This week 3 members of the WiRE Team attended the Prowess conference. We were shortlisted with one other organisation for a 'Flagship of Flagships' Award.  It became apparent that it was very high profile and highly sought after.Our presentation went well despite the venues A/V equipment letting us down, and by the time the awards were being presented we were in a state of high anxiety.

Sadly we didn't win, the judges stressed how close it had been since we were very different organisations (they: south, urban depravation, physical centre, entirely public funded, little sustainability, high level full programme, us: rural, national, sustainable, creative, little money lots of activity).

The Conference was also an opportunity to present WiRE to “movers and shakers” in Women's Enterprise and it was clear that WiRE is regarded very highly in all the right places. We had breakfast with the head of Women's Enterprise at BERR; he remains a staunch supporter of WiRE but it was clear that we need to talk more about the “rural” element of our business. Much is made of under-representation but it seems that rural is not included in this, people seem to discount it as privileged, comfortable and not terribly needy and we all know this is not the case!

The whole process was a great boost and made us realise just how great WiRE is and will shape our next action plan!

23rd April,  Harper Adams University College, Newport Shropshire

Places are limited to a maximum of 200 this year (due to building work being done on campus) so please encourage members to book early to avoid disappointment! By the time this newsletter reaches you booking should be available online on the WiRE website.  You can also keep up to date with how the conference is shaping up as we confirm speakers!
www.wireuk.org
 
Network Leaders can attend for FREE just contact Julie@wireuk.org and let us know your 2 workshop choices.

Julia Stanley  -
www.juliastanley.co.uk

Unfortunately HSBC have withdrawn from sponsoring WiRE- although it did not come as a surprise in the current climate.  But the good news is they are still offering WiRE members a preferential card processing package.

We are looking at working with other banks and have already had some promising meetings. As far as inviting banks to network meetings as speakers, we don't have a particular loyalty to any bank at present so please feel free to invite any helpful bank representatives to your meetings, that you think members would benefit from hearing.  In the meantime, we will keep you posted of developments.

It's fantastic to see that you are leaving comments for each other on the network leaders forum.  The Network Leaders forum is on the admin site and can only be seen by Network Leaders and WiRE. It is a great way to ask advice and share tips and ideas with other WiRE Network Leaders.

Current topics being discussed are whether to hold meetings in the evening, how to find speakers, and how you wish people would be more considerate and turn up if they said they would!

To find the forum go to http://admin.wireuk.org and use your network login and password.

Click on 'Communicate' button
Click on 'Network Forum' button