A new STC Atlanta year

Well, it is official. The officers for this year have taken their place. It is interesting the transitions that take place when a new STC Atlanta year begins. Each manager or officer is responsible for turning over the information they have to their replacement. Holly is responsible for turning pertinent information to me and I to Howard. This process is not defined anywhere that I have found. It just needs to be accomplished. Some people deliver CDs or DVDs. Some people do a verbal turnover. I hope at the first council meeting on Tuesday, June 5, these transitions take place and are successful.

Speaking of social media: there is a meeting of the Social Media Club that sounds very interesting. If you are interested, go to this link: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/59430759. There will be an interesting group of speakers, including EarthLink's own Dave Coustan. Social media is an interesting phenomena. It is the reason I am writing this blog. We want our members involved and informed.

There is so much I would like to discuss from the conference. I would like all of you to attend the chapter meeting in June where a panel of your peers that attended the conference presents their views on the conference. This year's conference was much different than year's past because topics and speakers were picked that would provide a more diverse learning experience. I believe it worked although there were some problems with some of the sessions. There were some session that were standing room only. I don't know how the STC could foresee the popularity of a particular speaker and/or topic to allow for more room or multiple sessions, but there needs to be a way. I was a little late getting to the session on Web 2.0 101 by Scott Abel and could not get in the room. I ended up attending my secondary session.

(If you have never attended the conference, I was given the advice to have a primary and, at least, a secondary session chosen so if the first one is full (or lame) you can move on to the secondary session. That was probably the best advice I received before my first conference.)

I had only one really lame session. This was billed as a panel session on "Making Your Career Happen." It really did not live up to expectations. The panel consisted of come excellent presenters that I have seen and heard in the past, so I'm not sure what happened in this session. The advice of the panelists were that tools should not be listed under skills in your resume. Anyone can be taught to use tools. If you can write well, that is what is important, not the tools you use to do the writing. The panel, for the most part, slammed the tool vendors at the conference for trying to sell their product. They said that the emphasis on tools in technical communications is misplaced.

See you all soon. In the meantime, if you want to talk to me, please call, email, write, comment, or just approach me with anything concerning STC Atlanta. I am looking forward to this year!