Week Four – Monday 10 February – Sunday 16 February

Business meetings took up much of my time this week although I did represent the WCM at the Royal British Legion Reception at Glaziers’ Hall. I offered them assistance in planning their future Marketing department and approach if they required it – right down to sitting in on their recruitment meeting (if they wished).

Also represented the WCM at the CIM Marketing Awards Dinner at Grosvenor House – a delightful and very full evening where many Awards were presented to very obviously delighted recipients. Used the opportunity to talk to a number of senior Marketers about potentially becoming Marketors!

Had a very pleasant lunch meeting with a Member who wanted to talk about his vision for the WCM and how he could be involved. Very happy to do this when my diary allows!

The week ended with my wife, Jeanne, celebrating an important birthday. Enough said.

Weeks 3 - Managing the Marketing - Monday 3 February – Sunday 9 February

Monday required me to go to our office in Plaisterers’ Hall for a meeting with the Clerk, then a session at Fishmongers’ Hall together with representatives of the Berkhamsted School Foundation regarding a charity dinner that I had suggested to both parties. Brief explanation – I had found that there are three Masters this year from Berkhamsted School (Master Musician, Sir Anthony Cleaver; Master Information Technologist, Michael Webster; and me) and therefore proposed that we should jointly organise a “livery style dinner”.

I then had a meeting to do with my own business, followed by a briefing for Masters attending the Ironbridge weekend (in June) at Insurers’ Hall.

Tuesday I had a session with Court Assistant Richard Christou on the events programme for the year (Richard had agreed to run the programme as Chairman of Events and is clearly extremely well organised, for which I am extremely grateful – I suspect that you will see those words again!).

Then to a black tie dinner at Stationers’ Hall (shown above), which was my first formal Dinner representing the WCM – a very pleasant occasion enjoyed by all.

Wednesday saw my first “Master and Wardens” meeting with me in the chair – these are held monthly and the intention is to spend ever more time on the future and strategic items and far less on the minutiae of the past. We will do our best! One special agenda item was a presentation by our current investment manager on how our investments are progressing, something that we will be reviewing more frequently.

Friday saw me at a black tie dinner – but this time at Berkhamsted School!

Week 2 - Up to Speed - Monday 27 January – Sunday 2 February

My first external appearance representing the WCM – although to be fair it was the AGM of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and therefore I was there in my own right. But I did ensure that people were made aware of the Livery and hopefully some will seek to join us.

Wednesday saw me interviewing potential new Freemen as part of a panel, followed by a session with the Learned Clerk and the Assistant Clerk.

Thursday I was at the Gresham Lecture given by the Lord Mayor at the Museum of London and later on I was with her again at Mansion House for the reception celebrating last year’s Lord Mayor’s Show and getting an early idea of the themes for this year (Andrew Marsden as Senior Warden came with me so that he could meet this year’s Lord Mayor and also the “most likely” candidate to become the next Lord Mayor!).

Friday I visited Skinners’ Hall with the Learned Clerk – to discuss holding the Spring Lunch there. I then went on my first “representative lunch” (together with the Clerk) at Cutlers’ Hall where my kind hosts were the Worshipful Company of Arbitrators.

I am beginning to realise just how many e-Mails are sent to the Master! Oh well.

Master Michael Harrison - 2014 Week One – Monday 20 January – Sunday 26 January

Preparations take far more time than you might think! Because a new gown had to be made (not just because I am very tall, the old one is looking rather tired) I had to collect it (this has been going on for some time). Then there are the rehearsals, the list of photographs to be approved, final seating plan agreed…..all very necessary.

The day before the Installation, I had a meeting on the website followed by an Armed Forces and Cadets Committee meeting – whilst the received advice was to relax on that day!

Thursday was a blur. One thing that struck me as funny was that at the Installation Court there was a slight pause – immediately after I had been “installed” and took my place at the lectern I read the words “the Master will now say…” and it took me just a moment to realise that this meant me!

Dinner was excellent – the food, wine and service all first class and our speaker, Terry Mansfield CBE (of Hearst Corporation fame) was equally so. In my response, I was able to emphasise my belief that the Master and Wardens must work as a team and that the entire Court is also a vitally important team. To emphasise that I was able to announce that (subject to the Court’s approval) the Master and Wardens had produced a four-year rolling plan to which we were all committed, rather than have four individual “stove-pipe” years.

And so the next year of the Worshipful Company begins – a good first day!

The Last Post 23rd January 2014

Looking back on the many posts I've made in the past twelve months it has clearly been a busy year.

It is a great privilege to act as Master of a Livery Company with the opportunity to attend many interesting events and to meet many people, whilst representing the profession of marketing within the City of London.

I hope the blog serves to both inform and inspire any who are motivated to progress through a livery company to achieve the Mastership.

Tonight, at an Installation Court,  the Senior Warden progresses to the office of Master having been clothed in the gown and invested by me with the Chain and Badge, the insignia of the office as Master. I wish him every success.  

Women in Manufacturing House of Commons Tuesday 21st January

“Smashing the Glass Ceiling”

Science,Technology, Engineering and Mathematics – the so called STEM disciplines – are key to the UK’s engineering and manufacturing capability and schools are under increasing pressure from government to facilitate and support their delivery within the curriculum, encouraging pupils into these important and challenging subjects.

Women in Manufacturing is an organisation that seeks particularly to attract and retain women to this key sector of the economy, encouraging diversity and increasing the UK talent pool by raising the number of women in industry at all levels.  It does this by urging both educators and employers to forge partnerships to mutual benefit.

As things stand fewer than 10% of STEM qualified managers are female.  Women complete only 1% of apprenticeships in construction, planning and the environment, 4% in manufacturing, 18% in ICT.    Indeed only 27.3% of manufacturing workers are female, the same level as in 1972.  Clearly there is a lot of work to do in redressing this imbalance.

With my long standing interest in promoting diversity Women in Manufacturing is therefore a topic close to my heart.  The organisation was formed by the Glass Academy working with the Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers.  The aim is to attract a broader mix of skills, experience, views and ideas to the UK manufacturing sector to help address the impending UK manufacturing skills shortage and significant gender imbalance in the sector.

The Aim:

• Inspiring more girls and young women to take up careers in manufacturing and engineering
• Raising awareness of the numerous well paid, exciting and fulfilling career opportunities in the sector
• Contributing to a cultural shift through education to eliminate gender stereotyping from the industry.

The well attended reception held in the Churchill Room within the House of Commons was to raise the profile of this new and worthy initiative and was full of faces known to me.  In many ways the need to engage with Industry, Government and Education was familiar ground for me from my years running the Industry and Parliament Trust – educating MPs and Peers about the continuing importance of maintaining a manufacturing industry back at a time when the City appeared far more seductive to most in achieving economic growth.

It was good to meet again with Alderman Andrew Parmley, now Master of the Glass Sellers, and as a Musician a driving force behind the City Livery concerts, now firmly re-established.  I was also delighted to also meet with a very dear friend and one-time neighbour Tony Thatcher, a member of the Glass Sellers and former Vice Chairman of Thyssen-Bornemisza.  Tony came to my Installation a year ago.

I do hope this initiative gathers momentum.  Manufacturing today is no longer the heavy work of yesteryear but more usually embraces innovation, precision,delicacy and design – all gifts possessed by the female half of the population.  My sense is that girl schools are still succeeding rather better at bringing girls into STEM subjects and this new organisation gives me ideas of where I might well decide to apply my business experience in coming months and years.

Reception to honour Sir Robert Worcester KBE DL 80th birthday Monday 20 January 2014 at the Reform Club

I was delighted to go to Sir Robert Worcester's celebratory birthday party which was attended, as one can imagine, by practically every luminary of the political and business world. 
No General Election in this country could possibly take place without commentary from the founder of MORI. Despite being American by birth Sir Robert was appointed by Her Majesty the Queen a Knight Commander of the British Empire (KBE) in 2005 in recognition of his 'outstanding services rendered to political, social and economic research and for contribution to government policy and programmes'.
I know Bob ("never Sir Bob - that's Geldof") best through us both serving many years on the Council of the University of Kent, he as Chancellor and me as a Council member. He is visiting Professor of Government at the LSE and also of the Institute of Contemporary British History at King's College. Most importantly he is Chairman of the Magna Carta 2015 800th Anniversary Commemoration Committee.  Bob spoke on that fascinating topic as my guest at the Marketors Court Dinner in December.
I was delighted to catch up with many MPs, Ministers, business leaders and media moguls. I was listed by Bob as "Church Commissioner" in the evening's printed programme so received a number of congratulations from a wide spectrum of those attending.  I very much enjoyed speaking with Eleanor Laing, Deputy Speaker and Tessa Jowell, and other old friends from the House of Commons, along with Sir Peter Bottomley, who gave a glowing tribute to Bob's work. I also caught up with a number of Peers, including Lords Clement-Jones, Quentin Davies and Michael Howard.  I was also pleased to meet up with my old friend John Pullinger, House of Commons Librarian.
Sir Robert and Lady Margaret are as busy as ever, living in Allington Castle, their magnificent Kent home. When asked during the evening if he was thinking of retiring, the firm answer from octogenarian Bob was 'no'!