It’s been a wild and exciting ride…so far
At the start of the year the IABC NSW board held our annual strategy day and agreed that we would check back in after six months to revisit the strategy and see how we were tracking. Our vice president Kieran McCann shares our 6 month update.
This week we had the chance to come together and ensure we’re continuing to deliver exceptional member value.
Looking back
To set us up for session, it is important to look back and celebrate our successes. As a chapter, we’re proud to continue to have a solid member base with highly engaged new and existing members, that we are in a sound financial position with great governance, and we have great ongoing relationships with UTS and our sponsors Salt & Shein.
The past six months, we have also:
Welcomed new corporate members
Delivered our first ever member-only learning and development workshops series; Change, Engagement and Artificial Intelligence by Lee Hopkins and Jo Curkpatrick and a highly differentiated Resilience and Mental Toughness workshop by Jo Pollard and our friends from Phuel
Delivered a sold out roundtable ‘Take your communication career to the next level’ with three leading communicators; Andrew McGinnes, Executive Manager, Corporate Affairs and Communications, Qantas Group; Mikeela Sinclair, Group Head of Integrated Campaigns, Westpac Group; and Karen Davis, General Manager, Global Communications, Xero
Delivered a sold out reputational management event with Karina Keisler, Executive General Manager of Communications and Stakeholder Engagement at Cricket Australia
Celebrated our NSW Gold Quill award winners
Enjoyed meeting our members and attendees at Salt & Shein’s sponsored event at the Corporate Affairs Summit and shared the key insights from the IABC World Conference in Vancouver with a special “Insights Unveiled” breakfast for members and non-members alike.
Developed, and will soon be releasing, an ‘experience survey’ (the first in over five years) to explore member and non-member insights into the IABC to help establish our strategy for 2020
Inspired a Banking and Finance Oath strategy session day thanks to our member Jodi O’Callaghan
Organised a new unique approach to events with a member only cocktail and dinner evening
Ensured our social channels, website articles and updates are rocking
Celebrated our president Andrew Cooper being elected onto the IABC Asia Pacific Board of directors.
An exciting six months ahead
Aside from a great series of events in the pipeline, including additional learning and development workshops on podcasting and corporate social responsibility, a wonderful thought-provoking session with Distinguished Professor Jim Macnamara, networking drinks and a sensational speaker ready for our Gala event, we’ve also outlined our ambitions and visions for the remainder of the year and into 2020:
Firming up an 18 month event calendar and booking events for 2020
Sending out our IABC NSW experience survey and sharing the results back with our communication community
Integrating a student support role
Continuing with great governance
Bringing forward our strategy day to October/November so that we can plan further ahead
Exploring the opportunities of working committees to support certain board roles
Beginning our search for recruiting our 2020 board
Continuing and honing our communication schedule and calendar.
I think we all left the session fired up for the next six months and into 2020.
I’m particularly excited by the opportunity to share our IABC NSW experience survey and would be extremely grateful if the community (members and non-members) would give us their feedback so we can deliver an evidence-based strategy for 2020. The survey will take no longer than five minutes and will be shared via our newsletter and buddy system in the coming weeks.
Our forward plans now extend into 2020 and we’ve already started our 2020 calendar of events and created a ‘wish list’ of speakers, workshop facilitators and event ideas. If you are, or know of, some exceptional speakers then please comment below or send me a direct message. I’d love to hear from you and our audience of strategic communicators and corporate associations are hungry for your insights.
Finally, the board roles are voluntary and I’m so thankful for everyone’s input. It’s a big job being a board member when we need to fit this work in alongside day jobs, work commitments, family and day-to-day life. As a board, we’re also externally grateful for our speakers, facilitators and event hosts who support us by offering time, insights and member opportunities on a pro bono basis. And, of course, we are very proud that Salt & Shein has renewed their sponsorship with us for 2020.
If you haven’t already, we invite you to join our network of communicators here in NSW. The board and I look forward to welcoming you into your community.
