When I was a candidate for the position of President of ISA, I wrote an article about the future of ISA. Our Past-President, Steve Mustard, wrote in his last column in December that time flies, and I could not agree more with him as we are now in 2022.

I am starting my term as President of the International Society of Automation (ISA). I will have the honor to lead the Executive Board to define and execute our strategies to operate ISA in the present year and think about our opportunities for the future.

As this is my first article as President, I’d like to remember the components of our strategy that includes our vision, mission, and values. We need to live our strategy, and all of our members and volunteers, from the sections and divisions to our staff, need to take them into consideration in all that we do. Every time we have an idea, we need to check if it will help us achieve our vision, mission, and is aligned with our values.

• Vision: Create a better world through automation
• Mission: Advance technical competence by connecting the automation community to achieve operational excellence

Values

• Excellence: We provide industry-leading, unbiased content developed and vetted by a community of experts
• Integrity: We act with honesty, integrity, and trust—respecting others in all that we do
• Diversity and Inclusion: We are committed to being a global, diverse, and inclusive organization
• Collaboration: We seek out opportunities to work together for the benefit of the Society, its members, and our profession
• Professionalism: We uphold the highest standards of competence and skill in everything we do

During the last month of 2021, the Executive Board reviewed ISA’s strategy, defined our objectives, and introduced the concept of key results that will allow us to measure our progress.

Key Results that we will focus on during 2022:

• Grow our professional membership by 2%
• Increase ISA’s audience in specific target segments by 5%
• Increase ISA’s non-US audience in specific target segments by 10%
• Increase total training attendees by 5%
• Increase in non-US training participation by 2%
• Increase certificates and certifications by 5%
• Improve Leader Satisfaction Score by 2%

I am thrilled that one of our key results is to increase our membership. Members are the essence of ISA, and they are the main reason we exist. We need to know our members, and members need to be aware of and use the benefits that ISA offers to them.

Every month, I will highlight what’s going on at ISA that is of importance to our members:

• ISA’s new headquarters will be ready in January/February. It will be a multi-use, leased space that includes areas for collaboration, training, meetings, and warehouse space for inventory and storage.
• Our new Executive Director, Claire Ramspeck, started in November 2021. I am sure that she will bring many new ideas based on her previous experience at other associations such as ASME, ASHRAE, and ANSI.
• After many years of discussing the need to grow internationally, ISA will finally start the implementation of a new Globalization Framework, a plan to implement the recommendations of the Globalization Task Force to become a truly international Society.
• A new District structure was implemented this month, reducing the number of districts from 14 to 8, to allow better support to our global expansion.
• ISA will expand its international events in 2022, including events in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, and India.
• We’re planning to have our annual leadership conference (ALC) in-person again, combined with a technical event after two years of virtual events due to the pandemic.
• Our marketing team is improving the user experience of our website (isa.org) that will have an improved look and feel. Many relevant articles are posted monthly on our two blogs (ISA Interchange and ISAGCA).
• Various improvements of ISAConnect will be launched in 2022.
• The ISA/IEC 62243 standard was recognized as a horizontal standard by IEC.
• InTech magazine recently published a great article, “Beyond the Pyramid: Using ISA95 for Industry 4.0 and Smart Manufacturing.”
• Register here for our upcoming virtual events, FREE to all members.
• This year, we will launch a new leadership training and development program.

I have heard many times from members around the globe that ISA needs to do this or that. We need to remember that WE are ISA. ISA is formed by its members, volunteer leaders, and staff, and WE are the ones that can “do this or that” to create the ISA we want to be.

I love to connect with our members and listen to their opinions about automation, about what ISA is doing now, and about what ISA should be doing to answer their needs.

Please connect with me on ISAConnect, LinkedIn, or send an email to president@isa.org.