Newsletter: August 2015

Table of Contents

-Happy Hour

-Call for Volunteers

-Role of Chapter President

-Role of Chapter Secretary 

Happy Hour

Please join AMWA North Central chapter members for happy hour at Grumpy’s in Roseville, MN, on August 19th from 5-7 pm. Overflow parking is available at the strip mall kitty corner from Grumpy’s after 5 pm. RSVPs are appreciated: president@amwanorthcentral.com. 

Volunteers are needed!

Get involved at the chapter level! AMWA North Central Chapter will need members to serve as chapter officers in the fall. Read below for more details about the positions of president and secretary. 

Your name here: President-elect______

by Nissa Mollema

The AMWA North Central President role is designed as a three-year term where the selected AMWA member serves one year as President-elect, one year as President, and one year as Immediate Past President. No prior executive committee experience is needed to serve as president-elect—all training is provided during the first year. The first year is spent as “President-elect,” where the member has an opportunity to learn about the roles of members of the executive committee and general operations of the chapter. The President-elect serves as a delegate for the fall and spring AMWA board of directors meetings, which are great opportunities for networking and travel. The second year of the term is spent as President of the chapter—leader of chapter operations.  The President receives communications from the AMWA headquarters and is responsible for relaying news and helping the North Central chapter committee members to achieve goals for the year.  The final year as Immediate Past President involves minimal responsibilities and, if needed, the past president can provide guidance to the new president. The term of the president position ensures that this role is a “team effort” with three people putting their heads together and making light work of the position. Previous presidents of the North Central Chapter have come from all different backgrounds and levels of experience—if you are looking to develop leadership experience, this is a wonderful opportunity! Please contact Nissa with specific questions about the role: president@amwanorthcentral.com 

The role of the Secretary in the AMWA North Central Chapter (and wouldn't you like to have it?)

by Naomi Ruff

I have served as Secretary or Co-Secretary (more on that later) of the AMWA North Central chapter since October 2013. This has been a great position for me, particularly because I live in Duluth, far from the population center of the chapter, and I can do my job remotely. Being Secretary has given me the opportunity to get to know more about the chapter, form relationships with other chapter leaders, and learn a few new skills. The time I devote to it is not onerous and is well balanced by the rewards I get from contributing to our community of medical communicators.

In the North Central AMWA chapter, the Secretary has 3 main roles:

1. To keep the website updated, with help from the newsletter editor and others

2. To keep the membership informed

3. To participate as a member of the chapter Executive Committee

1. The website

The website is set up in a WordPress platform. For those of you unfamiliar with WordPress or with website management more generally, this means that it is very easy to make changes. You don’t have to know anything about coding, although knowing a little lets you get a bit fancier. If you haven’t looked at the website lately, check it out to see what it offers.

Each month, the newsletter editor uploads a draft of the newsletter to the site. I check it over, making sure that everything looks right and any links work, and then I send it out to the rest of chapter leadership in PDF form for proofreading and approval, updating it as needed in response to the feedback.

I also keep the events calendar updated with information from our chapter, other AMWA chapters, the national AMWA organization, and the world at large, and I make sure chapter reports and other important documents are on the site as well. Occasionally, there is routine maintenance or other changes, like updating the resources page.

2. Keeping the membership informed

Once the newsletter is approved by the leadership, I send it out to the members as an email via MailChimp—again, a very user-friendly platform. In fact, chances are that you are reading this in an email distributed through MailChimp. We also use MailChimp to distribute job ads to those who are interested in receiving them and announcements about events of interest—perhaps an extra message or two a month.

3. Serving on the Executive Committee

In some ways, participation on the EC is the most interesting part of the job. We meet by teleconference once a month to discuss policies, programs, and ways to both engage and serve chapter members. This is a great way to make sure that your voice and priorities are heard and to shape the AMWA experience. A few times each year there is additional work to do, such as planning for our new membership award, considering the budget for the upcoming year, or reviewing changes to our bylaws.

Although Secretary is technically a 3-year commitment, the chapter has a wonderful “Co-Secretary” setup that eases everyone into and out of the position. In your first year, you serve as Co-Secretary with the person in their third year in the position—kind of an apprenticeship. You can slowly learn the ropes and take over responsibilities as you become comfortable with them. In your second year, you serve alone as Secretary. In your third year, someone new comes on as Co-Secretary, and you in turn train them and slowly hand over the responsibilities. A written handbook further smoothes the transition. In this way, no one is thrown into the deep end, and the chapter retains continuity.

Officer terms begin October 1, to roughly coincide with the AMWA annual conference. It is therefore time for us to find a Co-Secretary. Would you like to work with me in the coming year? I would love to have you! Please contact me at secretary@amwanorthcentral.com.