REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE LAUNCH OF THE WOMEN IN BUSINESS NETWORK, ROSCOMMON
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE LAUNCH BY ROSCOMMON PARTNERSHIP COMPANY AND ROSCOMMON COUNTY ENTERPRISE BOARD OF THE WIBN
A chairde uilig,
Is onóir dom bheith anseo libh inniu ag ócáid speisialta seo.
Good evening everybody,
I am delighted to be here with you today for the launch of the Roscommon Women in Business Network. My thanks to Noel Connolly, for inviting me to share this occasion with you and my thanks also to you all for that warm and generous welcome.
When Dr Johnson wrote his famous dictionary he defined a ‘network’ as “any thing reticulated or decussated, at equal distances, with interstices between the intersections”. Isn’t it interesting, the answers you get when you ask a man a simple question! The network we are launching here today, however, is a much more human institution than the dictionary might lead us to believe. What is a network only that which happens any time you connect two or more people together so that they can share experiences, ideas, and understandings. Such simple human contact is probably our greatest resource, for in the development and widening of contacts between different individuals, groups, companies, or institutions, a creative synergy is released which makes the whole so much greater than the sum of its parts.
Connecting with people with similar interests, professions, concerns, and backgrounds, uncovers opportunities of all kinds and at all sorts of levels, from identifying opportunities, problem solving, learning of best practice, matching complementary talents and ambitions, promoting partnerships and collaborations, identifying new clients, new contacts, sharing experience, skill and insight- all of which are of great assistance in developing and building up any enterprise, big or small.
In particular business networks like the one we are launching this evening help women to learn success strategies from other women in business. When we connect with women at the top of business we learn valuable business lessons, valuable career strategies and well-tried and tested work-life balance solutions. A new generation of Ireland’s most influential women are doing great things in their work and in their lives - redefining success in the 21st century. From award-winning writers and columnists to professionals in every sphere, entrepreneurs, artists, all showing how great women's professional growth has been in Ireland in a relatively short period and all proving how crucial to Ireland’s success has been the liberation of the genius of her women.
Ireland’s recent economic progress has been driven in fair part by the entry of very many more women into the workforce. It has provided them with a wide spectrum of new opportunities and it is important to remember that we are still only at the start of this journey for women. The woman entrepreneur is still a scarce phenomenon in 21st Century Ireland but that too is changing and will keep on changing thanks to initiatives like this all around Ireland.
Your Network is ideally placed to meet the needs of the women of Roscommon at this time of such great change in Ireland’s rural economy. The training programmes and mentoring provided by the network are a very important part of the Rural Employment Service in Roscommon. Without these programmes, many women would find it difficult to make the transition back into the workforce or to have the confidence to engage in enterprise with all its risks and its difficulties before you reap the rewards.
I am glad to hear that this project has been supported through the Dormant Accounts Fund, for most would be entrepreneurs start out with a good idea but the elements commonly missing are appropriate supports in the form of training, mentoring and finance. I hope that many of the women directly supported by this project will in time start up their own businesses and achieve great success becoming, in turn, an inspiration and a role model for other women. Your success will act as a catalyst for others to think and then to believe that they too could do likewise. It will also encourage women to raise their expectations and ambitions and set out confidently to make it into the top echelons of any business.
I congratulate everyone associated with this achievement and in particular Roscommon Partnership Company and Roscommon County Enterprise Board. I wish you every success with this important initiative in the future.
Is iontach an obair áta ar súil agaibh. Gurb fada buan sibh.