CEO's Update 29/4/20

Kia ora koutou members and supporters, As a result of the Government announcement last week, we have now moved into Level 3 restrictions. For many of you this will mean a return to your workplace, or supporting those who have returned to work this week. While your focus will quite rightly be on supporting your colleagues in this transition, our focus right now is on supporting you.

As many of you will have seen, we are delivering an increase in webinars out to members. Although our monthly webinar programme has been running for some time, you may not have joined us yet, or are a bit unsure about the technology. With the dramatic changes brought about by COVID-19, this mode of learning and engagement will become increasingly important to enable maintenance of continuing professional development (CPD) and to get access to experts sharing their knowledge to guide you through this journey.

If you haven’t participated in a webinar yet, check out these instructions on how to be an audience member from Zoom https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/115004954946-Joining-and-participating-in-a-webinar-attendee-. Like everything new, the first time might feel daunting, but the great thing about being an audience member is no-one can see or hear you. You can join in your PJs and if the kids or animals interrupt, no-one notices. You only engage with panellists if you want to and this is done by typing a question.

There are so many benefits to webinars; they are almost like a personal tutoring session with feedback, questions, and engagement with specialist speakers. It can be challenging to get in front of the top experts in our industry, and although a webinar isn’t as personal as a face-to-face meeting, a webinar puts you in the room (digitally) with professionals willing to share their expert insight. Webinars also provide you with the opportunity to access business-critical information that is relevant to you without spending a lot of time and effort. This is why I am a big advocate of webinars and why I believe they offer us the best solution to provide an enviable and equitable member experience across the network.

Check out a webinar recording first, we have all of our webinars available to view in the member resources section under webinar recordings: https://www.nzism.org/webinars/. Our branch AGMs are being held via webinar this year and you will have the chance to vote for local and national nominees in a really simple online poll during the webinar. If you are new to Zoom meetings and your branch is catching up on Zoom, or you are keen to join our weekly online networking coffee group, click on this link to see what to do: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201362193-Joining-a-Meeting. There's a video and a step by step guide to attending Zoom meetings.

This year the NZISM National Roadshow will be delivered in a weekly webinar series throughout the month of July. All NZISM members who have renewed for the 2020/2021 financial year will have FREE access to this masterclass with Nippin Anand. This masterclass will be an opportunity to learn about advanced concepts in analysing and learning from accidents focused on the Costa Concordia Case.

This week the online Coffee Catch-up has been postponed due to our Governance Board meeting, however these will kick off again on Thursday 7^th May at 2pm. These online catch-ups are a great opportunity to try out the Zoom meeting platform, meet new members, chat about what's happening in your bubble or seek feedback from colleagues on health and safety challenges. I’d love to see you there.

Ngā mihi nui, kia kaha

Selena Armstrong,
Chief Executive Officer