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From Your Executive Director, August 2021

Greetings ASIS&T Members,

As is always the case around this time of year, most of our thoughts and activities focus around the Annual Meeting. This year's meeting is particularly challenging as we strive to simultaneously produce an in-person meeting and an online meeting. This presents unique challenges that we have never faced before. We know that we cannot create the in-person experience for those participating online, but we want to make that experience as rich as possible. This requires increased audio visual equipment and staffing to cover all sessions. It's shaping up to be an intimate gathering in Salt Lake City with the majority of attendees participating online. But it will be wonderful to see those of you that are able to attend. We are sure it will be another high-quality meeting with excellent speakers and content, regardless of how you access it!

In other news, Brian mentioned the Board's interest in exploring the possibility of launching a consulting service. This is an exciting undertaking and one which I am eager to pursue. Over the next few months we will be rolling out additional details on the offering and inviting ASIS&T members to give us feedback and express their interest in participating in this innovative undertaking. I am confident that this new service line will not only provide some much-needed revenue for ASIS&T, but will increase our visibility and profile with both the public and private sectors around the world.

We are looking forward to recognizing our innaugural class of ASIS&T Distinguished Members at the Annual Meeting. These individuals have demonstrated their commitment to the profession and the associatoin through engagement and service at the highest levels. Look for these folks at the Annual Meeting and make sure they're part of your professional network. If you're interested in pursuing Distinguished Membership for yourself, keep in mind that the primary eligibility requirements are continuous membership in ASIS&T and attendance at meetings. So be sure to renew your membership on time and take advantage of the opportunities presented at the Annual Meeting and elsewhere. We look forward to welcoming more Distinguished Members in the near future!

The rollout of our membership renewal cycle conversion has gone smoothly and we very much appreciate your patience with us as we make this conversion. As I've mentioned before, our auditors have recommended and the Board has agreed that we must move to a July-June membership year cycle in order to meet US tax guidelines. In order to make this happen, most members have been asked to either pay a slightly larger or smaller amount of dues in order to bring them to a July-June cycle. Our database is struggling to keep up with this and we've had a couple of mis-steps along the way with unintentional emails being sent to members. However, you've worked with us to make this right and ensure that everyone's membership conforms to the new guidelines by the end of this fiscal year.

As always, we appreciate your continued commitment to the organization and feedback on how we are doing. Please don't hesitate to reach out if we can be of help in any way.

All the best, Lydia