Canadian Chapters Meeting #4

Five of the six Canadian STC chapter presidents met in April by teleconference, and we discussed the following ideas.

Electing a Canadian Director

The directors who won in the 2010 election each garnered from 306 to 457 votes. Considering this, we think we could elect a Canadian director with just over 300 votes. Bernard Aschwanden from the Toronto chapter intends to run for a director position next year. STC policy states that chapters cannot endorse a candidate, but we can certainly help to publicize the candidacy of a Canadian. We can’t expect a single Canadian director to change the entire STC organization, and every director has a duty to the entire organization, not just one country, but a Canadian director can advocate for issues affecting members outside of the USA, and facilitate communication between the Canadian chapters and the Board of Directors. The Canadian chapter presidents agreed to continue working together to facilitate this two-way communication.

Salary Survey

The national salary survey has been drafted, but we are debating who should participate in the survey. On one hand, the survey results are a significant benefit, and we would like to restrict it to STC members. On the other hand, if we include non-members, we will obtain a better statistical sample. However, concerns have been raised about the accuracy of the survey if we cannot be sure that the participants are technical communicators. One possibility is that we send the survey to employers and clients in addition to members. Discussions are ongoing, but we feel we can meet the intended schedule of an October distribution for December results.

Insurance Proposal

Canada West Coast chapter is spearheading the investigation into health insurance for independent contractors and consultants because many of the STC members work in this capacity. The CWC chapter has found several alternatives, and are developing a survey to find out which option their members prefer. The other Canadian chapters are welcome to re-use the survey and offer the same insurance coverage as a chapter-member benefit.

Proposed National Organization

A senior STC member and STC Fellow, Geoff Hart, has proposed the idea of creating a Canadian umbrella organization. This organization would collect STC dues and give a portion of them directly to the Canadian chapters (thus avoiding currency conversion fees), send the rest of the money to Head Office (so it’s only converted once), centralize the international affiliation agreement, and co-ordinate communication and joint efforts between the provinces. We had some concerns about the availability of volunteers to work in a national organization, and whether it would be cost-effective. A business plan is required; however Geoff is unable to commit his time to develop one. Is anyone else interested in pursuing this? If so, please contact your chapter president.

Usefulness of Canadian Chapter Meetings

The Canadian chapter presidents agreed that these conference call meetings have been helpful to all participants, and we intend to continue having them on an as-needed basis. We also took the opportunity to compare membership numbers. Most chapters have experienced a 50% drop in membership and are taking steps to attract more members and encourage people to renew. Both the Toronto and Alberta chapters are exceptions to the membership decline; Alberta even won the STC renewal race for chapters of 150 to 300 members! Congratulations, Alberta!

Several chapters introduced their incoming presidents who will participate in meetings after June 2010.

As always, if you have any concerns, questions or suggestions, please discuss them with your chapter president.

Canadian Chapters Meeting #3

The Canadian chapter presidents had another meeting on November 11. Here are the highlights:

• Our request to the Society (Head Office) to enable us to elect a Canadian director has been turned down.
  
• The Alberta chapter has shared their salary survey questions with the other Canadian chapters, where they will be reviewed to see how they can be used to perform our own Canadian salary survey.
  
• Our chapter offered the Society an interest-free loan for two years, and the Society turned down the offer. As a result, our chapter will keep all surplus funds to pay for our chapter activities. The Society will not have to cover a shortfall in our budget for years to come.
  
• Two other Canadian chapters have decided to make a gift of some of their surplus funds.
  
• All Canadian chapters are interested in amending the international chapter affiliation agreement, which the Society says is open for amendments because it no longer reflects the new relationship between the Society and the international chapters. The Toronto chapter and our chapter have been drafting an amended agreement, and we will share it with the other chapters and the Society.
  
• The Toronto chapter discovered that the council members are actually covered by the Society’s Directors and Officers (D&O) insurance, contrary to information that we were previously given. This means that each chapter does not have to buy their own insurance, saving us hundreds of dollars annually. We have a copy of the policy which specifically states that Canada is a jurisdiction that is covered.
  

We discussed a mutual concern about getting new and existing members to join/renew their memberships not only with the Society, but with our chapter. The new dues structure makes it easier for people to join the STC without joining a specific chapter; in fact, people will have to pay an additional fee if they want to become a member of any chapter. Since the amount of funding available from the Society depends on the number of members who join chapters, people who choose to become members of the Society only will have a big impact on what services the chapters will be able to provide.

We decided that a three-tier pricing policy (one for non-members, one for STC members, and one for chapter members) was unwanted overhead. Instead, chapters decided that a two-tier approach would be easier to manage. The structure of those tiers is something that each chapter will have to decide. For example, one option would be to give discounts to all STC members (regardless of whether or not they are a member of the chapter). Another option would be to give discounts only to members of the chapter. In all cases, fees paid for events will go directly to the chapter.

If you have any questions or concerns about these issues, please feel free to comment, or send an email directly to president@stc-soc.org.

Canadian Chapters Meeting #2

The Canadian chapter presidents had another meeting on September 22, 2009. Here are the highlights:

• We are going to propose to Head Office that Canadian members be allowed to elect a Director who will represent Canadian interests.


• We are developing a Canadian salary survey.


• The chapters that have a surplus would like to voluntarily share at least some of it with Head Office. We recognize that the local members worked for that money and deserve to benefit from it, so we are working to balance our chapter's needs with Head Office's needs. We are currently negotiating with Head Office to find a way to do that.


• We discussed contingency plans in case the STC organization goes bankrupt.

Feel free to comment if you have any concerns or ideas.

Canadian Chapters Are Meeting

The Canadian Chapters would like to discuss how and how much we can co-operate to provide more services for Canadian STC members. Due to the vacation season, it's taken a while to find a date when a representative from each Canadian chapter can meet via a conference call. That call is now scheduled for August 12, so check back next week to see the results of that meeting.

In the meantime, the council has created a budget for 2009-2010 and we plan to submit it to Head Office to meet their deadline of August 17. The council is also working on finalizing the by-laws which is a requirement of registering as a non-profit organization.


More to come...

A Conversation with Head Office

Cindy Currie, President of the STC, talked to our chapter and other Canadian chapters about our reluctance to give our surplus funds to STC Head Office, and our general feeling that we are not fully integrated in the international organization. There were representatives from the Canada West Coast, Alberta, Manitoba, Eastern Ontario, Toronto, and Montreal chapters, as well as us. Cindy was joined by Susan Burton, Executive Director/CEO, and Aiessa Moyna, Treasurer. We had a very constructive and enlightening conversation; these are the highlights:

• Canadian chapters are not legally obliged to give surplus funds to STC Head Office.


• Cindy made the case that if we want to see the STC survive, we should be motivated to help them out financially because without enough funding, the STC will collapse. Passing surplus funds to Head Office is meant to be a temporary measure to see them through the financial crisis.


• The Canadian chapters pointed out several important services that Head Office does not provide, such as a Canadian salary survey and group insurance. The Canadian chapters discussed taking the initiative to implement these purely Canadian services. Cindy said that the Society might fund these initiatives if we presented them with a business case.


• The Canadian chapters discussed whether to form a national organization.

The Canadian chapters are currently discussing where to go from here. In my opinion, all Canadian STC members would benefit from closer co-operation between the Canadian chapters, but whether there is enough collective will to form a national organization remains to be seen.

The Southwestern Ontario chapter is currently setting the budget for the rest of 2009 and 2010 to meet Head Office's deadline of August 17. As part of the budget discussion, we will explore what, if anything, we can do to help Head Office out of their financial crisis.

Your thoughts and feedback are always welcome.

I'll keep you posted on any new developments.