In February of last year, I hurriedly walked over to the CSEG office to attend my first board meeting as Assistant Director of Communications. After meeting all the incoming and outgoing directors, assistant directors, presidents, and our managing director, I was excited about the prospect of adding value to CSEG members in the next two years.
Fast forward to one year later, I have yet to meet all the board and committee members in person since that meeting in February due to the COVID-19. As the organization went through the change of conducting all meetings virtually, I had concerns about how I was going to develop relationships properly as a new board member without any face time. But I quickly learned that all the feelings like professionalism, mutual respect and camaraderie can still be communicated through computer screens.
In regards to the communication with our members, our committees and board members have been making considerable efforts to ensure that we are efficiently utilizing different ways of virtual communication. Our social media pages are not only the places to announce upcoming events and publications, but they are also the place to laugh together at inside jokes and learn something interesting about our profession.
Also, the RECORDER is moving towards a more digital, continuous posting format in 2021. This will allow the publication’s articles to reach our members in a more frequent and regular basis by announcing them through CSEG’s social media pages. This change is the reflection of the RECORDER committee’s efforts to adapt to the changing ways that our members absorb information.
Going back to the story about my first year as the board member, despite the lack of face time I was still able to develop friendship with many of the committee and board members. We shared the stories of how we spent the holidays, exchanged photos of our dogs and cracked a few jokes all through Zoom and email.
Through the recent changes in CSEG’s communication, our hope is that you continue to feel welcomed and supported in this community. Although we cannot say when in-person events will be allowed again, you can still feel connected in the community by responding to social media postings or sharing a RECORDER article.
As I’m preparing to take the position of Director of Communications, my hope is that we can use the virtual communication to our advantage by actively making connections online rather than considering it as a limiting alternative.
Share This Column