Past Events

THE "P's" OF BUSINESS

26 October 2006

Winchester Mansions Hotel

BWA Members went all out at the recent business market event to promote there businesses to fellow BWA members. It was a fantastic networking & promotional opportunity for all who got involved. The buss market was followed by a PR presentation by Jane Notten of Rothko International, which left all with interesting food for thought & great ideas for effective PR for 2007!

BWOYA Road Show Gloria Serobe

19 October 2006

BWA Committee Jenna Monk & Jane Notten

Gita Lison, Amanda Greef & Wiebke Lusted

Gloria networking with guests

Gloria with guests

Pam Golding, Gloria Serobe, Namane Magau & Ferose Oaten

PWC Guests

Lunch Raise Your Game

13 October 2006

Helderberg

Jenny Handley Guest speaker chatting to guests at lunch

Guest networking at Helderberg Lunch

Ferose Oaten, Jill Ritchie, Jenny Handley & Caren Willett

Ina Lopes& Joy Klein

Dollie Hanekom, Ester Buzidenhout & Kim Marr

Tumi Seatle & Elma Erasmus

Janit O Connor, Jill Ritchie, Caren Willett, Tracey Gordon & Jenny

Make the most of yourself

21 September 2006
Winchester Mansions Hotel

Guests at Presentation

Nina Joubert & Lauren Rush

Guest, Jane Shonfeld, Lauren Rush, Mandy & Wendy Brown & Ferose Oaten ( Chair)

INSIGHTS PERSONAL EFFECTIVENESS WORKSHOP

16 September 2006
Graduate School of Business

Sarah Legodi, Jenna Monk, Rene Bonzet & Cathy Clarke

Birgit Westermann- Winter, Melanie Bailes & Yvonne Finch (Facilitator from Insights)

All having fun at the workshop

Lydia Hendricks, Jane Notten , Gita Lison & Amanda Greef

Who is BWA

1 September 2006

Winchester Mansions

Best Hat Winners 2006

Guests at breakfast

J Monk & T Hugo

J Kilian & E Osmond

Ladies from PWC

G Lison & E Donovan

Cheryl, Angelo & Jenna

Networking with old & new members

E Osmond N Van Meurlen, A Black

S Spreeth & A Hoffmann (Pep stores)

The Hat ladies

N Johaardien & S Chilwan

Angelo of Winchester Mansions who donated the BEST SPRING HAT Prizes
-Prize giving of best hats

M Marx

Dealing with Men @work & in the Boardroom

18 August 2006
Encore Restaurant
Review by Deborah Flannery, PriceWaterHouse Coopers

Friday, 18 August saw me at my first Businesswomen's Association event entitled Dealing with Men @ work & in the boardroom and hosted at the Encore Restaurant on the Northlink College Campus in Bellville.

The title was intriguing and the speaker, Natalie Soine of Papillon Training, energetic and interactive with the audience. She started us off with a simple but effective practical demonstration of how you can do anything that you set your mind to. Her spin on the event was breaking through the perceived glass ceiling which some women feel holds them back in terms of their professional progress.

She shared with us her findings on what men look for in those individuals they wish to promote to leadership positions i.e. Focus, Authenticity, Courage, Empathy and Timing (FACET). The message to all us women is that these are not gender specific and the opportunities for us are there we just need to have confidence in ourselves and grab them. Not much was shared on the practical side of how women should "Deal with men at work & in the boardroom" but I think we all have our own experiences which we share with one another and handle in our own unique ways. All in all a worthwhile event and I look forward to attending future events.

C Rose & R Gluckman

C Wilett & M Doveton

M Stock & W Smith

Natalie Soine (Speaker) had guests in action from the start

Y Mohamed, P Lala & D Jaques

Guests at the Encore Restaurant enjoying their breakfast while networking before the presentation

Regional Business Achiever Winners Breakfast

27 July 2006
Winchester Mansions Hotel Sea Point
Caren Willet

It?s not often that you get to hear how people achieved their success, as not many want to share their secrets, but the four winning women did just that at the networking breakfast at Winchester Mansions in Seapoint.

All the speakers were absolutely dynamic and extremely inspirational and members attending were overheard saying that they could have listened all day. Susan Stelzner, winner of the Professional category, shared that ?taking people with you? and ?achieving the balance in life? to her, is success. Laurence Ata, winner of the Corporate category said ?see challenge as good and always stay true to yourself. Have integrity and remember that no one can make you inferior without your consent?. Sandy Roy, winner of the Entrepreneur category, told us that ?the feeling of accomplishment is the reward?. Jerushah Rangasami, winner of the Start-up category, said that ?people sustain you? and that we have to try, ?just do it?, in order to have a chance of succeeding.

Yvonne Finch, our National Vice-President, also gave us feedback about the Global Women?s Summit in Egypt, which she attended recently on behalf of the BWA. To have attended such a conference amongst the pyramids sounded absolutely fantastic. Yvonne stated that the one message that she needed to pass on, was the importance to brand yourself.

All in all, these pearls of wisdom were priceless and combined with the good company of all the women attending, the morning proved a great success. I certainly left feeling that much more enriched.

Guests enjoying breakfast

M Stock (Cliffe Dekker) & A Minaar, K Pettit & M Lefevre (Mortage SA)

Contact Personnel Team

R Bonzet (Northlink College), H Gartz (Business Partners) & Susan Stelzner (SHG)

R Maharaaji (JHB Mmeber visiting CT), S Nieuwenhuizen & E Erasmus (Wizard Cape Town City)

Business Speed Dating

23 June 2006
Graduate School of Business
Birgit Westermann-Winter, Managing Partner, People?s Dynamic Development-Cape

Ferose Oaten Chair ? keeping time for the 1minute speed dating connections

What struck me was the difference in approach, style, friendliness and overall philosophy of the BWA?s speed dating event!

I enjoyed the formalised / structured; yet relaxed proceedings provided by the BWA; giving me a chance to chat one-on-one with other like-minded businesswomen. I also enjoyed the fact that (although my voice pitch by the end of the session was slightly elevated) I was able to see and speak to just about everyone in the venue. I interacted with many individuals that I may have never otherwise had the chance to network with.

Getting face to face with a prospective client or partner is the only way you really know whether you can do business with them or not and conventional networking events can sometimes be very unproductive and perhaps even a waste of precious time / money. We tend to be drawn towards those we already know, never getting the opportunity to meet others who could be wonderful business contacts.

Even though there were some that I met, that could not directly relate to or benefit from my business, I was able to think about others that I know who would be a good contact for them, and vice versa ? that said, it will require follow up on my part.

Each ?date? lasted about one minute, and so I did not get stuck in a pointless, long conversation trying to figure out how to end it graciously and move on. It is inevitable for this to happen! At times, I would have liked a longer period to engage, but I made a point to meet with that individual at a later stage.

Being able to meet a fair number of business women at this event in the timeframe usually set aside for just one or two appointments meant that I could spend more of my time actually doing work that may earn revenue.

A potentially profitable contract, or the perfect company for the job you need done may sometimes be easier to land with an event like this - if you meet the right people, you just needed to get out there and let your ?date? know what you're looking for or what your company's strengths and offerings are.

Realistically, making a ?sale? at this event would be like winning the lotto for me! I was really hoping at minimum to start by building relationships. The thing is that real and sustainable business relationships cannot be forced right away, but like any other kind of relationship, needs time to build mutual trust and confidence.

I would not have otherwise met these businesswomen without this ?matchmaking? exercise and feel that I still benefited even if my meetings haven?t resulted in sales, yet!

It was a privilege to be part of such a vibey set of like-minded businesswomen! Thank you for all the efforts behind the scenes to orchestrate a meaningful event. It definitely has my vote for a repeat episode!

Business as usual with coffee & fab goodie bags filled with business contacts

Business Speed dating underway

Great Business Connections made

All Guests getting connected

Regional Business Achiever Awards 2006

14 June 2006

Holiday Inn, Cape Sun

Ferose Oaten, Dr Namane Magau & Corporate Finalists

Ferose Oaten, Dr Namane Magau & Entrepreneur Finalists

Ferose Oaten, Dr Namane Magau & Professional Finalists

Ferose Oaten, Dr Namane Magau & Start Up Finalists

Colour your mind

24 May 2006
Graduate School Of Business
Roz Messenger, Haw & Inglis

What I thought would be a ?fun? presentation, turned out to be a major thought provoking experience. The subject is far more complex than you think and needs a lot more in depth knowledge to apply appropriately. Nicole did a superb job of getting the message across, leaving one with the distinct feeling that you needed to know more.

The objectives are:

Develop an understanding of self and personal impact
Understand others and their communication needs
Learn how to adapt and connect to others and improve relationships and effectively influence

Awareness empowers us all. Nicole asked us to imagine every single person on earth standing on their own mountain. Everyone looks down or across at someone else. Each creates their own perception of the world as they see it. The opportunity is to get off your mountain and try to understand others. Try to ?hear? others - basically people want to be heard. What you are listening to? Every judgement made by an individual is conditioned to his personal type and every point of view is relative.

Four basic colours can be used to classify people:

Fiery Red, Earth Green, Cool Blue and Sunshine Yellow.

On GOOD DAYS some of the characteristics are:

Fiery Red ? Bold, demanding, determined, competitive, strong willed.
Earth Green ? Encouraging, caring, sharing, patient, relaxed.
Cool Blue ? Precise, formal, cautious, deliberate, questioning.
Sunshine Yellow ? Demonstrative, enthusiastic, persuasive, sociable, dynamic.

On BAD DAYS:

Fiery Red ? Driving, aggressive, controlling, overbearing, intolerant.
Earth Green ? Stubborn, plodding, reliant, docile, bland.
Cool Blue ? Cold, stuffy, reserved, indecisive, suspicious.
Sunshine Yellow ? Flamboyant, indecisive, excitable, frantic, hasty.

It?s necessary to figure out what percentage of each colour you?re made up of as well as the make-up of the people you?re dealing with. From these results you can see how you should handle others to optimize results.

Ways to handle people depending on their colour coding:
Do Don?t
Cool Blue Be well prepared & thorough
Put in writing Get too close or hug me
Be flippant Change my routine without notice

Earth Green Be patient & supportive
Slow down & work @ my pace Ask my opinion and give time for me to answer& take advantage of my good nature

Sunshine Yellow Be friendly
Entertaining, open & flexible Bore with details & Tie down
Expect to work alone

Fiery Red
Be direct & Focus on results
Be brief, be bright, be gone Hesitate or waffle
Focus on feelings

There are so many facets to describing each type. It?s not something to be taken lightly and just acted upon. A lot more knowledge is required to make an informed decision about how to ?colour code? the personalities of people but the benefits of this knowledge will give you an ?insight? of how to handle or manage people.

An excellent concept!

Ferose Oaten (CT Chair) welcoming guests to the event sponsored by Business Partners

F Solomon & R Arend

K Cluver & L Rust

S McGrath, A Fendakis H Gartz & M stock

T Ferrari, K Brower , M Poole & S Marais

Working women and healthy cooking plans

11 May 2006
Encore Restaurant Tygerberg
Roz Messenger, Haw & Inglis

Ina Paarman & Roz Messenger

What an absolute delight it was listening to Ina. She is an incredible person with a wonderful personality and adds such class to her talks.

How to balance making meals for your family and doing a hard day?s work was explained so simply. The interesting thing about Ina?s presentation is that her principles make perfect sense and can be applied to work and life in general as well and not only in the preparation of meals.

Here are but a few:

Relaxation - anything you tackle whilst stressed out will reflect your mood.
The use candles creates a relaxing atmosphere for dinners.
At work listening to the radio promotes relaxation.
Quality ? important in absolutely everything we do.
Involve the family by delegating odd jobs to everyone and convert the drudgery of preparing - meals to quality family time.
Make pretty pictures ? the nicer the food looks the more appetizing.
The more pleasing an office looks, the nicer it is to come to in the morning.
Plan ? if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.
One of the best tips I picked up from Ina was using the internet to shop for the basics like - cleaning materials and the like but shop more frequently at the stores for fresh seasonal groceries.
Pleasure ? enjoy what you?re doing!!
Equipment ? make sure your space is properly equipped.
Your working area, regardless of what you?re doing, must be set up to maximize space and for you to operate effectively and efficiently.
Understand the philosophy ? if you understand shortcuts, take them but don?t compromise on quality.
Professional ? what a revelation.
Approach cooking professionally!
Our meals would be a delight.
Amazing, if you approach everything in life in this manner then everything will be done, well, professionally.
The mind boggles ? what a great job will be done if more people tackled filing professionally.
Be adventurous ? don?t do the same thing over and over again.
Think of ways and means to make anything you?re doing more adventurous.
Remain excited ? how appropriate.
Someone else said don?t tolerate negative or neutral energy and remain exited about everything in life with positive energy.

An inspirational talk and ?food? for thought.

I Meyer, H Meyer & Ina Paarman

J Smorenburg, J Monk & M Inglis

R Retief & S Schmid

Rene Bonzet - Northlink College

Ina Paarman het op 11 Mei by die Encore Restaurant en konferensiesentrum van Northlink College in Welgelegen, Parow met die Tygerbergtak van BWA kom praat oor kosmaak in die dag van ?n besige sakevrou.

Haar vindingryke idees het groot byval gevind. Haar babas was baie allergies en sy moes dus noodgedwonge so gesond moontlik probeer kook. Die meeste van haar produkte wat op die winkelrakke beskikbaar is, het dus weinig of geen preserveermiddels in. Die Ina Paarman-reeks is baie gewild, soveel so dat hulle nou uitvoer na oorsese lande ook.

Haar resepte het deur die jare soveel aftrek gekry, dat sy tans ?n resepteboekie saam met haar produkte bemark. Lede kan gerus uitkyk vir die boekie ? julle sal nie spyt wees nie. Daar was ?n hele paar gelukkige prystrekkings waarvan Ina Paarman ?n groot hamper geskenk het. Die res van die geskenke was deur Northlink College geborg.

Business Speed Dating

20 May 2006
Winchester Mansions Hotel
Refqah Fataar, Refqah Fataar Attorneys

I cannot recall having had this much fun at another networking function! Maybe it's because I absolutely love what I do and enjoyed plugging my wonderful all-female team 50 times to a captive audience!! Over the last 9 years I have schmoozed at functions to promote my conveyancing practice but found that I only spoke to a handful of people per function. Often, you only chat to those in your own or related industry.

Through speed networking I met loads of amazing women I sometimes see but never get to speak to, for whatever reason. I made good contacts from various industries, many of whom I'll definitely be contacting shortly for the service they can provide to me, both professionally and personally. And hopefully my minute left a lasting impression on each of them! Well done, BWA. Hopefully the experience has not left Cheryl and Ferose with sore throats.

Guests getting ready to speed date their way through 50 business dates- the tension & buzz in the room was deafening!

Fair Trade Lunch

31 March 2006
Protea Hotel, Techno Park Stellenbosch
Elspeth Donovan (Committee member)

Fair Trade ? a solution for disadvantaged communities

Nicole-Marie Iresch the founder of Township Patterns gave an inspiring presentation on her business model and Fair Trade. She reflected her own experience growing up in Algeria and how she learnt then that the future of developing countries was in to ensure that ?we build together?. The business model is a perfect example of Social Entrepreneurship in action ??doing well by doing good?! This is a model of entrepreneurship that will work in an emerging market economy, contributing to development whilst also creating value. She stressed the fact that without the marketing arm of the business the initiative would have failed.

This a wonderful example of an NGO providing seed capital, technical support and business skills training to a cooperative of women in Khayelitsha who produce high quality goods which are turn marketed and sold by Township Patterns. Township Patterns CC is responsible for new product development, branding, marketing and sales, manage the supply chain are proudly South Africa and accredited by Fair Trade. The products are made from natural fibre, are bio-degradable and they have a township feel.
In 2001 the revenue was R1 million and in 2006 it will be R2.5 million.

Fair Trade is premised on five principles:
Solidarity ? not Charity
Direct ? no long supply chains
Fair ? to the people who make or grow the product
Transparent- willing to show who benefits from the sale
Qualitative ? high standards

Nicole- Marie shared with us what the in fact being a Fair Trade business just happened naturally and the lessons she has learnt in the 10 years of building this business are:

To believe in dreams, intuition and miracles
To deal with time differently
We belong to a bigger picture
Everything is possible

Nicole-Marie stressed the importance of considering more carefully what we are buy but acknowledged that the labeling of products in SA has a long way to go.

Jill Ritchie asked how BWA could help and Nicole-Marie without hesitation said:
?Teach the women in Khayelitsha to eat properly- their productivity is affected by poor eating habits!?

Nathi then told us about his experience with discovering Fair Trade on a trip to USA and an exciting initiative on 10th April to give publicity to growing Fair Trade in SA.

Thank you Nicole?Marie for sharing your miracle with us!

Personal & Professional Balance

30 March 2006
Encore Resturaunt Tygerberg
Amelia Aucamp - Nedbank

What a wake-up call we all had again when Natalie Soine brought us back to the important things in our lives! 'What should we be doing that we're not doing now?'

The subject matter suggests a lot of food for thought, and I've had to make time to reflect on all this. We run around in over-drive all the time and never take time out to think about what it all means and whether we are really coping.

Natalie emphasised the fact that we have to have courage to have discipline. And this rings so true; having courage to actually say no from time to time and courage to stick to our personal schedules - not only the professional ones.

The calendar is a great aid to plan ahead, for both work and play. I will definitely implement this immediately.

Thanks Natalie, for waking us up again! We would surely like to have more presentations in future on topics such as this and also coping skills!

Ros Messenger, Rene Bonzet & Yvonne Finch

Natalie Soine (Guest Speaker) & Rosemary Gluckman

Guests networking after the presentation

Meet Businesswoman of the Year: Monhla Hlahla

24 March 2006
Winchester Mansions Hotel
Sally McGrath, Graaffs Trust

On Friday, 24 March, members and guests of the Cape Town Branch of the BWA were delighted to host Monhla Hlahla at a luncheon at Winchester Mansions in Sea Point. Monhla is the Chief Executive Officer of ACSA (Airports Company of SA), as well as holding a number of non-executive positions in other organisations.

During her address she emphasised that good leaders are inspiring to others and that an important part of their role is the empowerment of others rather than just leading the way. She also feels that those in leadership positions should teach others to be navigators and must always remain learners themselves. She says that solutions very often come from "ordinary people" not necessarily the "rocket scientists" that are held in awe!

It was so unfortunate that Monhla had to dash back to the airport (having flown to Cape Town from Zurich via Durban) as we all would have loved the opportunity to get to know her better.

ACSA Staff with Monhla Hlahla

Guests with Monhla

Zelda Mycroft, Chaeli Campaign, handing Certificate of Acknowledgement to the BWA for their contribution to the Chaeli Campaign in December 2005 to Ferose Oaten, Chairperson

Demystify the New BEE Codes

13 March 2006
Garduate School of Business
Gita Lison, Contact Personnel

Graeme Dorrington, Ownership Solutions Cape Town, certainly demystified and gave clarity the new BEE Codes to those 35 delegates attending his talk.

The codes have a major impact on SMME's and their BEE strategies. So it was most helpful to hear from an expert how to look and understand more clearly the new codes, and specifically what it can mean to you and your business. Graeme highlighted opportunities it can bring to a business venture. He gave us a detailed breakdown of the balanced scorecard and how to go about getting a rating.

The talk ended with many questions from the delegates, but we all left the session wishing it could go on for longer and a "little" wiser about the scorecard and its ratings.

Annual General Meeting

3 March 2006
Graduate School of Business
Jill Ritchie, Pappilon Press

This years Cape Town AGM was well attended with 60 delegates present, which is a real pat on the back for the outgoing committee under the leadership of Yvonne Finch?s chairmanship. AGM?s are traditionally considered boring & avoided. Business matters were dealt with professionally & constitutionally.

Sunny Stout Rostron delivered a lively and energetic talk on networking and shared numerous tips in her effervescent manner. Delegates participated in a few fun exercises and rapidly acquired new friends and business contacts.

Mercifully the now notorious Western Cape electricity saga spared us (Sunny had the foresight to bring along a torch) and we were able to have a ?Normal? evening!

It was most touching to receive a gift of a flowerpot, complete with soil and seeds from the Chaeli Campaign our fundraising projects beneficiary for the last year. A cheque of R 22 300.00 was handed to Chaeli & Zelda Mycroft at the function.

Yvonne Finch Chaeli Mycroft & Zelda Mycroft receiving cheque for R 22 300.00 from money raised at BWA End of year lunch 2005, for the Chaeli campaign

It was also most heartening to have Pria Pundit & Diane Smith from the Graduate School of Business MBA facility present. They are this years recipients of the BWA bursary and they each received R 8 000.00 towards their studies.

Ferose Oaten (new Chair), Yvonne Finch (outgoing chair) & Truida Prekel handing Yvonne a plaque commemorating her contribution to the grow & development of the BWA & all women as Chair of CT

Members of the CT BWA at the AGM

National Budget Analysis

20 February 2006
Graduate School of Business
Tess Rodrigues, Property Factor

Nicky was fabulous and a very knowledgeable speaker. She communicated the budget analysis in a way that we all could understand and even when it was necessary to use economic jargon, she explained it in detail.

Ferose Oaten, Nicky Weimer & Sumaya Adams

One often wonders how the powers at be go about setting the budget and the reason behind the decisions they make. As Nicky unfolded & elaborated on the economic status of the country for the year 2005, we were given a better understanding of the why and how of how the budget is set. Her view on the economic future of the country after the budget also helped us identify possible opportunities and threats for the 2006 / 2007.

It was a brilliant presentation that anyone in business should not have missed! Thank you BWA and Nedbank for organising a great presentation!

Guests at luncheon

Guests at presentation

Managing your Caveman & Investment Portfolio

14 February 2006
The Graduate School of Business

Susan Stelzner, Yvonne Finch & Lele Mehlomakulu & Rene Bonzet

Yvonne Finch, Namane Magau, Jenny Handley & Ferose Oaten