President’s Message
Partners at the Summit
For the past year, I’ve written often in this
space about national AIHA’s volunteer
groups, and with good reason. Our volunteers’ commitment to the profession of industrial hygiene forms the foundation of
all that our association has accomplished.
This month, in my last column as
AIHA president, I’m pleased to discuss
another cornerstone of AIHA’s success—
our local sections. For many members,
local sections are the face of AIHA.
Often, a new member’s first impression
of AIHA is formed at a local section
meeting. Our high membership retention
rate is just one indication that local sections do a splendid job of welcoming
new members and making them feel like
valued participants in a professional
community.
Multitude of Ideas
In March, representatives of AIHA local
sections, the Local Sections Council, and
the Board of Directors attended a Local
Sections Summit at AIHA’s national office to discuss ways to forge a more effective partnership between local
sections and AIHA national. As many of
you know, AIHA local sections are autonomous entities with their own dues,
officers and professional programming.
Although membership in both a local
section and AIHA national is encouraged, it is not required.
Running a local section requires a significant volunteer commitment. The
Summit in March—as well as a follow-up
virtual town hall meeting in April that
occurred too late for inclusion in this article—was intended to better align and
broaden the synergy between local sections and AIHA national. Participants
unearthed a multitude of ideas and
shaped them into the following broad
recommendations:
1. Develop a culture of expectation that
AIHA members will naturally be involved in local sections. Promote affiliation with AIHA national and the
value of AIHA membership at local
section meetings. Expand the concept
of membership to a broader audience
and promote the culture of belonging.
Develop ways to connect industrial
hygiene to hot topics (for example,
green building and sustainability).
2. Develop an online community, activities and training for local section officers. Develop and share local section
best practices. Redesign the AIHA
Speakers Bureau.
3. Develop and publish new measures of
local section success. (Possible metrics
include member involvement and
member services.)
Participants also discussed the overlapping roles of the Local Sections Council and the AIHA Board Coordinators. The
council’s mission is to serve as a liaison
between local sections, the AIHA Board
of Directors, and AIHA staff. The Board
Coordinators are Directors charged with
supporting several local sections. As a result of those discussions, I appointed a
task force to examine the current governance structure and recommend ways to
better use volunteer and financial resources. The task force members are Di-anne Grote Adams, CIH, CSP, CPEA;
David Roskelley, MSPH, CIH, CSP;
Theodore Knutson, PE; Jeff Throckmor-ton, CIH; and Chris Lorenzo, CIH. Elizabeth Pullen, CIH, is chair of the task
force.
Ideal Community
I’ve had the privilege of knowing firsthand the value of local communities and
the challenges of leading them. My time
on the AIHA Board of Directors, and especially my year as AIHA president, has
familiarized me with the similar challenges and rewards of leading a larger
group. In both roles, leadership has made
me feel more involved in the community; I had more at stake, I took more
pride in the community’s successes and
consequently felt deeply rewarded and
immensely supported. For these reasons,
I urge members to become more involved in AIHA, whether at the local
section level or the national level.
For all the buzz surrounding the word
community—thanks to the soaring popularity of online social networking—the
most effective communities are still
those that provide physical forums for
interaction among real people. That kind
of community—where people put faces to
names, shake each other’s hands, engage
in conversation, and share ideas for
solving common problems—is priceless
and will never go out of style. That’s the
kind of community our local sections
provide.
Since I can’t shake all of your hands,
this will have to do: thank you, truly, for
giving me the opportunity to be your
president. It’s been a privilege and an
honor to serve this great profession.
CathyCole,CIH,CSP,ispresidentofAIHAand
directorofcorporateoccupationalhealthatThe
Sherwin-WilliamsCompanyinCleveland,Ohio.
Shecanbereachedat(216)566-3096or
cathy.l.cole@sherwin.com.
