Summer Party 2007, Soho
Yesterday I was invited by Oli Barrett to attend the Summer Party 2007 at the Chapel of the House of St Barnabas in Soho. The Party was hosted by seven like minded companies: Cognac, Cominded, Policy Unplugged, Connected Capital, Ian Moncrieff Macmillan, Freshminds and i-genius and was buzzing from the moment I arrived. The fact that there were free cocktails throughout the night wasn't bad either!
Oli fits the Malcolm Gladwell connector mould perfectly: he seems to know everyone and is a genuinely nice guy. In fact, he kindly introduced me to Jonathan Moules. Jonathan has been writing about UK business life for the Financial Times since October 2003 and edits the newspaper's Your Business page. I spoke to Jonathan about Mesh and our ambitions and he seemed genuinely interested. Unfortunately for me the heat emanating from the room (there were hundreds of people at this event) caused me to start perspiring so I was forced to make my excuses and move to the terrace area outside (obviously leaving with his contact details!).
On my way out in search of fresh air, I bumped into Freshminds Managing Director, Charlie Osmond. Charlie is an exceptionally talented entrepreneur. He co-founded Freshminds in August 2000 and in June 2003 Charlie was named the Business Link For London Entrepreneur of the Year. I managed to chat to him for awhile before he was whisked away by a sea of admirers.
Towards, the end of the night I met Andy Lopata, the former Managing Director of Business Referral Exchange, one of the UK's leading referral-focused networking groups. Andy and I had met previously at a Make Your Mark Connectors evening. He is a seriously busy guy and in addition to his numerous speaking engagements and work as a consultant has set up an online network, Word of Mouse, that aims to become the pre-eminent platform for online business referrals. Andy and I are meeting for lunch later this month. At the very least, I'm looking forward to picking his experienced brain about Mesh.
I always leave these networking events completely shattered, but buzzing from all the great connections I've managed to make. I think there is often a temptation to run around and try to collect as many business cards as possible. That's wrong. The key, in my opinion, is to make a couple of really good connections and then spend time consolidating them afterwards. Now it's time to consolidate.
