Networking in India - BNI India Blog

This post has been specially written by Sanjeev Raghani

It was only 7.30am on the 7^th of March 2009 at the J W Marriot and the room was buzzing with the top networkers in India. It was the morning of the 2^nd BNI National conference in India, a morning that was eagerly awaited by seasoned members (who had seen the phenomenal growth of BNI India) and also by the new ones who would be witnessing a BNI conference for the first time. These members REFUSE TO PARTICIPATE IN A RECESSION!By the time the clock struck 8.45am the room was filled with around 230 members of BNI India. We had about 150 come from the city of Mumbai, around 45 from the neighbouring Pune, around 35 from the Garden city of Bangalore while the rest were from Chennai. The international presence was made with members, regional directors and speakers from Dubai, Ireland and UK.The Conference started with Dr. Richard our emcee, introducing the entire team of 25 BNI directors from across India who were largely responsible for the growth of BNI INDIA.Mr. Niiraj R Shah, who presented his report as the National director of BNI India. 2008 was a special year with many highlights:

• BNI India moves in to a new office on the prime Linking road in February.
• Norm Dominguez, CEO of BNI visits India for the first and is balled over by the warmth of the welcome from members.
• BNI India crosses the 500 member milestone in September
• BNI India wins 2 CEO awards for growth and highest average chapter size
• Niiraj Shah is promoted to Director of Business affairs for Australasia, Middle East & Africa.
• BNI India members passed over 39,000 referrals which generated over 98 Crores of business (US$20 Million)

Niiraj promised that 2009 would be even more successful with BNI India poised to “Raise the Bar” (the official BNI theme for the year). In 2009 BNI India will cross the 1000 member milestone, with over 37 chapters in over 5 cities. Our goal is to help members generate over RS 150 Crores (US$30 Million) over the year.

“Raising the Bar” would mean helping members to focus on executing the fundamentals that help generate business: doing great 60 second and 10 minute presentations, focusing on getting over 90% of the members trained, building power teams and focusing on 1-2-1’s regularly.

We had 4 distinguished speakers who would share their knowledge. Andy Hart
Our first speaker was Andy Hart. A business coach by profession, Executive Director of 2 BNI regions in IRELAND, who has won 5 BNI CEO awards. Andy had helped in growing the strength of a region in Ireland from 750 members to 1200 members within a year.

He shared with us his secret of the phenomenal growth, where he emphasized that how, if each member of a chapter, just concentrated upon building his/ her POWER TEAM, there would automatically be an increase in the chapter size.

He also explained the importance of growing your chapter size with a wonderful example that if there was money lying on the table, a proactive chapter - with a member count of more than 45 members, would earn 57% more share as compared to a chapter having less than 25 members.

He also shared the important fact that on an average 2 members are absent (without a substitute) each week from a chapter, because of which, an average 57 referrals are not passed and by the end of the year this will cost your business, a huge revenue loss of  Rs. 7.3 Crores (around US $ 1.5 million) .

He illustarted all of these figures using the BNI performance management systems: “The Traffic Lights system“.

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Thomas Power
Our second speaker was Thomas Power, the Chairman of Ecademy Ltd., UK market leader B2B social network portal. An experienced business leader, who has successfully founded, built and sold a number of businesses in the e-Commerce, Social Networking and Call Centre arena.

Thomas Power has been always a Networker. What he does is “collects people”. In 1998, Penny, his wife got an idea, “Why not use the Internet for connecting business people?” Penny and Thomas saw value in this, and founded Ecademy, with the purpose of providing information, contacts and support. Thomas Power says that Ecademy is not perfect since his thoughts are not, and is always evolving.

When asked about what has kept him going for so long, Thomas answered: - “There is a lot of hype around Social Networking and every year there is something new which becomes the biggest thing happening in this space. Twitter, is the latest craze in online networking.

But it is “Ecademy”, that will prevail in the end. This is because other networking websites such as Linkedin are Closed, Selective and Controlling, while Ecademy is Open, Random and Supportive”.

Thomas stressed that you need to get across who you are first rather than what you do. People like to connect to people that they have something in common to or people that they like. Make friends first and the business will follow.

One of the biggest Takeaway’s from his talk was the three questions that he said one should ask another person while networking:-

• What is your expertise in?
• What is the biggest project that you’re working on right now?
• Who can I put you in touch with for your dream project?

If you’re able to answer these, you know that you have chosen the right path in your quest to realize your dream.

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The fingers just wouldn’t stop snapping during the SNAP exercise.

What is S.N.A.P?

• SNAP stands for - SUPER NETWORKING ACCELERATED PROTOCOL

It was one of the most valuable exercises for generating referrals for your fellow members. It was flawlessly conducted by Gopu Raman and Chitranjan Gupta.

The members were paired up in teams of two. Then each of them filled the SNAP card, where in he/she mentioned his most important “specific referral” that they were looking out for.

His partner would then go out to other members, present at the conference, and would ask for his referral and get the cards of the people who could help him get to his “specific referral”.

The highlight of the exercise was when one of the chapter members of the “BNI Premier Chapter” in Mumbai, Mr. Siddharth Shetty, helped generate 20 referrals for his partner, who had come down from Dubai and wanted to set things up in MUMBAI.

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Niri S Patel, one of Europe’s leading networking experts and an accomplished professional international speaker & trainer, one of three finalists in the Business and Enterprise Category of the Yorkshire Young Achievers Awards, then took centre stage to share his knowledge about the “10 methods to double your income in 90 days”.

Of the ten methods, he emphasized 3 key factors,

• Written Goals - Once you write your goals in crystal clear and specific words, it becomes the laying of a strong foundation towards achieving them.
• Peer Group: - “You are the average of the 5 persons whom you move around most with.”  The influence of the peer group is too strong to be left alone.

And most importantly,

• Take action: - Act immediately. Do a constant follow up, for the faster you do so, the closer you come to achieving your goal.

He emphasized on the importance to build a very strong network around you, one that would always be with you, and help you stay afloat, even during trying times like the “RECESSION”.

This was demonstrated by the “CHAIR REMOVAL EXERCISE” that was performed on stage.

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Our fourth and final speaker was Mahesh (Mac) Srinivasan.

Having lived in the US for over 12 years where he managed IT and ITES Companies. Mac returned to India in 2003, to set up the India operations for SeatonCorp, a company headquartered in Chicago. He is also the Vice-Chairman of the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce. He is also the founding member of BNI Addvantage in Bangalore.

He shared with us, the 8 secrets of starting and running a business successfully.

• WHAT

1. Find a Proven Concept. Discover what is the need in the market and then find a way to fulfill that need.
2. Brand attraction: - Build relations with customers.

•  WHO
  3.Operating team: - Build a team that will consistently fulfill the needs of these clients.Market connections: - 4.Identifying other businesses which would be complimentary to yours and identifying other market players who value in tying up with you. Think WIN-WIN.

• WHEN

5.Tradeable entity: - Build your business with the right people and systems so that you don’t need to micro manage and you can look to sell a part of the business to fuel further expansion.
6.Bankable asset: - When you have a good track record with positive cash flow. Banks are willing to lend or you are able to attract private Investors to put their money in your business and can even have an easy exit.

• HOW

7.Cash Generation Infrastructure: - Revenue is Vanity, Profit is Sanity. How you can create stable cash flow and profits from the ongoing operations.
8.Licensing system: - One you have all these in place you can franchise your business.

We also had the unique concept of the SMS wall.

The SMS wall was an electronic opportunity board, where each member participating in the conference could post a referral request for himself or his chapter member.

Armed with the right knowledge, the right new opportunities and robust network members of BNI INDIA are now poised to make 2009 the best year yet. Clearly this is a group that refuses to participate in a recession!

If you were at the conference we would LOVE to hear your feedback and testimonials. Please leave your comments on this blog.

For photos of the conference please visit the following links:

Link 1  Link 2

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