Melissa Wheeler, EIT, M.ASCE, your Region 5 Director, is a member of the Georgia Section and the Transmission Project Management organization at Georgia Power Company in Atlanta, Georgia.

Melissa represented you at the ASCE Board of Direction meeting held March 27-28 at the Renaissance Capital View Hotel in Crystal City, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C.  As in recent years, the meeting was held in conjunction with the ASCE Legislative Fly-in and the OPAL Awards Gala, allowing board members to support those events.

With the March meeting, the board relaunched its ongoing strategic planning process, first instituted in 2006. Over time, that process led to ASCE’s current strategic initiatives of Infrastructure, Raise the Bar, and Sustainability.

An advisory council made up of four Board members, chaired by Region 8 Director Kristina Swallow, has been working with staff to create a preliminary list of “strategic issues”—states of affairs, developments, or trends that could have a major impact on civil engineering, ASCE members, and ASCE as an organization.

Board members received this list of strategic issues and topics in advance of the March Board meeting and were asked to think about what might be missing. During the meeting, members divided into breakout groups to share their thoughts on gaps, as well as provide input on relevancy, clarity, and issue consolidation.

The same question--what’s missing?--was asked of the chairs of the ASCE Society and Strategic Initiative Committees and, following the Board meeting, of an expanded group that includes Region Governors and Section Presidents, Institute leaders, and the ASCE Industry Leaders Council.

During a full-day strategic planning session at its July meeting, the Board will consider this input and work to better understand the issues and begin the process of refining the list. Then, at an October Board session an updated ASCE “radar screen” of strategic issues will be created.

Such a radar screen represents the 10 to 20 issues the Board feels are most important for ASCE to either act on or monitor. In subsequent planning, the Board must then decide which of the very highest priority issues should be addressed as strategic initiatives.

Once the top few issues are identified as strategic initiatives, the Board will establish desired outcomes and will charge the relevant committees to present action plans to achieve those goals. Finally, such initiatives will need to be launched through the budget process. Over time, the Board will monitor progress on the initiatives and will later return to scanning the environment for major trends that could require more focused attention down the road.

• A report from the Continuing Education Blue Sky Task Committee outlining a bold new direction for ASCE’s continuing education programs

• Authorization to proceed with the development of a proposal to create the Utility Engineering and Surveying Institute, for consideration by the Board at its July meeting

• A discussion of ASCE’s current and future role in ABET in light of pending changes in that organization’s governance

• An update from the Industry Leaders Council on its work to optimize the return on infrastructure investments
  
  
• Approval of 13 new Distinguished Members
  
  
• Adoption of a set of core values to guide the Board’s interactions

Read more on the Board’s meeting in ASCE News.

Board members are interested in your views on the issues they are considering. To share your views, or other ideas on how ASCE can better serve its members and the profession, please email Melissa.