18th April 2008

I was having one of my nocturnal thinking nights, you know, the nights when you have so many ideas buzzing around that sleep escapes you and eventually you are drawn to get up and write and act on the activity whirring around in the brain. Well, one of my thoughts was about commercial life and how we have to be and the traits we are required to have in our pursuit of success. I thought about the common traits and realised that (and I believe, as a reader, you may identify with this) regardless whether you are in business, in civil service, a home maker, a parent or retired, there are common traits and as usual these are not complex, but something that we all do every day in our different ways. Under key headings it would be communication, negotiation & respect. It is so obvious that if we handle these three things well, it is critical.

I would like to also extend this to good manners, although this is not vital, it is the icing on the cake and if it is added it makes for a more pleasurable job. At Bales, however, good manners are essential and something we would seek from our team, even back to interview stage. We all have our hobby horse and I guess I have a few and high on my list is abhorring bad manners. I am proud and delighted to say that once you step into the experience of Bales, you will be very valued and appreciated as a client. When we say ‘thank you for booking with us’ it is extended far beyond that and we take responsibility of getting your holiday right very seriously and though I would love to boast we get it right 100% of the time, it is something we continuously aim to do & I can only boast 99%.

I guess, more importantly, what I have done in the last few weeks has a direct effect on you.

One event I went to which was very stimulating was given by Mantis Collection, a beautiful range of ‘out of this world’ safari lodges in South Africa. What a different approach to promoting properties – the guest speaker introduced himself as a biologist/business man. The audience was a very mixed group, far extending the travel industry. I met bankers, strategists, those driving leadership development and more. Our speaker therefore made the analogy of a successful business and team to a successful tribe in South Africa. Sound ridiculous? It wasn’t, it made so much sense and the reality is that solutions are never as complex, but just need logic, focus & communication. I go on to say in fact that many of the corporate guests in the audience were looking to take their own teams out to South Africa on strategic & leadership development courses led by Mantis, displaying how survival isn’t enough and how we can all be successful.

Great admiration for a PR company that have set up an informal evening every three months under the label ‘Women in Travel’. I promise you it isn’t sexist, though you may say ‘how is that so?’ It is just that so many events in our industry are more male dominated and yet the larger percentage working in the industry is female. Whilst I have previously been invited, this was the first time I was able to go and I am so glad I did for the stimulus and ideas from such a diverse and dynamic group of people. Well I guess that was the cause of my ‘nocturnal overdrive’.

My father, our founder, used to always say ‘look after the clients and the money will come in’ and that is very much the philosophy we still have today. So in a company that is about putting the customer first, and being genuine about it, you will have experienced or if you haven’t yet travelled with us, you will, I promise, see a world of difference which is what sets us apart. I think I have been quite philosophical about life in this blog – must be what happens at 4am but I do need to add in a whisper that my keep fit training is going OK…not brilliant but at least in the right direction. I am getting to the gym and do manage to walk past the aroma of coffee to do my hour of exercise before being lured into the café. Guess I better make the best of rising early and get on with some work.

Speak soon.

Mandy