Working Women's Network Grenoble

Congratulations to the newly elected 2011-2012 Board of the WWNG:

• Mickey Farrance, President
• Franςoise Lerond, Vice President
• Michelle Onofrey, Secretary
• Mireille Derain, Treasurer
• Lotte Peeters, Programs Chair

We are pleased to welcome our brand-new Board member, Mireille Derain – who brings to the Board a fearless approach to accounting.

And on behalf of myself and the entire Board I’d like to say “thank you” to outgoing Board member Helen Perrin-Gouron, whose own fearless approach to accounting AND banking kept our accounts straight through the present (and even earned us a bit of interest!)

At the WWNG Annual General Meeting, we also did a bit of brainstorming about how to best use the money in our accounts for the most benefit of our membership.  The new Board will be meeting shortly to establish the association’s goals for the coming year (July 2011-June 2012). If you have a suggestion for a goal or objective for next year, or for anything you’d like to see our association do, please email us at wwngrenoble@gmail.com.

Note that we have 2 more social events planned through the summer (after our wonderful family picnic on 25 June!): an aperitif at La Table Rond on Friday 29 July, and a wellness day on Sunday 4 September.  I, and the new WWNG Board, hope to see you at one or more of them!

Happy networking,

Mickey Farrance

This past month the WWNG had two notable events: the regular monthly meeting, and the Professional Development Seminar “Essentials of Successful Negotiation.”

Why notable?

The program for our May monthly meeting was developed and presented by Amy Cannata (Waterfall Wellness) – we made name tags. If you think that doesn’t sound very interesting – maybe there is a side of Amy you haven’t seen yet.

The introduce-yourself excerises that Amy conducted, using different plays on everyone’s names and interests, and a bingo-card treasure hunt had everyone laughing – and even more, remembering each other better when it can time to pass leads. 

I think we have broken our all-time record for leads passed in a single meeting: 68 leads passed among 22 [laughing] women. That’s an average of 3 leads per person!

Wow.

And on Saturday May 28, Ellen François-Jacobs facilitated a day-long Seminar in which we covered the basic theory behind successful negotiation, and then put it into practice using role plays from case studies.  And if you think that doesn’t sound very interesting, maybe you have never taken a workshop with Ellen! Amid the fun and laughter, she conveyed some very useful take-aways, 2 of which I’ll share here: prepare yourself well, and know your BATNA.*

In passing, I’ll mention that whenever the WWNG gets together, networking happens. Without even really trying very hard, we managed to pass 17 leads.

So May has been a notable month as we bring our “academic” year to a close. We’ll be celebrating our accomplishments and looking forward to next year’s activity when we get together in June for the Annual General Meeting and the spring/summer Social.

Happy networking,

Mickey “Networking in France” Farrance
(thanks to Amy!)

*BATNA = best alternative to negotiated agreement. Your Plan B if you need to walk away from a negotiation.

Are you thinking of setting up your own business? Or have you already started down the road to being your own boss? Join us for this evening WWNG Professional Seminar and start learning about what you need to know to navigate the road ahead.

We have assembled a panel of self-employed women (French, American, and English) who will offer their advice and experience and answer your questions* about legal and tax issues, finance, marketing, and using web resources.

Register today – this Professional Seminar is 30€ for non-members, and free for WWNG members. It is open to all, but places are limited so don’t delay.  (And please forward this information to anyone you know who may be interested in this topic.)

*When you have registered, you’ll be solicited to send in your specific questions in advance.

When:     Wednesday 20 April 2011, 6:30 – 9 pm

Where:    Grenoble Ecole de Management

For more information, contact wwng.program@gmail.com.

The WWNG Professional Enrichment Program (PEP) did it again!

There were 23 of us at in the PEP this year. And what a Seminar…with 3 modules back-to-back in an all-day program, we worked, laughed, and shared quite a lot.

First, we identified values and talents. We have some incredibly talented, experienced, and generous women in our association.

Then we individually developed concrete goals and objectives, and many of the PEP participants agreed to share progress on them at the next WWNG meeting. Not only is it immensely helpful to actually write down those long and short-term goals, but accountability is a great motivator to help us meet them. So – be accountable to your fellow WWNG members, and tell us how you’re progressing when next we meet! Get support — and help, if you need it – from all of us.

And to finish off a long day, we heard some really good progress on those 30-second introductions. I’m really looking forward to hearing them again at our next meeting.

If you are a graduate of the WWNG PEP(2011 or earlier), bring your best 30-second intro to the February monthly meeting. Our program of the evening on the topic of career sustainability will be presented by Nathalie Reynaud, and I expect it will be an excellent follow-on to our PEP work.

And of course, whenever WWNG members get together, networking happens. Though we didn’t specifically set up the event for networking, we managed to pass 30 leads anyway. Amazing.

A big thank you to Lotte Peeters and the Program Team for coordinating the logistics, and to Véronique Rostas, Françoise Lerond, and Karine Gerentet for facilitating the workshop modules.

Happy networking!

Mickey Farrance