President's Finale

Jeff Feuquay

As discussion at the latest Board meeting showed, it has been a productive year for IPMAAC. This was due in vast part to the efforts of an experienced team of committee chairs. I'll discuss a few of the accomplishments and accomplishers in the random order of the stack of paper next to me.

First, Bill Waldron, of TECO Energy, Inc., has continued to maintain and enhance IPMAAC's award-winning Electronic Communication Network (ECN). With its home at "ipmaac.org", the site gives our organization a truly international presence; our discussion group has about 200 members from eleven countries. Bill has also forged links with online booksellers such that we receive revenue when books in our field are sold to those coming from our location. I get tremendous pleasure pointing people to our website when asked "What's IPMAAC?" I encourage you to point people to it.

Beverly Waldron has both facilitated the ECN and ramrodded the ACN, the Assessment Council News. The quality of this publication is self-evident. Not so obvious are Beverly's unrelenting efforts to get sub-editors and authors (such as this author) to meet time commitments so that we can have a communication medium we can count on. A call from Beverly when one is tardy is as appreciated and painful as the snap of a parachute harness when it does its job . . . saved again, ouch. ACN is another benchmark in our industry; another fine place to point folks in answer to the question, "What's IPMAAC?"

As past-president, Paul Kaiser chaired the Nominations Committee, blessing us with a slate of excellent candidates. As most should know, Kristine Smith will become President-elect of January 1, 1999, to be joined by new Board members Beverly Waldron and Mike Willihnganz. Ilene Gast accepted the Board's request that she fill Kristine's unexpired term on the Board. Please help me continue in Paul's footsteps -- send me names of individuals who you believe should be nominated this next year. Paul Kaiser also chaired the By-Laws Committee. The Board reviewed and approved a number of proposed by-laws changes which will be submitted to the membership for ratification prior to our next annual meeting. The primary thrust of the proposals is to recognize that the skills and information possessed by IPMAAC are applicable in both the public and private sectors.

The Training Committee, headed by Kristine Smith, is working with the IPMA Regional Conference Chairs to offer IPMAAC-sponsored sessions. The committee is also providing ECN with updated training information and continuing to refine the Oral Examination course materials. They are also exploring those IPMAAC training session components which might be appropriate in the IPMA foundations track.

T.R. Lin and Ken Shultz, Co-chairs of the Student Paper Committee, solicited student papers for our conference with inordinate success. The two also coordinated the review process and worked to ensure that the conference presentations came off as planned. T.R. also worked heavily with the Board to refine and revise the solicitation and selection process. Results are clear of the efforts of the Bemis duo, Anne Soileau, Nominating Committee Chair, and Harry Brull, IPMAAC Representative to the Bemis Board and Selection Committee. IPMAAC continues to be proud to join in the Bemis award process.

Those who attended saw the results of the work of Jean Tozer, Conference Program Chair, and Renee Jones, Host Committee Chair. Until one has the opportunity to Chair Program or Host Committee, it is not possible to fully appreciate the time and effort required to ensure success. This year, Jean thoroughly revised our Call for Papers to allow it to also serve as a marketing tool -- to provide information about who and what we are -- with considerable success. Her format will likely be the foundation of our on-going efforts to expand and cement our membership base. Harry Brull and Deonda Scott, Co-chairs of the Marketing Committee , bolstered Jean's efforts by providing new and rich recruitment sources, and by reviewing the marketing media to ensure breadth of appeal.

Finally, committee chairs were quick to praise the IPMA/IPMAAC staff for their efforts. It is only through their professional efforts that volunteer committee chairs and board members can hope to maintain an organization we can be proud of. Thanks for all the work done by the Committees, their Chairs and the IPMA/IPMAAC staff.

Committee work for next year is already well underway. But, we are a volunteer organization and the rowing is easier with more hands on the oars. Look through here and/or look through the ECN, find next year's Committee Chairs, contact one of them and get to work. Advancing one's field is the hallmark of a true professional.