Day 13 - January 13th - "I'd like to thank..."

This morning was our first BNI (Business Network International) meeting of the year. We were meant to meet last week but the snow put a stop to that. Our meeting starts at 6:45am so I was out attempting to de-ice the car at 6:20am....far too early and there was far too much ice! When I finally got going I realised how treacherous the roads were. The snow had started to thaw yesterday and it had rained but then went down to -5 over night so everywhere froze and Sheffield was covered in black ice. When I arrived at Sheffield United Football ground, where we have our meeting, their car park looked really clear...but I soon found out that it was a one pure sheet of ice! I managed to swerve into a space but then had the nightmare of making it down the car park to the meeting. There were moments when I was clinging onto cars just to keep upright. I've never experienced black ice quite like it. There were far to many accidents and I think the ambulance service had all their vehicles out all day.

The BNI meeting I go to is a networking group of 34 different business men and women which meet once a week. The aim of the meeting is to share with all the members about our businesses and then we work on finding referrals for each other. It has been a great way for my business to grow over the last 2 years and I have found that personal recommendations means a lot more to people. As part of the meeting we get 60 seconds each to tell the others about our business and what sort of work we would like people to find for us. We then vote for the best one of the week and they win the 60 second Oscar....this week I WON!!! I only get the Oscar for the week so I'm making the most of it! Now, need to go and write my speech.