 South Carolina Society of Certified Public Managers®
The South Carolina Society of Certified Public Managers® (Society) has been fortunate since its formation in 1997 to have a committed and visionary Board of Directors (Board), and this year is no exception. We began our operating year, which runs parallel to the State's fiscal year, in July and already have a list of accomplishments. These are a few of the highlights:
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Reviewed and Revised the Strategic Plan
Last year, the Board adopted its first strategic plan which outlined the goals of the Society and listed strategies to accomplish them. This year, the Board reviewed the goals and strategies to determine if the goals were those we wanted to continue to pursue and whether the strategies needed to be changed to accomplish them.
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Adopted a budget for the Society
We appointed our first Budget Committee Chair and developed our budget for the year.
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Held Summer Education Event
The Events Committee coordinated the first education Event of the year with the topic of "The Importance of Project Management in Government." The presentation included: Initiating a Project, Policy for Management of Technology Projects in Government, Strategies for Successful Management of a Project, Dealing with Change and Conflict, and Project Closeout and Final Reporting. Project management is a topic of significance for the State of South Carolina as all state agencies are looking for methods to improve the success rate of large and small projects. We had 90 participants in attendance with 35 different governmental agencies represented at the Event.
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Collected Food and Money for the Harvest Hope Food Bank
The Board decided to use each education Event as an opportunity to collect food and money. The Harvest Hope Food Bank delivers containers for the collection and also picks up the containers at the end of the Event.
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Piloted a Luncheon
The pilot luncheon featured Dr. Blease Graham, a professor of Political Science at the University of South Carolina, who gave an enlightening overview of the political process as it pertains to the Electoral College. He also shared interesting history on southern politics, especially South Carolina politics. An employee from the South Carolina Election Commission, who is also a Society member, demonstrated the new electronic touch-screen voting machine that will be used in 15 counties of our State in the upcoming election.
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Increased Membership
Our members have to renew their membership at the beginning of each fiscal year. The Membership Committee is using different strategies to maintain members and add new members, which are proving to be effective. Since July 1, we have 42 new members and 79 members that have renewed their membership. The membership committee has already exceeded their goal for the year.
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Developed New Logo and Changing Look of our Web Site
The Marketing Committee designed a beautiful new logo and is working to update our Web site. As a marketing tool, they had "post-it notes" printed with the new logo. The notes have become a very popular give-away to our membership and guests. The Marketing Committee is also exploring a software program for online registration for events.
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Sponsored a Golf Tournament
As part of our networking strategy, the Society sponsored its first golf tournament with 43 participants. The tournament not only provided a wonderful day of golfing fun, but also provided an array of fantastic prizes, gifts, and trophies donated by over 30 businesses and vendors and fabulous food. We were also treated with the music of a live band from the local area. The overwhelming participation indicated that the tournament was a great success.
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Appointed an Historian
The Board decided to formalize the gathering and storage of the all the Society's business and Events by appointing a Society Historian. The Historian will be responsible for capturing and organizing all of the Society's functions in written and pictorial form.
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Scheduled Meetings with Top Level Management to Promote Society and CPM Credential
To give the Society visibility and have the CPM credential recognized as the State standard of leadership excellence, the Board thinks that it is essential to have the support of the top leaders in State government. Sam Jones, the President-Elect, and I recently met with our Governor's Deputy Chief of Staff to introduce the Society and offer our willingness to assist them during transitions, disasters, and any other ways needed. We have met with other top State executives and will be meetings with the directors of the largest state agencies in the months to come.
The Society sponsors four education events each year. The Fall Event will feature Sheri Callahan as the presenter on "Emotional Intelligence Know-How for Dynamic Professionals." A Legislative Forum is planned for the Winter Event and will feature members of our General Assembly who will field questions from the membership. We are planning the first two-day conference for the Spring Event in collaboration with the South Carolina Certified Public Manager® Program.
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