SIS becomes Bright Futures

Linked-In, the business focused social networking site is phenomenal.  I took a call from an old friend who suggested we try to get an old alumni site together.  I used to run a national student society called the Student Industrial Society (SIS).   When the old Industrial Society (which was the parent of the SIS) finally gave up the ghost and folded about ten years ago it ended up being led by the left leaning social commentator and writer Will Hutton.  It did though get a great new name - The Work Foundation.  Unfortunately its vibrant student arm, the SIS was hived off to a career advisory library quango in Cambridge called CRAC and became briefly The Skills Society. It is now called something new and to these ears, adopted a mind-numbingly awful name; Bright Futures, though it does have a new entrepreneurial owner Simon Reichwald.   Its such a shame it now sounds like a budget holiday company.  I googled Bright Futures and could not find the organisation which at its height had about 30,000 student members all over the UK and Ireland...I could though find something about toothpaste and dental hygiene.  Anyway, Simon now has the responsibility of building the society and the brand again in a market where the recruitment of graduates is almost certain to get tight again.  Hopefully the values of the SIS organisation from which many people gained so much still hold true.  We will be watching with interest.  Back on Linked-In; we have found 49 former members - mainly from the early 1990’s.  Few are captains of Industry - though very many are consultants, coaches, advisors and mentors to the aforementioned captains.  Again - the market for such consulting services is likely to tighten and the value of contacts, networks and these extended ‘virtual networks’ is likely to become enormous in the next couple of years.  I have been a little slow to jump in their, but since noodling around with Linked in and building some contacts it's fascinating to see how it develops.  Its powerful in one way - easy and intuitive to use.  At the same time I wondered what all these people building virtual networks did with their time before they spent hours on social networking sites.  Inspired, several of our Alumni have suggested we meet up for a beer and find out.  A date has now been fixed for later this month.  The invite is now on Linked in and Facebook...  Lets see how many show up to network in the real world.  I will report back here.  The Alumni site is here:  SIS Alumni.