This morning, the winners of the “Face to Face” contest were told to get up early for breakfast and a seminar on Face to Face opportunities in London.
After getting four hours sleep at the beautiful Sofitel Hotel in Heathrow Airport, I showered, dressed and went downstairs to the conference. They had a full breakfast spread that was delicious. Following that, Simon Talling-Smith of British Airways, welcomed everyone and introduced Willie Walsch, CEO of British Airways.
After that, Digby, Lord Jones of Birmingham, UKTI Business Ambassador, spoke about doing business in London. He said, “if you want to do global business, London is the global hub!”
He stated some interesting facts as well, like:
- London is the 6th largest manufacturing country in the world
- 1/2 of every airbus is built in the UK
- the UK and the US have the best schools in the world — Harvard, Cambridge, Oxford, Yale, etc.
- every structure built for the 2012 olympics will be used for other things after the olympics are finished and London will keep these people employed.
Andrew Sherman, Esq. of Jones Day followed his presentation. He was a wonderful speaker and told the audience that if they live in New York, they didn’t have a domestic company. “If you live in Des Moines, you have a less domestic company,” he said.
Finally, Angelia Herrin of Harvard Business Review Group gave a report on findings from a study where they interviewed more than 2,000 people. HBR found that 95% of the people who do face to face meetings build stronger relationships and that in the next year, small business should invest in face to face meetings.
“78% of all small business should invest in current client relationships and 72% should invest in meeting new clients face to face,” she said.
When the event was over, I went upstairs to meet my husband, who took the red eye Delta flight. As I was walking up the stairs, he was there with his baggage.
“Ready to go to London?” he said.
I shook my head and away we went on the express train to Paddington Station. We checked into our hotel and headed over to Kai in Mayfair for lunch to meet two people from Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) London.
Tonight we’re meeting more EO’ers at Mews of Mayfair for drinks and then dinner…. More to follow….
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