IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - May/June 2022 - 8

Tim Licitra
a brief look back
a big look forward
I
8
IN JUNE 2021, I WAS LUCKY ENO UGH
to be selected as the next executive director
of the IEEE Power & Energy
Society (PES). Coming from an organization
outside IEEE and doing so during
the COVID-19 pandemic certainly
creates a different type of transition and
onboarding experience. However, my
experience is with a standards development
association within the lighting
engineering industry, so this familiarity
has aided me during this time.
Future Endeavors
We have navigated many issues during
this transition period and started
to lay the groundwork for our future
successes. Working hand in hand with
Society leadership, we have worked
through several issues, such as the
continued impact of the pandemic on
conferences and meetings (and the Society
as a whole), the unfortunate passing
of PES President Frank Lambert,
and more. Together, many improvements
have been made already but
more so internally. We have worked to
improve our bylaws, the roles and responsibilities
of our Governing Board
(GB) members, the onboarding process
for new GB members, alignment
(structurally) of our committees with
the GB, and started to gather more information
from our members and customers
to better understand how we
can serve you all in the future, among
other items.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPE.2022.3150813
Date of current version: 19 April 2022
ieee power & energy magazine
As we progress through the new
calendar year, we are excited for the
successes that 2022 will bring for PES.
There is a renewed focus in many areas
that you, the membership, will experience.
Some of these items include
✔ Efficiency: We are reviewing our
operations to streamline and improve
efficiency. These improvements
should not only benefit
PES staff but also our volunteers
and members. This would improve
the support that we can
provide and allow for greater
flexibility.
✔ Operations manual:
If we are going
to improve efficiency,
we must
first understand
our operations.
Although we have
documented some
of our policies and
procedures, some
have remained
as " h is t o r i ca l
knowledge, " and
we certainly have
not compiled them
into one document
accessible to our
member s . Ou r
goal is to create a GB-approved
operations manual that contains
the policies and procedures of all
aspects of the Society. This also
includes the rules around how
these policies can be amended to
remain relevant.
Our goal is
to create a
GB-approved
operations
manual that
contains the
policies and
procedures of
all aspects of
the Society.
✔ Transparency: All of the efforts
to gather and document
our policies and procedures are
being done so that we can increase
transparency and allow
our members and volunteers to
access this information. A major
goal is not only to increase transparency
but to do so in a way that
is beneficial to the membership.
One by-product of transparency
can be an increased sense of belonging
and community. There
are several areas where we believe
increasing transparency
will improve
interaction with our
customer base, which
includes, the roles and
responsibilities of each
GB member position;
pol icies that govern
the PES Publications
Board and surrounding
processes; nominations
and appointments process;
awa rds, conferences,
Chapters, operating
committees, and
technical activities; and
joint IEEE programs.
To be effective with our
transparency, we must
also improve how we communicate
this information. We have to
make this information accessible
on our website and shareable
when changes are made. As an
example, we recently spent time
going through improvements
may/june 2022
leader's corner
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - May/June 2022

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