District 5 Leadership Conference

The conference was held at Cuyahoga Community College, Western Campus Parma, Ohio.

There were ten attendees at the conference, including ISA President Leo Staples and Bob Crigler of ISA Marketing and Business Development. The six sections were represented at the conference were Cleveland, Niagara, Charleston, Dayton, Michigan and Toledo.  Attendees were welcomed by Rick Albrecht District Vice President 2010-2011 and Debashis Sadhukhan VP Elect. Each of the attendees introduces themselves and identified what section they were from. 

The first presentation after the welcoming was by John Mihevic on ISA Certifications. The primary point of the talk was that the certifications are global and not specific to a country or state. It was noted that the CCST material is now available on-line for use by members. Discussions about the certifications where concerned about how to make them have value to those who obtain them and making them of importance to employers. It was noted that some employers were requiring that technicians to have or obtain CCST’s. this requirement is mainly in petrochemical and power/energy industries. 

The second presentation was by William Stange from Wright-Patterson about Engine Turbine testing. His presentation talked about types of instrumentation primarily used for measurement tip timing and blade temperatures. He talked about how these measurements triggered the need for developing standards for Test Cell Instrumentation. As a result there is now a committee ISA 107 for development of these standards. 

William Stange was also scheduled to talk about ISA Governance but it was delayed until Saturday afternoon. 

Debashis Sadhukhan gave the final presentation of the day on the NASA CPS. He showed a video about how the centralized services such as air and electrical are provided from a common supply system at NASA Glen. The volumes and conditions of air required by the wind tunnels are so large that the resulting power demands limit the testing to third shift. Having a common supply system for air is unique to NASA Glen. 

The Honors and Awards dinner was then held at Bucci’s Restaurant, where certificates were awarded to each of the section presidents. At the dinner there were a number of discussions concerning how to attract new members and getting more input from existing members. There was no consensus on how to achieve these goals.

Leo Staples ISA President gave the first presentation on Saturday morning. He started by giving some of his background and how he became a member of the ISA. He was brought to a meeting by another employee where he worked (Oklahoma Gas & Electric). The questions he raised were what has the ISA done for him and what has the ISA done for his company. Leo also talked about future concerns for the ISA:

            Financial Performance

            Society Governance

            Strengthening ISA

            Embracing Technology

In the area of financial performance while the investments held by the ISA are doing OK, the ISA is spending approximately $1.2 million more than it takes in. The largest source of income is standards and each member costs more than the society receives from their dues. Therefore this is a critical issue to be addressed by the leaders. 

The existing Society Governance is being reviewed (later talk) but the existing system is not efficient and not responsive to needs of the ISA. 

Strengthening ISA is required to insure its survival and will require input from all. 

The ISA needs to embrace new technologies in its operation. They are working on including social media links on the web site. 

One of the issues discussed was mentoring and having it occur within the ISA sections. Leo Staples indicated that this was of value to both him and the company he worked for. 

William Stange was next to talk on the work of the ISA Governance task force. The task force is working with a consulting firm to develop a proposed new structure for governance of the ISA. A proposal will be issued for review by the time of the Spring Leaders Meeting in St. Louis. At this time the proposal is based on have a board of governors to direct the ISA. The goals are to make the system more responsive to the needs of the members. 

Bob Crigler Marketing and Business Development Manager for the ISA gave the next presentation. He talked about work that has been done to improve the distribution channels for the books produced by the ISA in Asia and South America. Also he presented information on what is being done to increase the use of technology by the staff at ISA offices. Up-dating of the ISA web site and the addition of links to social media sites were discussed. There was a discussion about training of the staff to improve the interface to the members and purchasers of ISA material. The Spring Leaders Meeting will be held in St. Louis at the Chase Park Hotel on 6/25 to 6/29. The event will include scheduled activities for families along the meetings for the leaders. 

Rick Albrecht then conducted the District 5 Council Meeting. He presented the following information about District 5; there are 10 sections in the district, there are 1605 members and 6 student sections. An election was held for District Vice President Elect Elect, Nominator and Alternate Nominator. The results were:

            District Vice President Elect Elect – Jason P. Wright, Michigan

            Nominator - Rick Albrecht, Niagara

            Alternate Nominator – Dawn, Rochester

Rick Albrecht indicated that the Niagara Section may be willing to hold the 2012 District 5 Leadership Conference next year and he will confirm. 

Each of the section representatives then gave a brief report on their sections actives. 

Joe Kaulfersch of the Cleveland section gave a talk on the history of the Cleveland section and on leadership. I have a hardcopy of his Power Point for anyone interested. 

The meeting was adjourned at this point.

General Notes

It is OK to provide links from a section web site to event sponsors or booth renter’s web sites. 

The Niagara section which has about 180 members conducts a vendor show each year. 

Eventbrite.com is a web site for processing credit cards which has been used by ISA Boston. 

It was asked that any changes to section by-laws be forwarded to the District VP.