Happy May 2010! The theme of this executive message is community... just thought I would just spell it out for you all. It was after Peter Duncan’s address at the March CSEG AGM where he won the 2009 Honorary Membership Award, and spoke about (and I will paraphrase a little) how great we have it here in Calgary and how our environment is unlike any other he has experienced, that I started to ponder what makes our community so unique.
I was wandering around the Plus 15s at lunchtime, and one of my colleagues commented on the number of people we recognized and greeted. It started me thinking about how interconnected we all are in the Calgary energy sector. Back in the 90s, there was the trivia game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, where virtually every actor could be linked to Kevin Bacon within six professional steps. I am thinking that everyone in the geophysical community in Calgary (and across Canada for that matter) could be linked through a maximum of four degrees of separation... we are a tight community that promotes active social and professional networks. I rather like that.
This May, we are fortunate to be holding the GeoCanada 2010 convention in conjunction with the CSPG, CWLS (and many others). This is our time to shine academically, professionally and socially. I would like to encourage you to support your compatriots as they present technical talks and posters, cheer on our students during the Challenge Bowl, support our Outreach committee as they bring “Earth Science for Society” to the public eye, and network with the over 4,500 attendees (including me!) during the Monday Night Mixer, Tuesday Networking Happy Hour and the Friday Core Meltdown. Take advantage of these opportunities!
As part of the Communications portfolio on the CSEG Executive, we (Cheran Mangat, my Assistant Director, and I) are responsible for communicating these opportunities to you through our CSEG website and the RECORDER. Well, to be transparent, we oversee two rather wonderful committees who do the work, and we then report back to the Executive. A quick “shout out” to Satinder Chopra (ooh! “Four Degrees of Satinder Chopra”! Anyone? Anyone?), Penny Colton, Marian Hanna, Gary Margrave, John Logel, Jason Noble, Paul Anderson, Joanna Cooper, Jon Howlett, Eric Andersen, Kurt Wikel and Jim Racette who made the past year’s RECORDER publications commendable in an economic downturn. I also have it on good authority that the first articles everyone reads are “Tracing the Industry” and “the Grapevine”, so thanks to Carmen Swalwell and Lorna Engleson for keeping the gossip networks active and making our readers flip to the back of the magazine first. Corey Hooge is the backbone of our website (www.cseg.ca), and has taken it to the level we see today. Plans are in the works to make the website even more interactive going forward, and to streamline membership information and event registrations. A sincere thank you also to Carol Laws for her two years serving in the Communications role on the Executive: Cheran and I hope to continue moving forward as she has previously.
If anyone is interested in serving on any of the Communications’ committees, please let Cheran or me know. We are fortunate in that we work with some of the most creative people in our industry, and are always looking for new talent and ideas.
In conclusion! Our community is unique because we have made it so, and continue to do so by encouraging each other to maintain our connectivity through social and professional networking both casually and through events sponsored by the CSEG. We should be proud of who we are, what we have achieved and what we represent... the future of our industry.
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