ideas and concepts around getting the most from your team. Rebecca will get straight down to the “how to” nuts and bolts of the subject.

Michael Masterson, a former CEO of the largest contact centre in Australasia who took the business to over 6,500 staff in a short time. Michael has some humourous and pertinent insights from this experience – and is a great advocate of “leading from the front” in order to keep your team fully engaged.

Paul Diver, a lawyer, employment specialist and HR Partner at the ICEHOUSE, who will share some of the latest and emerging legal issues relating to employment in New Zealand. Paul is the Plastics Industry multi-employer collective agreement advocate – and also negotiates collective agreements for the Order of St John, Restaurant Brands, Chubb, Otis, DHL and United Group.

Format is casual over pizza, beer and wine – and Business Owners Forums are always rather lively events! These events are targeted to owners of businesses with $1 million turnover and more.

The ethos of ElevateCA Limited and the Business Owners’ Forum supporters is to give back to the business communities which support us. In line with this ethos, Business Owners’ Forum events are always free of charge.

If you would like to be invited to this event, please contact ElevateCA.