Chris Howe's describes his ventures in China and Japan building a business partnership with local Brand Leader IWNC.

"Exciting and sometimes quite surreal. Take for example the weekend when I found myself staying in the same hotel in Tokyo as the Tartan Army, there to watch their national football team lose yet another game. They were wonderful company and boy did they know how to drink! Then a few hours later I found myself chatting to some of the World's leading tennis players as we navigated the unpredictable challenge that is Shanghai Airport."

In the future we will need to increase the Train the Trainer activity in China and if any Associates are interested we will need your support in that. You will have the opportunity to work with some great young talent and people who are passionate to learn.

For Clients, we now have a much better understanding of this exciting and complex market and are happy to share what we know.

In May we decided to invest resources into the further development of our sales strategy. During the last six months I have been working with an outside consultant to develop our systems and secure work through the Public Sector Tender process.

I have also been working towards building a pipeline of business for four of our core products:

Leading and Performing in Teams

Heart of Change

Coaching for Success

Explorer

We are delighted to see successes now coming through and I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the Associates for their input, encouragement and feedback. Here's to a successful 2010.

A reflection on the recent symposium sponsored by the Leadership Trust and Ashridge Management College.

Chris Howe delivered his Maasai MasterClass at the first event and can now be seen on YouTube in a short extract:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd6jyTlDWdM

OR

If you have not already had the chance to experience Chris giving this keynote speech why not join us at a networking event and informal coffee morning in Taunton on the 3rd February 2010?

Chris will be hosting the event giving insights into the Maasai's ancient way of life and how these lessons can be applied to business today.

The Maasai have built an organisation that has survived for 1000 years and we can learn from their broad Leadership approach in which shared responsibility and influence are always more important than power.

They have developed the wisdom to predict what may be coming but most importantly they have to build a culture that can respond quickly. Sustainability only happens if successive generations are inspired by the vision and allowed to use their skills and wisdom to bring about appropriate change. Does this ring any bells?

The lessons are simple and totally transferable to ANY organisation!

Full details are available on our website and a few limited places remain, for bookings contact office@ChangeMakerweb.co.uk

We recently used this spectacular tree-cabin with a view of Mont Blanc as part of a team event for the Global procurement team from our client Bacardi.

If you would like a team workshop that makes positive use of the winter environment rather than hiding from it. Let us know.

You've tried raft building as an exercise - how about building a team sledge?

Of course the exercises are just the vehicle (sorry about the pun) to examine the team behaviour and we have the experience and the well researched tools to help you.

http://www.changemakerweb.co.uk/research_and_tools.html

A view from the "back of the bus" by a frequent flyer who has been buying his own tickets this year.

"A left hooker believes that a 747 has about 40 seats, that seats are indeed beds and that all flights start with a free glass of champagne and a hot towel."

"Right hookers on the other hand know that a 747 actually seats many hundreds of people, that all babies are right hookers, and we sit at the back of the bus in what some left hookers dismissively call "cattle class" and we prefer to call the 'crumple zone'."

In keeping with what has become a tradition we will again be donating to charity this year rather than sending out Christmas cards.

Many of you will remember Lizzie Dagnall who joined the ChangeMaker Administration team in the summer of 2008 and worked with us on a part time basis for six months. Remember all those nagging emails as she supported Andy with the development of our Associate Database? What you may not have known was that during her time with us Lizzie was battling Cancer and sadly lost her brave fight in September this year.

In memory of Lizzie the ChangeMaker Christmas donation will be made to Cancer Research.