Being in the chair for only a matter of weeks has exposed me to the continuing nature of the business and in particular the nature of the people with whom we work side by side every day.

Those who do not work for Cleanevent can only imagine what drives us on relentlessly to achieve personally and to kick goals for our company. Day to day in the venues, with schedules in hand for the next three months we fairly well know where we will be and what we will be doing at what time. This is not the case when we are involved in the event side of our business.

When the call comes, those in venues or events know that there will be a job for them in the event. Whether this is a major or a minor role, they will participate in some way and will get a sense of achievement from their contribution.

While the Olympics get underway and ultimately goes ahead, we will be looking to our interchange or rotation players to step up and take it up. In some companies there would be the hesitation that maybe the reserves might not cut it, but in our organisation there won't be one thought of that nature. Such is the depth of talent and the resourcefulness of the management team we have, that we can in cases like this, go ahead with confidence that we will still win.

This confidence is bolstered by recognition of all of our efforts when we can lay claim to the awards such as the Banksia Award and now more recently that the Melbourne Exhibition & Convention Centre has been awarded the Exhibition Centre of the Year Award, internationally. Are we doing something right? Yes we are. It says that we can get ready to roll out an Olympic effort and still keep the focus.

These awards are not a result of one group's efforts over a short period of time. It takes commitment and dedication over a measured period by all of the teams all of the time working in coordination to get these results.

So now we are back to us. It can be said in two words, that which makes us different. Pride and Passion.