Work for yourself, not on your own

There are many, many advantages to working from home: freedom from office politics, no daily commute and avoiding the interminable, Monday-morning meeting to name but three. But, it’s not all rosy. There are potential drawbacks and disadvantages too. The main drawback, particularly if you are a sociable person, is the possibility of feeling isolated and lonely. Working for yourself might mean not having a boss, but it can also mean not having any colleagues. If you share an office with somebody you don’t like, this probably seems like a very small price to pay for the freedom of being in charge of your own life, but you shouldn’t underestimate or discount the importance of the friendship and support you get from working with others. This is why we place so much importance on the concept of working for yourself but not by yourself, and organise regular events to bring Auditel franchisees together. Although these events usually have a business focus, they also provide important opportunities for our franchisees to catch up with the head office team, meet old friends and make new ones.

Two weeks ago, we held the September round of what we call Regional Meetings. These are mini-conferences held in three locations around the country to which all of our franchisees are invited four times a year. The agenda is designed to provide a mixture of industry updates, Auditel-specific news and developments, consultant-led workshops, plus plenty of opportunity to network and catch up with friends and colleagues. Among the new developments we launched at the September meetings, was a beta version of a mobile phone analysis component to the Auditel Business Management Toolkit. Consultants will be testing this on live cases over the next couple of months so final tweaks can be made before it goes live in November. Chris Howard of the insurance group SBJ UK brought his new colleague Howard Beddoe along to meet the troops and also introduce a new SME product designed to broaden the opportunities for Auditel consultants to service their clients’ insurance needs. Sylvia Hirst of energy brokerage company Powertel (UK) and Steve Darch from EDF were both on hand to give updates on the ever-changing energy market, while Auditel consultant Daryn Dodge gave a couple of presentations about bench-marking and selling new services. Useful and interesting as these presentations were, for most of our consultants the most valuable aspect of the day was the opportunity to network and socialise with friends and colleagues. From the head office/support team point of view, this is also invaluable. Feedback is so much easier to give and gather in face-to-face conversations and we love the opportunity to catch up with the network and hear all their news. It’s amazing what you find out over a drink in the bar before lunch!