President’s Corner – First—and Last—Steps in Any
Process
By Beth Wingate, AM.APMP, NCA Chapter President
One of the first things we learn as children and teach as parents is to say “please” and “thank
you!” We frequently hear “what’s the magic word?” Answer
(depending on the situation) – “please” or “thank you.”
One
of the first things I did when approached to run for NCA Chapter President was
to ask many of my NCA Board of Directors to “please” remain
on the following year’s board to help me run the largest chapter in the
world and to teach me how they ran their committees. I spent my first year as
NCA President learning and helping and encouraging our chapter leadership to
expand their committees and educational programming. This year, I’ve worked
with the board to refine, fine tune, and codify the way we run our events and
committees, and to turn that information into “run books” we can
leave that as our legacy to future boards. I’m happy to report that not
only have we documented all the “policies and procedures” of each
committee and event, but we’ve also shared this information with many of
the APMP chapters around the world to help them learn to run their own educational
events.
Along the way, I’ve tried hard to recognize everyone on the board
for their tireless efforts to support our chapter and APMP as a whole – and
I’ve
said “thank you” to each of them as often as I can. I’d like
to share my “thank you’s” to each of them here. As you meet
our board members – and our many committee members – at NCA functions,
please let them know how much you appreciate their many hundreds of hours of
volunteer support to our Chapter. They truly are the backbone of our outstanding
NCA Chapter.
Brenda Crist – Vice President and Professional Day Chair. Brenda
has been an active member of APMP-NCA since 2003, serving as Professional Day
Chair of Publicity (2006), Speakers Program (2007), and Chairperson (2008, 2009)
events. Brenda organized our NCA Chapter Strategic Planning meeting this year,
ran our successful Grant Program, and has done an outstanding job for our chapter.
Brenda has already set the wheels in motion for this coming year’s Professional
Day – now to be called the “NCA Annual Conference” in recognition
of its growth over the years. Brenda is running for the 2010 NCA Chapter President.
Thank you, Brenda, for your enthusiasm and amazing hard work on behalf of our
chapter!
Jan Cook Butorac – Secretary. Jan
has served for 4 years on the NCA Board, patiently and accurately providing minutes
of our Board meetings to the Board of Directors, and submits copy to the national
organization. Jan is switching gears for 2010 and running for NCA Membership
Chairperson. Thank you, Jan!
Eric Schwarz – Treasurer. Eric has been
an active member of APMP since September 2007 and joined the Board as a Director
at Large in 2008 and Treasurer in 2009. Eric, I appreciate your letting me twist
your arm to stay and help keep our finances in order! Eric is running for NCA
Treasurer for 2010. Thank you, Eric!
John Bender – Networking Committee Chairperson. John
has served on the Board for the past 8 years and currently leads the networking
activities at all Chapter functions. He meets and welcomes new members and colleagues,
provides them with information about the organization and events, answers questions,
and makes introductions to other members and colleagues. John has also graciously
provided meeting space and snacks for our Board meetings for years. He is leaving
the board in 2010. John, thank you so much for all of your encouragement and
support. Our meetings just won’t be the same without your warm welcome
and cold Diet Cokes!
Robert Lohfeld – Program Committee Chairperson. As
NCA’s Programs Chair the past 3 years, Bob set up a strong committee to
plan and obtain program presentations and speakers for our Roundtables – and
presented one of our best-attended Roundtables (on Capture Management). Bob championed
the creation of our first Proposal Basics Boot Camp and put together a committee
that went on to run a tremendously successful event. They have codified their
efforts in a “run book,” which is now in use by multiple APMP Chapters.
They repeated their stellar performance this year and are already hard at work
planning our 2010 event. Bob is retiring from the board at the end of this year.
Thank you, Bob, for your many hours of dedicated and motivating support!
Richard Patterson – Chapter’s Ombudsman.
Rick created the Chapter’s Ombudsman position in 2005 and has supported
the NCA Board ever since by creating and running our Chapter’s Job Board
web page. Rick is retiring from the board this year. Thank you so much for all
your support over the years, Rick!
Jay L. Schiavo – Marketing and Web Site Committee
Chairperson. Jay has served on the NCA Board since 2005 managing the Chapter’s
Marketing and Web Site efforts – truly an heroic effort requiring innumerable
hours of support. He has spent many hours educating us in the art of crafting
effective advertising, surveys, and messaging and in communicating the core messages
of our education programs. Thank you, Jay, for your creativity and your gracious
patience as we’ve all learned how to better communicate with our members!
Marcia Horting – Corporate Partner Chairperson. Marcia
has served on the NCA Board for the past 3 years as the 2008 and 2009 Corporate
Partner Chairperson, chair of NCA’s 2008 Boot Camp Program Subcommittee,
and 2007 Professional Day Exhibitors and Sponsors Subcommittee. Marcia has helped
to grow our Corporate Partner program into a strong cadre of businesses that
support the Chapter’s activities and promote our educational programming.
Marcia is retiring from the Board this year, and we will miss her strong leadership.
Thank you, Marcia!
Chris Simmons – Membership Committee Chairperson. This
is Chris’ third year on the board. He has been a regular contributor to
the NCA Executive Summary newsletter (now ezine) and a contributing author
to the APMP Journal. Chris also presented at the 2008 and 2009 NCA Proposal
Basics Boot Camps. As Membership Committee Chair, Chris encourages and promotes
membership in the Association and Chapter, coordinates the Chapter membership
roster with APMP International, identifies all new members, sends individual
welcoming messages to each new member, and coordinates activities to ensure retention
of existing members and promotion of new membership. Chris is running for 2010
NCA Chapter Vice President. Thank you, Chris!
Olessia Smotrova-Taylor – Newsletter (now ezine)
Chairperson. This is Olessia’s second year on the NCA Board,
and she and her committee produce our NCA Executive Summary ezine five times
each year. Under her leadership, the newsletter has evolved into a recognized
educational tool for our Chapter. Thank you, Olessia! We’re all looking
forward to the coming year’s ezines!
Bob Miller – Event Logistics Chair. This is Bob’s
second year on the board, and as Event Logistics Chair, Bob coordinates all meeting
arrangements with our hotel including catering and menu selection, room setup,
billing, contract negotiations, AV equipment, etc. He and his committee prepare
thousands of nametags for our events. He processes thousands of event registrations
for our Roundtables, Boot Camp, and Professional Day and then prepares our meeting
registration lists. Thank you so much for all of your hours of support and coordination
on behalf of our chapter, Bob!
Lou Robinson – Director at Large. Lou has supported
the NCA Chapter for 17 years. Lou served as the Chapter’s Treasurer for
8 years, Secretary for 6 years, President for 2 years, and Director-at-Large
for 2009. He was awarded the National APMP Leadership award in 2003. Thank you
for your tremendous dedication to our Chapter, Lou, and for all of the institutional
knowledge you’ve shared with all of us. You’ve definitely set the
bar high for the rest of us!
The End and the Beginning
This is the end of 2009, so “thank you” to all of you who
participated in Chapter events this year and supported our educational mission.
It’s also election season for NCA and for the International Boards of Directors.
Please take the time to vote in our local election, and thank you to all who
voted in the APMP International election in early December.
Results from the
APMP International election were publicized on December 9, and I’d like
to congratulate NCA Chapter member, Betsy Blakney, on her election as Chief Operating
Officer (COO) of APMP International. I’ve been elected
as APMP International’s Director of Education. (“Thank you” to
everyone who supported me!) In this position, I will take the lessons we’ve
learned and the programs we’ve initiated in our NCA Chapter to share with
APMP at the international level, and I look forward to working with all of you
to continue APMP’s mission.
As I step down at the end of this year as NCA
Chapter President, I’d like
to say “thank you” to all of the NCA members who’ve taken the
time to communicate with me over the past 2 years and to share their many suggestions
for improving our programming, events, web site, membership procedures, newsletter,
email broadcasts, Corporate Partner Program, and every other aspect of running
our chapter. I’ve listened to every suggestion and worked with our committees
to implement as many as we could. “Thank you” for being a member
of the NCA chapter, and “thank you” for all of your support over
the past 2 years. I look forward to seeing all of you at future APMP and NCA
events.
It’s also the beginning of our planning for NCA’s 2010 events,
so “please” get involved and enhance your proposal/business development
career and network with colleagues at the many opportunities the NCA Chapter
provides for you. “Please” consider writing an article for our ezine. “Please” help
identify dynamic topics and select speakers for our Roundtables, Professional
Day, and Proposal Boot Camp. “Please” work with our Membership Committee
to recruit new members and with our Network Committee to greet members at our
functions. “Please” share your talents, highlight your abilities,
and forge strong relationships with folks who understand your challenges and
goals.
There’s something for everyone within NCA. “Please” come
join us—you never know when the opportunity you seize today will reward
you in the future!
Beth Wingate, AM.APMP, APMP-NCA Chapter President, served as Newsletter Chair
and editor/publisher of NCA's Executive Summary newsletter in 2006 and 2007.
She has more than 22 years' proposal development experience. Beth is Managing
Director, Proposal Development and Corporate Communications for Lohfeld Consulting
Group, Inc. (www.LohfeldConsulting.com).
Contact Beth at
beth@apmpnca.org.
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