In late January of this year at the Outsourcing in Clinical Trials West Coast conference, Lorri Perkins received her FOCM card.  It was a very moving ceremony, many tears of joy were shed.

Lorri and I worked together at ICON Clinical Research.  Lorri then went to work for ClinStar and has recently joined ChemDiv’s IPHARMA Division.  Thanks to Debbie McCoy for taking the photo and making sure to get her company’s logo in the background.

 

February 22, 2014

A good group is expected: Brian Frankel and Gwen, Chris Diehl and Polly, Sheryle Browne (FOCM’s favorite massage therapist), Carol and Harlan Cox, Angie Lee and Mike, Carol and Don Lewis, May Singh, Gayle Grandinetti, Deb Jendrasek and me.  Sadly Carrie Gallagher, Mike Burrows and Wendy Revenaugh are unable to attend

 

FOCM WBWW_2014

I recently was introduced to Heather Hollick through Tanyss Mason, a FOCM member since Fall of 2013.  I met Tanyss through a friend who introduced us.  As you can see, we each gained additional people and resources into our respective networks.  Heather’s business focuses on leadership development, team building and career coaching.  We hit it off right away with our recognition of the need and value for networking.  Heather blogs at her own website on those topics.  She has an excellent article on how to create a stronger LinkedIn profile and is graciously sharing it with FOCM Network.  This has very practical and easy to follow steps, starting with what should you do when updating and writing content for your profile.  The first thing is to turn off notifications until you have completed the update, so as not to inundate your network with multiple notifications on each thing you update.  Then once you have made the changes that she recommends, you are to turn back on the notifications.  You can go to the link below to read the full content.

How To Create A Stronger LinkedIn Profile

LinkedIn is so much more than a resume — an up-to-date profile leads to better meetings, better connections and better introductions.

But what should you actually do when updating and writing content for your profile? Every entry in your resume or LinkedIn profile should contain three key pieces of information: What you did in that role, what you learned, and what you were ready for. Most people stop at listing what they have done. You are stopping yourself short. Read on for details on how to make create a LinkedIn profile that depth and color rather than just the dry facts about what you have done.

In an extremely rare moment, I actually issued the announcement of the January 14 meeting 6 days before the event.  I am serious! I really did.  As such, we had a very good turnout. It was also helped party for Tom Perkins, which added a few more people who also came over to the FOCM section.

I gave so much notice because Toni Tiburzi had let me know she was coming to Raleigh and we had been wanting to meet and learn more about each other’s companies. I said, not only will we meet, but I’ll throw a FOCM event so you can meet more RTP area people. So thank you Toni.

First to arrive was Andrew Smith, he even beat me there. In attendance were (in no particular order):

Toni Tiburzi, Rosina Maar Pavia, Josh Davis, Mike Burrows, Vince Hoefling, Nick Macaulay, Kelly O’Brien, Heather Lee, Susan Thomason, Paul Casey, Gayle Grandinetti, Carrie Gallagher, Mike Markowitz, Tom McPhatter.

Receiving their FOCM Cards that night were: Toni Tiburzi, King Jolly and Paul Casey. If I forgot anyone else who received their card, please let me know and I’ll amend the minutes.

 

Saw this on a LinkedIn posting

The question posed was has the internet taken away the human factor in the selling process.  The answer is a resounding NO!  While some research suggests that 60% of the buying process has been done by the time a sales person is contacted, non-personal/internet cannot do these three things:

1) know the details of the situation and the proposal

2) develop trust and confidence

3) Create the right customer experience

Read more at:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/netapp/2014/02/10/sales-human-factor//

 

In a rather rare moment of thinking ahead, I gave more than 24 hours’ notice for the January 9 FOCM Northern Philadelphia Suburbs Chapter Networking meeting.  Under the influence of a member from the Northern suburbs, the meeting was held at Via Marconi Sports Bar in Hatfield, PA.  (this part belongs on the humor section but I can’t stop myself from telling it here: Debbie McCoy was invited but unable to attend – do you know why?  Because Hatfield, PA doesn’t allow any McCoy’s into their town – get it? Hatfields and McCoys – okay, so maybe it doesn’t belong on the humor section either)

First to arrive was Jim Ashby, that’s two firsts in a row for Jim – a current FOCM record.  We were joined by Nadine Maag and Brian Connor.  As a result, Brian has added to more contacts into his network and Jim and Nadine have each added Brian to theirs.  It’s really not all that far from Malvern to Hatfield.

A last-minute (what’s new with that) announcement was sent for FOCM RTP area chapter to meet at Page Road Grill in Durham on December 18, 2013 from 7:00 – 9:00.  Sometimes FOCM likes a small intimate chapter meeting as this one turned out to be.  Jim Ashby was first to arrive and then we were joined by Vince Hoefling.  Jim and Vince had never met, so therefore a goal of networking was achieved.  A CRO person meets a computer industry person.  The food at Page Road Grill is quite good.

submitted by Warren Fischer

Does anyone know about Aris Global: any intel on them, working experience/environment, quality of their services, etc.

 

Submitted by FOCM Member Nick Hargaden, Ardroe LLC

Does anyone have experience with Intelemage?
http://www.intelemage.com/
Looking for capabilities,  quality of work, overall niceness 🙂

You can reply via posting a comment or contact Nick directly at: nickhargaden@ardroe.com

I recently realized how much networking and connecting people is ingrained in my daily life.  An example:

In November of 2013 I was working at an industry conference and met a man from a biotech company (potential client) in Boston.  He saw that my name badge indicated I was from Wilmington, NC.  He mentioned that a college fraternity brother (from 40 years ago) owned, ran or managed a bar in Wilmington, but he couldn’t remember the name of the bar.  I said, it would be good if you could find out as we have a networking group in Wilmington called the Wilmington Pharma/Bio/CRO Networking Group (pretty clever name, right?).  This group meets once a month and we have it at a variety of bars in town and we’d be happy to have it at his bar.  Two weeks later I emailed him saying it was nice to meet him and asking him if he’d been able to find out the name of the bar where his friend worked.  About a week later I got an email from him, saying he found out the name of the bar – The Bridge Tender – which has been in Wilmington for many years and is quite well known in the region.  That is where we had our January networking event.  So because of his comment to me, we brought business to his friend’s place and it also gives me a topic with which to share with the potential customer.

I could have responded, “yeah whatever, so your old frat brother has a bar” or “that’s nice, let me know if you’re ever down there”, but I didn’t, I followed through on the comment.  I now have had 2 more follow up communications with him and we’re building a business relationship.  I thought of this example when I saw this information on LinkedIn last week.