Eating with a conscience

Back to Stationers Hall less than two weeks after my Installation. This was the Stationers' annual
Master and Clerks' Dinner and was held in the Court room rather than the hall since it is a far more intimate gathering. I'm beginning to meet more Masters from other Companies whom I know, so I feel I'm getting into the job, as it were.

Adele who would normally accompany me at such a Masters and Clerks' event was, the same evening, elsewhere being installed as the new President of the Aldgate Ward club. Many congratulations to her.

Whilst it's always a pleasure to enjoy another Company's hospitality there was, I thought, a certain irony in feasting on good food and wine whilst the enormous oil painting dominating the room is of King Alfred Sharing His Cakes With A Begger, by the late eighteenth century/early ninteenth century Anglo-American artist Benjamin West.

At a sumputous lunch last week in Vintners Hall, surely one of the finest in the City, I found myself seated between two Clerks. On my right was the Clerk to the Broderers an ancient Livery company with its roots in the craft of embroidery. There were, he observed, not a lot of members still in the craft. But I rejoined at least you must have a strong female membership. Not so apparently, and he commented that anyway all the great embroiderers were men. He then ruminated that the finest exponents of a great many of the supposedly traditional female crafts --cooking, fashion design, flower arranging, knitting were all men. The conversation then conveniently moved away on to a very old custom of the Broderers. At every Court Dinner the Master has to sing the Broderers song. This not a short song and apparently the more out of tune the Master the greater the delight of the audience. I am mighty grateful that I am a Master of the Marketors and not the Broderers!

We are not alone.......

Here was I thinking that the Marketors were unique in publishing a Master's Blog and lo, by chance, I discover we are not alone. The Master Draper similarly runs a blog on their web site and happily gives Past Master Venetia the credit for being the first Master Blogger. See his blog on the link below and read not only the 'Welcome' opening paragraph but scroll down to see a super picture of Venetia.
http://www.masterdraper.blogspot.com/

FIRST BLOG

Would I like to continue where Past Master Venetia left off, with the Master's Blog I was asked. Why not I thought until I realised how much skill and verve Venetia brought to the task. As a management report writer rather than a journalist it will be an interesting journey for me--and I hope you.

First up obviously was the Installation Dinner last night  and the Ceremonial Court beforehand. We admitted 2 new Liverymen and 4 new Freemen, as well as appointing John Flynn as Senior Warden, Sally Muggeridge as Middle Warden and Roddy Mullin as the Company's new Junior Warden. I congratulate all of them. There will be a full report in the next edition of Marketor but suffice it to say that the guest speaker Mark Price, M.D. of Waitrose, kept us all entertained and made us better informed about grocery retailing.

With my theme for the year being Innovation, I introduced an innovation in the form of a wine quiz, all proceeds going to our Charitable Trust and this raised £435. A good evening in all respects.

Last Post - 17th January 2011

On Thursday this week I shall have the privilege of installing Jim Surguy as the next Master Marketor. It has been a joy to be the warm-up act for someone whom I am sure will be one of the great Masters.

This year I have been blessed with a wonderful team - as Senior Warden, Jim has provided cheerful wise counsel and moral support. Middle Warden, John Flynn, and Junior Warden, Sally Muggeridge, have been a delight to work with and have also shared the joys of the 2010 highlights. Our Clerk, Adele Thorpe, has been a wonderful coach and guide to me in the ways of the City, as well as organising our Great Events and so much more.

My husband, Roger, has been a diamond.

The Court members, both Past Masters and Court Assistants, have been tremendously encouraging and I am indebted to the Chairmen of Committees and their members for all their hard work and creativity on behalf of the Marketors.

Here is some quantification of what I have taken part in during the year (who says marketers can't handle numbers?):


27 Marketors' events - Great Events, seminars and social


5 tasting lunches


39 internal meetings e.g. committees (and that's only a fraction of the number that took place, attended by others)


8 regular Master & Wardens' meetings + 2 specials


4 Business Court meetings and 4 Ceremonial Courts


81 livery events outside our own Marketors' events, sometimes 2 in one day, occasionally 3. Includes a small number for the Master's Consort, invited on his own to join another companies' Masters' Ladies' or Mistresses' events (and where he was always extremely popular!)


26 external business meetings such as the Financial Services Group and a project for the Lord Mayor.


129 posts on this blog


5 articles written for our quarterly magazine, MARKETOR


203 personal letters sent, 153 of them written by hand (with a fountain pen!)

450 Christmas cards sent


5 box files of memorabilia from our own and others events


3 evening dresses, shoes and handbags, 1 day suit, 2 hats bought.


1 Royal Charter received - definitely NOT 'all my own work'.


And those words sum it up. It has been a team effort: I have just been the person fortunate enough to enjoy the responsibilities and privileges of being the leader for a year. I look forward to the honourable estate of being a Past Master and to supporting our new Master, Jim Surguy, in his year. I shall be Vice-Chairman of the Marketors Think Tank and will continue to represent the company on the Financial Services Group.

On the personal business front, I have treated this year as a professional sabbatical, hard work but constantly learning. In the coming months I shall try to expand the small amount of consultancy work that I have been able to do in 2010, and to seek non-executive opportunities where I can apply my blue chip B2B marketing experience, particularly in the areas of corporate reputation risk management.

If you have been reading, thank you.

Small crisis in taxi - January 2011

Normally I use public transport to move around London. Even after a dinner in a full-length dress, you can happily hop on a bus back to Waterloo to catch the train home. (There is CCTV and I remove any jewellery and wear a long coat. There are a surprising number of City workers going home at 10.30 at night, not to mention other Masters, self-consciously covering up their black ties.)

Taxis are kept for the biggest occasions (pre-booked) or if it's raining. However, last week I was running late so caught a taxi from Waterloo to the livery hall venue. I planned to use the journey to change my shoes, put on the Master's badge, ensure I had the right things in my evening bag so that I could arrive in my right mind, drop coat, shoe bag and brolly at the cloakroom and float serenely into the event, even if the timing was tight.

I was just getting the badge out of its little soft travelling pouch when I found I was holding the neck ribbon in one hand and the badge and its clip in the other - the clip had worn through the stitching which attaches it to the ribbon. Drama! You cannot (without a lot of explanation) attend a livery event, representing your company without wearing your badge.

Plan B - a safety pin. Except that (scrabbling around every bag and pocket in the half-light) I didn't have one anywhere about my person - bad mistake.

Plan C - start thinking creatively. Happily I was wearing a gift from my mother earlier in the year, a necklace with a pendant. The pendant was detachable - yes, there was the answer! The Master's badge would just clip onto the necklace. And the picture shows the result. (Actually, lady Masters sometimes wear their badges on a personal chain so no-one commented, other than the Clerk, who liked the effect. But with a 5 oz weight on it, only an emergency solution.)

Today I have carefully stitched the clip back on to the ribbon and I hope it stays there firmly for many years.

Ladies who lunch - Friday 14th January 2011

In my year as Master, there have been about 6 women Masters of their Livery Companies. I understand this is typical although, because the date of changing Masters varies so widely across the companies, the total is always a moving target.

On Friday 10 female members of the Masterhood (Masters, Past Masters, a Past Upper Bailiff [the Weavers' Company] and a Master-elect) met at the Lansdowne Club, courtesy of Helen Auty, Past Master Pattenmaker. Two I knew well, because our companies tend to be on the same 'circuit', but the others were all new, and an absolute joy to meet.

The restaurant at the Lansdowne Club did us proud too.