For those of you who have been reading the (many) emails that I send, you know that we recently held elections for the Board of the NY Chapter of IHRIM. We now have two new Board Members and some shuffling of roles on the Board. Here is the outcome –

Laura Spelke and Chris DeFoe have rolled off the Board. I would like to take a minute to thank them for their dedication, enthusiasm and hard work. They made my life so much easier and the chapter so much better.

Our new Board Members are Rich Wrede of SummitQwest and Marc Miller, of Marc S. Miller Associates – who by-the-way was a founding member of our chapter. I have known both of these individuals for many years and I look forward to working with them again.

And if that is not enough…I am finally relinquishing my role as President to Jessa Kilgore. Jessa has a wealth of experience in HR, HRIT and IHRIM and will be filling the role of President of the NY chapter of IHRIM.

And may I present the rest of the Board to you?

Vice President and Volunteer Director– Niki Kancov, Brown Brothers Harriman

Secretary – Louis Forte, Merrill Lynch

Treasurer and Student Outreach Director – Mickey Kavanagh, University of Albany

Program Director – Ken Forde, Forde Consulting

Program Director – Marc Miller, Marc S. Miller Associates

Membership Director – Kori Clemmer, Princeton Healthcare System

Marketing Director – Rich Wrede, SummitQwest

Sponsorship and Alliances – John Gillen, Standard and Poors

Web Master – Jeffrey Malkin, JGI Inc.

And if this is not enough change for you, I have a few more announcements to make. After all, what kind of President would I be if I relinquished office without fanfare?

We have a new Chapter name! The New York Tri-State chapter of IHRIM. We made this change aligned with our objective of reaching out to our members in upstate NY, Long Island, New Jersey and Connecticut on a more regular basis. You will see more satellite meetings shortly and a focus on developing a broader reach throughout the membership. We hope you are as exited about this change as we are!

Take a minute to look through the content. You might find out things about the chapter you never knew. And, of course we appreciate your comments.

Talk about rejuvenation! In addition to our new name and website, we have some great meetings planned for the remainder of this year so keep checking our website. And keep your eye out for information on our October, November and December meetings.

Well my friends, it has been a pleasure serving you. I look forward to working with you in my new role of Past President. Just remember this, you will only get out of IHRIM what you put in! So attend a few meetings this year, learn a little, network a little, live a little!!

And with that, I will let Jessa add a few words….

To begin with, I would be remiss in not giving thanks to Beth Stanley for her years of dedication leading the New York Tri-State Chapter as President. If my calculations are correct, Beth has led New York for over 8 years, bringing us through many challenges with many successes. Through her guidance, the chapter has thrived as one of the largest and most active IHRIM affinity groups. The past couple of years were difficult for the chapter and the association with diminishing membership and attendance at IHRIM events. However, Beth led New York this past year through a cycle of rejuvenation.

Rejuvenation… with membership growing beyond the goals set by the association, the chapter again is one of the largest affinity groups. Over the past year we held seven highly successful events from New York City to Albany and two webinars. In addition the chapter had significant representation at this year’s IHRIM Annual Conference with the second largest attendance from a chapter (Mid-Atlantic had a slight advantage over us with the conference being held in DC). At the conference we also saw our own chapter Board Member, Mickey Kavanagh receive IHRIM’s prestigious Excellence Award and Ken Forde awarded New York’s Member of the Year, as well as ten presentations by New York Tri-State Chapter members. If you were not able to attend one of these events, we hope that you will join us next year where we have planned for important topics to be addressed with opportunities to network with your professional associates.

This past year we also reintroduced IHRIM Connections – the chapter’s on-line newsletter. Articles and pictures from this year’s events as well as ideas and opportunities were reported. For our chapter and the association, networking is a major priority and the newsletter provides another means for our associates to keep connected.

As Beth mentioned, the board has planned an exciting year ahead. Our annual summer event, this year on August 17th, has always brought great insight and ideas to the attendees, with a fun networking hour at the Seaport looking out onto the Brooklyn Bridge. We have two meetings scheduled for this fall in New York City – in October, Marc Miller and Al Walker are delivering their Consulting Arts presentation that was a great sensation in Albany this past May. In November, the much anticipated vendor Workday (the former President of PeopleSoft, Dave Duffield’s new company) is presenting on web services – a new method for delivering Human Capital Management Solutions and the foundation of Workday’s applications.

In line with the broader reach of our new name, the New York Tri-State chapter will begin our satellite meetings in December with local presentations and discussion of an IHRIM web cast. If you are one of our many members outside of New York City, we’ll be reaching out to your neighborhood with meetings in Upstate New York, Westchester/Southern Connecticut, Long Island, Central New Jersey (Princeton area), and Northern New Jersey.

In closing, please join me in thanking Beth and the past board for their leadership of our chapter and making it the vibrant association for education and networking for local Human Resources Technology professionals. We hope you will join us next year as an attendee at our many events and volunteering to bring more opportunities and connections to our membership.