Some Goals for the IEEE Student Branch

A follow-up to my previous blog post about why I have a tendency to gravitate to leadership positions, I’d like to discuss some current goals I have for the IEEE Student Branch at UH Manoa. Here are some general goals that my Vice-Chair and I have considered:

1. Become financially sustainable
2. Increase membership participation and retention
3. Increase interest in leadership
4. Strengthen the general board
5. Create a better and more accountable clubroom
6. Increase member benefits
7. Better planning
8. More workshops
9. More officer benefits
10. More fun

After narrowing down that list, there are the most important goals that we decided on:

1. Become more financially sustainable
2. Increase membership participation and retention
3. Create a better and more accountable clubroom

The Endgame

I’d say that the overall goal is to create a sutainable club which continues to draw in membership and leadership talent to help it continue for years to come. A common pattern I’ve seen in the few years that I’ve been involved with the IEEE student branch is that it tends to crumble after waves of leadership enter and then subsequently exit. The crumble leaves the leadership batch to fend for themselves and ultimately repeat many of the same mistakes that the previous board did.

Some Discussion

Becoming more financially sustainable is an obvious one - any organization needs money to operate properly. And while student organizations such as the IEEE Student Branch at UH Manoa may have the benefit of University-related funding sources, we do not have a constant source of operational money: money that we are free to spend from a day-to-day basis. We’re more or less locked into the funding cycles of financial programs offered by our University.

Increasing membership participating and rentention is also extremely important in regards to leadership talent. Talent (which includes dedication) is extremely hard to lure in. By creating value in membership, we hope to attract future leaders by showing them that the IEEE Student Branch is a valuable technical and professional development tool.

A big part of the culture of IEEE Student Branch at UH Manoa revolves around the club room here. The club room provides a very town-center type feel and is especially important at a University where the majority of the population commutes to school. So by creating a better and more accountable club room, we hope to continue and enhance the trend of benefiting the student community. Our club has grown over the past few years, and has had to deal with some growing pains regarding the use of the club room.