Archive for the ‘Tricks of the Trade’ Category

Change

Monday, February 1st, 2010

Today we hear from Master business coach, Ray Hutchin of Action Coach www.actioncoaching.com.  Ray is a regular guest blogger for us here and we are really looking forward to his words of wisdom at the forthcoming WPE ‘10.

Over to Ray:

I have just finished presenting a two day workshop for business owners, packed with great practical ideas to grow their businesses and a big learning for me from the attendees was, as usual, they will struggle to find the time to plan and put the new ideas into action (their words not mine).

Which is a huge shame as we all need to change, otherwise, as you know, if we keep on doing the same things we keep on getting the same results (if we are lucky, because now quiet often you don’t even get the same results, they tend to be worse).

I believe planning also has a big part to play in changing, I have spoken about planning before; check out the July Archive which covers the 9 Steps to Success. I will also be running through this at the Annual UKAWP Wedding Planning Excellence seminar http://www.wpe.ukawp.com/, with lots of practical advice and a fun exercise to lock in your learning’s, so don’t miss this event.

I also know that Bernadette has covered the importance of time and using a default diary (March 2009 Archive), which if you haven’t read or implemented I suggest you go back and read.

For me the biggest thing we need to do to change is to have a compelling reason to change, otherwise things conspire against us. Like staying in your comfort zone, not being able to break old habits, not being able to create new habits, not have the motivation to change, finding change too hard and not persevering, etc.

So we need to take time out every once in a while to understand what we want to achieve, what we need to change and what desire (compelling reason) we have to do it. The compelling reason will always be tied back to an emotional reason, so understand this and you will achieve far more.

And one last question regarding change, “have you kept your New Year Resolutions or didn’t you set any, because you knew what would happen?”

We can all change, we just need to understand ourselves better and have a compelling reason to change. So for me three of the key ingredients to change are Planning, Time and a Compelling Reason. Try it and see what happens!

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Posted in Business Development, Life as a Planner, Tricks of the Trade, WPE 10 | No Comments »

Be Date Savvy

Monday, October 26th, 2009

As planners we know all about diary planning and avoiding or deliberating choosing weddings on bank holidays, Easter holidays and the like. However there is a big event in for 2010 and some of us planners might be blissfully unaware if football isn’t our thing.

11th June to 11th  July 2010 sees the World Cup Finals take place in South Africa and for many a potential wedding guest this might cause a few problems for the summer’s weddings. So if you’re planning any weddings during that month and, in particular when England are scheduled to play, then you  may have to consider providing a discreet TV for essential viewing!

Most matches are likely to kick-off around 7.30pm so hopefully shouldn’t cause any disruption during ceremonies but might be a factor for later in the evening. Be sure to check the official Fifa World Cup site for schedules and check dates when England would be playing if they get through to subsequent rounds also; now that would be amazing! And even if your bride and groom aren’t football fans, you can guarantee that a large proportion of their guests won’t feel that way and when World Cup fever takes hold it converts even the greatest cynic!

Thanks to  Jackson Gilmour for pointing this out in their communications and alerting us to this fact!

football

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Posted in Life as a Planner, Tricks of the Trade | 1 Comment »

The Flower Council Booklet

Monday, August 24th, 2009

Recently in our new Step by Step training course  we have been giving students a book from the Flower Council  , it has an alphabetical listing of flowers within it and most importantly includes an image of said flower. I particularly find this useful when trying to decipher florist proposals as I can visualize better what flowers they want to use.

Since using the book myself I have even begun to recognize some of the flowers making me more knowledgeable in meetings with florists and clients.

What additional industry booklets do you use?

The Flower Council

The Flower Council

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The value of your data

Friday, July 10th, 2009

I’ve been upgrading some IT equipment this week and it prompted me to write a post on, let’s face it, not the most exciting topic but a really essential one. I don’t know about you, but when my broadband is down, it feels like I’m totally useless and my business comes to a crashing halt.

 

Think then about what happens if your hard drive dies and you loose all your data. With every month and year in business we gain valuable contacts and data and spend time creating all sorts of proposals, documents, files and fact sheets; imagine if it’s gone in a flash. The prospect is truly terrifying and many business fail to recover if they have a major data loss or at least suffer some really bad results.

 

So what options are there for small planning businesses who don’t have the support of an IT department to sort this for them? Whilst I claim to be no expert here are two options to consider if you haven’t already:

 

Online back up – companies such as  http://www.datalifeline.net/ provide online  off-site back up in their offices such that if your computer fails they can retrieve data for you remotely; you can set it to back up overnight and it happens automatically via the internet. This is of course also good if your computer is stolen, subject to flood, fire or other damage. With this company you choose which of your files you wish to back up and are basically charged on the volume of space that you purchase. Exact prices vary but can be around the £150-£300 mark per year.

 

External Desktop Hard Drive – available from all good IT stores and allows you to save your data onto a separate unit on a regular basis. You have to manually back up the data yourself but it literally takes 5 minutes in my case and I aim to do it once per week. The downside of course is that the external hard drive itself could be stolen, subject to fire or damage in the same way as the main computer so it’s worth storing it in a different location if you can to minimise the risk. External Hard Drives seem to cost less than £100 and it’s a one-off cost.

 

Naturally there is no right solution for everyone but these are just two we thought worth sharing.

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Posted in Tricks of the Trade | 1 Comment »

What’s In Your Kit?

Friday, May 29th, 2009

Today we have a guest post by Andri Benson of Always Andri:

Having recently launched my company I have been working on my emergency kit and thinking about what I should include. I’ve already got a good kit from my theatre and film set work but I’ve been adapting it to be more suitable for weddings.

The other weekend while working on a wedding with a florist a funny thing happened that made me realise I might need to broaden what I put in it. It was a country wedding and we’d just finished dressing the village church and were heading off to go to the venue with plenty of time to spare before the wedding in the afternoon.  So we got back in to the car and needed to turn it around and decided to do U turn, big mistake, the car swung around we felt a big dip in the road, carried on the turn and then felt a bigger dip, this time the front tyre had got stuck in a ditch!!  After about 10 minutes of trying to get the car out a gentleman drove by who luckily had a tow rope in the back of his car. We got the car out and as we’d given ourselves plenty of time to get the venue, we left the church well before any guests turned up.

So as a city girl it’s never occurred to me that I might need a tow rope in my kit but as I hope to do more country weddings I think it’s something I’m definitely adding to the list. So what unusual item do you have in your kit and why?

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Spring is Here!

Thursday, April 23rd, 2009

This morning we have a guest post from Lester Gethings, associate member of the UKAWP and owner of No 10. Wedding Design and Management.

I can now say that Spring is here… I know this because the Cherry Blossom tree in my garden is in full flower! The clocks have gone forward the days are getting longer and everywhere you look Spring flowers have started to show themselves in all their glory. So after visiting New Covent Garden Flower Market at the weekend with a client and, seeing so many beautiful flowers I was inspired to write about what is available for weddings at this time of year. If you are having a Spring wedding either this year or next, its a truly inspiring time where flowers are concerned. I always advise my clients to choose seasonal flowers wherever possible and do this by using what I call my QVC method!!!

Quality. Any flowers grown in their natural season will always be of better quality and stronger than their greenhouse equivalents.

Value for money. Buying seasonal flowers is a cost effective way of maximising your flower budget, therefore more flower to the pound!

Celebrate by buying seasonal flowers. You can celebrate in the knowledge that you will be supporting British growers, who produce the most amazing range of beautiful flowers that haven’t been flown half way around the world and don’t cost the earth, literally!

Some of my Spring favourites include Tulips in every conceivable colour,


fragrant Hyacinths delicate Lily of the valley,
blowsy little Ranunculas
and heavily perfumed Stocks,
to name but a few…

For further inspiration why not take a trip to New Covent Garden Market which is open daily to the public.

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