I recently became self-employed and have been going along to a few local networking events (although to be honest I think I am more likely to find ways of spending money than earning it, and the work I have so far is via contacts and LinkedIn). Anyway I went to an Athena meeting and have been asked to join. It seems to me that I need to get at least £500 value pa out of it to make it worthwhile. Has anyone joined their local network and would they recommend it over more ad hoc groups where you can just turn up and pay? At the moment I am thinking I won't bother but it seems to be quite popular with lots of local groups so I didn't want to miss a trick.