Happy New Year! I hope all of you had a great break and are reenergised and ready to tackle the year ahead. All the best with those New Year’s resolutions!
The SAIMC team is meeting on 16 January to finalise our business plan for the next five years. This very important document has been in circulation for many months and is now ready for final comments and adoption. The key theme of the document is that of adding value for our members, thus ensuring that they see a return on their hard earned membership fees.
The councillors will also be contemplating how we, as a voluntary organisation, can deliver all the services that our members desire. To this end, we will be aligning all the branch and council activities with the new business plan. The branches will be scored according to a new branch categorisation tool, which will be fully aligned with the objective of serving our members better. Branches will be given the necessary resources to deliver on their new mandate and additional sub-committees will be set up at branch and council level to drive our various objectives. Some of which are:
1. Industry standards & specifications – SAIMC to contribute to industry standards and guard our industry and members interests.
2. Innovation – looking at the future plans for the SAIMC.
3. Public relations/marketing – raising the profile of the SAIMC.
4. Education and training – ensuring automation & control education standards are improved and youth are encouraged to join the profession.
5. Finance – financial management and financing of SAIMC activities.
6. SIP Skills – assisting ECSA with the planning of future automation & control resources for the infrastructure rollout over the next 20 years.
7. Thought leadership – assisting ECSA with future strategic planning for our country.
8. Automation Federation/IFAC/SACAC/IIG – collaborating with other automation & control stakeholders.
9. Branch categorisation – managing branch performance against the business plan.
10. Member value proposition – ensuring all member categories receive value for their money.
We call on all members who are willing and able to contribute to these sub-committees to contact me. We need as many volunteers as possible if we are to realise all our ambitions for SAIMC, sooner rather than later.
In particular the Member Value Proposition sub-committee will be working on a proposal for our Patron members to show them value for their significant annual contribution. I am sure they will see value in the new initiatives that the SAIMC is leading within the automation & control industry.
You will also find the branch and council activities on our website for the entire year – a first for the SAIMC! This will better enable you to plan your valuable time. We are also encouraging all members to send their industry events to [email protected] for publication on the industry calendar we now manage on our website. This will result in fewer clashes for training, seminars, golf days, site visits and year-end functions, to name a few.
Other objectives for the year include our quest to get automation and control recognised as the 10th engineering discipline by ECSA. We will continue lobbying for support from various stakeholders to strengthen our case. We will not give up until we achieve the recognition our industry deserves!
I thank you all for taking the time to read this column, please e-mail me on [email protected] with your constructive feedback.
Working together, achieving more,
Vinesh Maharaj, President
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