Two years ago, I left the day job to become MD@FWL on a full-time basis. Straight away, I joined BNI. Having been in either education, research and/or management my entire life, I had no idea about this networking/referral marketing thing…. However, it soon became clear that I took to it like a duck to water. It made sense to me.
What I also had not realised was that during the long period of time I volunteered for a charitable organisation, I had built up a vast network of contacts around the work. Even better, those contacts were more than happy to do me a favour once in a while. So, we need a letter delivered in Boston, Massachusetts? No problem….! Or we need some research Down Under…. the Australian FWL Office is on hand to help. A potential beneficiary emigrates to Venezuela…. not to worry! We’ll find them! That’s what we do at FWL. The small matter of hundreds/thousands of miles/kilometres and a language barrier won’t stop us.
When I joined BNI, I attended a few of the training sessions offered and at one of them, we talked about inviting visitors to your Chapter. The question was asked: How wide is your network? We all (according to the trainer) know hundreds of business people who we could invite along to our breakfast meeting …. well, I know thousands but not very many of them live and work in shooting distance of my Chapter!
My network grew organically and certainly wasn’t developed to help me in my (now) line of work. I never imagined I would be able to follow my dream and do this full-time. When I left the day job, I think my colleagues were a little concerned that I might just have lost my sanity and they probably hoped that there would be a facility out there to help me at some point – in their eyes, in the near rather than distant future. Not so…. The network has expanded – through BNI and 4N as well as various other genealogical networks – and I cannot quite fathom how we are where we are today.
Thanks for all the support. That thanks goes out to all the FWL Team, FWL Friends & Family (many long suffering!) and all the FWL supporters…. worldwide.
