The 2010 Maroondah Business Week was held from the 4th of October through to the 8th and offered a range of events to develop skills and business promotion, concluded with a networking lunch, featuring model and author Tara Moss, as the guest speaker.

The lunch is aimed specifically at women in business and Tara spoke about her life growing up in Canada, as well as her transition into modelling and her development as an author. Tara discussed the need to persevere with dreams and highlighted her passion for writing, which she developed as a student in primary school.

The lunch marks the conclusion of the 2010 Maroondah Business Week and the speech I provided to welcome guests to this event is available within this post:

Good afternoon and welcome to the 2010 Business Lunch, our final event for Maroondah’s Business Week

Maroondah City Council, in the spirit of reconciliation, acknowledges that we are meeting on land for which the Wurundjeri people have been custodians for many centuries.

Please join me in welcoming my fellow Council colleagues, Cr Natalie Thomas and Cr Rob Steane, as well as Heidi Victoria MLA for Bayswater.

Today’s lunch is sponsored by Eastland Shopping Centre, and we would like to thank them for their continued support of Maroondah Business Week.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank all the sponsors of this year’s Business Week:

• Queensland Investment Corporation;
• Maroondah Weekly previously the Maroondah Journal;
• RACV Business Insurance
• The Karralyka Centre
• National Australia Bank;
• The Victorian Government; and of course
• Eastland Shopping Centre.

Maroondah Council has always been very proud of the program of events that it has offered during Business Week and this year is no exception. This is the 10th Annual Maroondah City Council Business Week.

The aim of Business Week is to provide the Maroondah business community with an opportunity to promote their business, to forge valuable networking links and to increase their own knowledge through various training initiatives.

Many of you have already benefited from attending some of the exciting and informative events and workshops held this week.

We are fortunate this afternoon to have as our guest, Tara Moss, and I would like to take this opportunity again to thank Eastland who through their generous sponsorship have made today’s lunch possible.

Our two other keynote speakers this week were, David Schwarz – an Australian football icon who was the inspiring guest speaker at the National Australia Bank Business Week Breakfast.

And last night we were delighted to have Peter Alexander, the pyjama king, as the keynote speaker at the RACV Business Insurance Networking evening.

In addition, this year’s Business Week Program provided an impressive 11 seminars, training sessions and bus tours.

I would like to thank the Economic Development staff at Council for again putting together this excellent program, and also recognise the wonderful efforts of the staff and management of the Karralyka Centre, throughout Maroondah Business Week.

Please enjoy the rest of your day and thank you for your participation in the 2010 Maroondah Business Week.