By Michael Pearsall, P.Eng., CVS, FEC – President, SAVE International
The Leaves are Changing – is SAVE?B
It is Fall now in the part of the world where I live and the leaves on the trees are changing. Many people see this as a beautiful time to take a trip and enjoy the many colours of the season before the leaves wither and drop off for the winter.
Lately, I have been looking at the trees and thinking of SAVE International. This is not because of orange leaves that remind me of SAVE’s current logo. Sadly, instead I think about SAVE as something beautiful I don’t want to see wither up and drop to the ground.
One of the things I enjoy about being President of SAVE is being involved in various committees and seeing many aspects of the society first-hand. I also enjoy the contact I have with members who reach out to talk with me about our society.
I would say that the clear number one topic people want to talk to me about is certification, followed by a desire for expansion of virtual activities. Both are topics I would like to touch on here.
I would like to clearly state that, having attended a couple of their meetings, the Certification Board consists of a good hard-working group of volunteers. These members volunteer many hours of their time each month to make the SAVE certification program work. I’m sure this is also very true of the volunteers in our international affiliates that help SAVE administer the certification program globally. It is often a thankless task and open to criticism.
I know that if your Certified Value Specialist (CVS) certification application has been turned down or you have been asked for additional information, you certainly may not share a positive opinion at the time. Trust me, I have been there. It is easy to go down that path of negativity.
The truth is that SAVE certification is not easy to achieve, nor has it historically been. Personally, it took me a little over eight years from the time I took my Module I workshop until I finally received my CVS. I was completely devastated when, after 10 years of being a CVS, the CVS-Life “magic carpet” – that I had strived to achieve for 18 years and finally saw within reach – was pulled out from under me and no longer achievable.
It would have been easy to quit SAVE at that time, to just give up and walk away. However, that is not in my personality. Instead, I increased my involvement, stepped up to help organize the next six annual Value Summits in various capacities and embraced taking on an Executive Committee role. I could see SAVE was in need of change and I wanted to be part of it.
Do I think it should be easy to obtain your CVS? No, it has a certain amount of value if you have to work to achieve it.
Do I think we can and should make additional changes to help more people obtain their CVS? Yes, I certainly do.
There have been many recent changes. I won’t attempt to capture them all here, but suffice to say that in some ways it is certainly easier now to obtain and maintain your CVS then it was seven years ago. There have also been great attempts made to increase accessibility to exams and allow virtual experience. Application numbers are going up again. However, we need to do more.
Recently, the idea was brought forward that we should have a spot on the SAVE website where members can offer up opportunities to help others gain workshop study experience. It is going to take some work, yet I am committed to supporting this idea. Still, I want to do more.
This is just one area. When I look around, I see the need for more change.
SAVE needs to turn things around – we are in the business of making the best use of resources, time and money. This is what we tell our bosses, customers and clients we can do. Our Secretary-Treasurer, Tom Fletcher, has been digging deeply into the financial operations of SAVE, asking questions, looking at everything, leaving no stone un-turned. I am thrilled Tom has taken on this monumental task. We need to question our own operations just as we would others if someone reached out to us for help. Don’t get me wrong, SAVE has certainly not been run poorly and others before us have done this exact exercise.
The fact is that times have changed and we need to reassess and evolve to stay current. How do we increase membership worldwide? How can we bring back some areas of practice? How do we run more efficiently?
A lot of volunteer effort has been put in the last year on developing an 8-hour e-learning course. Many thanks to Ginger Adams, Renee Hoekstra and others for their hard work and dedication to the cause. This is great, exactly where the world is headed. It is just a start though. We will need more on-line training resources as we head forward. Our Director of Education, Dave Wilson, has the new Education Committee started now and they have a mandate. Watch for more to come.
On a similar vein, how do we leverage more virtual opportunities for our members to learn and connect? Over the past 18 months we have had two very successful virtual Value Summits and a 2020 Fall Virtual Education Event. These have shown us a new path.
I would be lying if I told you I didn’t deeply miss seeing my SAVE friends in-person at the Value Summits. Admittedly, there is just something in that personal contact you can’t replicate virtually. However, virtual events are also much more accessible for a global audience from many social levels. We need to strike the right balance. The current plan is to start alternating virtual and live events, and the future may be hybrid events. I know our Director of Conferences, John Corcoran, joins me in lying awake at night trying to figure out how to make the numbers work for a future with the best of both virtual and in-person.
These are just a few examples. Every member of the SAVE Board plus many other volunteers are working hard to improve SAVE.
I want everyone to continue to work together for the benefit of each other. Think of those autumn trees – let’s show our brilliant colours, not wither and drop.
Great work has been started and we need to continue the momentum to evolve our organization for the next 75 years. Thank you for reading this and hopefully being a part of our future.
Just a reminder that these are my three top themes for the year:
- Education – e-learning, update the training approach for VMF 1 and VMF 2, ensure that testing and certification are in line with the new education content and the VM Guide.
- Global Inclusivity & Diversity – continue shifting the focus of SAVE to be more global, accessible and open to the world. This means leveraging more virtual opportunities (training/education) and listening better to global issues and needs.
- Innovation & Change – focus on leveraging the web to deliver VM services, looking to build on our recent successes with virtual facilitation and other approaches. Also, looking at how we can build on the results of the three Tiger Teams.
I will close by saying I was glad to hear how many of you enjoyed the Niagara Falls themed message last month – or at least the photograph of my wife and I pretending to go over the falls in a barrel. I appreciated the feedback from all who reached out!
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