29 Companies attended the March Network Meeting yesterday evening.

Our new agenda item entitled ‘Member Presentations – learn from your peers’ featured:

1. Fiona McGuire – Fiona McGuire Photography

2. Kevin Callaghan – Kevin Callaghan Construction

3. Oonagh Monahan – Alpha Omega Consultants

Each business owner presented their business, 1 improvement they have introduced and 1 challenge they are facing where other members suggesting ideas and possible solutions.

Some great ideas were shared both by the members presenting and those in attendance.

It is planned that this be a regular feature and we encourage members to get in touch if they wish to present. It is an opportunity to promote your business and get ideas and suggestions around the challenges you face in your business.

We also encourage members to sign up and contribute to the Network Group on LinkedIn.

Further notes from the meeting are available in the podcast below.

Leitrim Business Network Meetings in association with Leitrim County Enterprise Board take place on the first Tuesday of every month at 6pm in the The Ramada Lough Allen Hotel, Drumshanbo. All Leitrim based businesses are welcome.

November 3rd, 6pm.

Agenda:

6.00pm – Welcome – Member Introduction

6.10pm -”Health and Safety and the Self Employed Person – how it applies to you” with Geraldine McGovern of Safety Advice.

Geraldine will provide:

• information on what your requirements as a Self Employed Person and as an Employer of three or less Employees regarding health and safety are
• easy to understand steps on what you can do to effectively manage health and safety in the recession

Geraldine’s Profile:

Geraldine is a Chartered Safety and Health Practitioner and also an IRCA Registered OHS Auditor. Her Business is called Safety Wise Advice Services located just outside of Ballinamore. Safety Wise Advice Services provides Health and Safety Advice, Auditing and Training along with implementing Quality Assurance, Environmental and Health and Safety Systems which are compliant with ISO 9001, 14001 and OHSAS 18001 respectively. She has worked in her fields of expertise for over 8 years and has been Self Employed for almost 4 years. She is also the Secretary of the IOSH Ireland Branch North West District which organises a number of Free Seminars in the region on interesting health and safety related topics.

6.30pm – Sharing new ideas – Open Discussion

6.55pm – Update from Nicola – Leitrim County Enterprise Board

7.00pm – Networking – Tea/Coffee/Sandwiches

Details: Tuesday February 3rd, 6pm, The Ramada Hotel.

Attendance: Joe Lowe (LCEB), Johnny Beirne (Facilitor), Leon Quinn (Reverb Studios), Brian Timoney (Webforge) and Enda Madden (SaasTek).

Topics Discussed:

Joe updated the network on the National Broadband Scheme and a meeting between Leitrim County Development and The Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources.

Last year The County Development Board conducted a broadband survey and presented the findings to the department ensuring that as much as the county would be serviced by the national scheme.

Joe also discussed plans for a new IT Incubation Centre which will be based close to Leitrim County Enterprise Board offices in Carrick on Shannon. He encouraged members to look out for potential tenants for what will be a state-of-the-art centre suitable for technology based start-ups. The centre will also cater for companies who wish to avail of tele-work facilities allowing their locally based employees to work closer to home thus removing the need to commute to Dublin for example. More updates on this soon.

The Centre will also have a classroom type facility for people on Third Level Courses ran by Leitrim County Council.

All Leitirm ICT companies are invited to provide input into the design of this centre and its facilities.

Enda Madden brought our attention to the NCPP Fund.

A very positive discussion also took place about saving money through IT. Examples included using OpenOffice and Linux as opposed to paying for Microsoft products such as Microsoft Office. These are just some examples. All Leitrim businesses are encouraged to contact local IT experts and save money.

A “Meet the IT Experts” is being organised and details will follow.

Last week I met with Conor Daly of Travel Logic Limited and he is currently looking for 2 software developers for the Sligo office.

These are positions with a difference.

“The software developers will enter into a commercial relationship with IT Sligo, where they will be awarded student status that will allow them a tax-free salary.
At the end of the project, the students will be awarded a master’s degree from IT Sligo, without having to attend classes or sit exams. In addition to these roles, Travel Logic is seeking to recruit sales and marketing professionals to support its growth and expansion into the UK market.”

For more details, please click on the links below.

Irish Developer Network

Silicon Republic

Leitrim Business Network Meetings in association with Leitrim County Enterprise Board take place on the first Tuesday of every month at 6pm in the The Ramada Lough Allen Hotel, Drumshanbo

Next Meeting: Tuesday October 7th – 6pm SHARP.

Agenda:

6.00pm – Welcome – Member Introduction

6.05pm – Keynote Presentation – COST SAVING WITH ZOHO.COM (Details below)

6.30pm – Presentation Q&A

6.35pm – 3 cost saving ideas from 3 network members – 1 per member

6.40pm – Update from Nicola – Leitrim County Enterprise Board

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Keynote Presentation: COST SAVING WITH ZOHO.COM

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Speaker: Enda Madden – MD – SaasTek, Co. Leitrim

Today organisations have an opportunity to reduce their spend on IT by up to 80%. Developments in Cloud Computing and Software as a Service are eliminating the need to purchase and maintain expensive servers. Along with this the price of software is dramatically reduced allowing Small to Medium Enterprises to afford the type of software that until recently was only used by large corporations.

One of the implications is that companies can focus their IT budget on adding value. Reaching their customers, increasing sales and improving productivity.

Zoho is creating the most comprehensive suite of affordable, online collaborative productivity applications and business applications for companies. To date, Zoho has launched 20 different applications and more are in the works.

In this talk we will introduce Zoho CRM and Zoho Business. Demonstrate how businesses can use these tools and what are the advantages.

SaaSTek works at the cutting edge of where technology and business meet. With our clients we design, build, deploy and support systems that aid the flow of goods and services in our clients’ businesses. We were early adopters of Lean Principles in our delivery process and we help our clients tailor and adopt these practices in their businesses.

We work with businesses to;

* Significantly reduce their spend on IT infrastructure
* Eliminating waste from their current processes through better use of their existing technology or by employing new technology
* Removing bottlenecks in delivering value to their customers

18 businesses attended our July network meeting. Campbell Scott from IGOpeople.com gave an informative presentation on future trends in marketing on the Internet. He discussed how adverting alone does not realise the full potential of the “two-way” nature of the Internet. In essence, the future is “to to create a conversation with your customers”.

If you wish to receive the slides from this presentation or would like more information on IGOpeople.com, please email info@leitrimbusinessnetwork.com.

From Carol Quinlan of Blue Hills Consulting

Blue Hills Consulting would like to invite you to the launch of their new website and also to their revamped facilities at Carrick-on-Shannon.

We value the importance of the Internet and the Web to advice people on the work we are doing to provide the best service that we can to our Clients. Our web site allows you to look inside our business and see how we propose to keep ourselves at the edge.

So grab a tea/coffee, have a seat and take a few moments to join us in launching our new office and website.

Many thanks for your time.

Best of luck with the new site Carol.

Leitrim Association of People with Disabilities represented by chair-person, Mr.Tom Murphy won the overall Cathaoirleach’s award for 2008 in Cloone on Tuesday last.

Philip Martin from Cora Systems gave an honest and informative presentation our last weeks meeting.

He highlighted the importance of cash flow, netwroking and customer referrals. He also mentioned the benefits of using the services on offer from the County Enterprise Board, Enterprise Ireland & The Western Development Commission.

Again, I would like to thank Philip for his time.

As you may know, our network meetings now take place on the first Tuesday of the month from 6pm to 7pm.

Therefore, our next network meeting will take place on Tuesday July 1st in the The Ramada Lough Allen Hotel, Drumshanbo

Damien points out the ‘answers’ feature of LinkedIn that I haven’t got around to highlighting yet. It will be something we can use in the Network Experience Club which is something I will be introducing this week.