Hopefully, in the coming months, we will be returning to some semblance of a new normal. That is to say, our ability to host in-person events is returning, and with it, our ability to also host in-person events with you, our Community. Our London venue is open with social distance restrictions in place, allowing smaller meetings at a BCS venue (contact your coordinator for more information); our guidance on events is to wait for all local restrictions to be lifted (following your local COVID guidance) before holding physical events again. To say it has been a challenging eighteen months would be an understatement. It has been the most challenging eighteen months our member groups have faced. And yet, with a global pandemic shutting down activity in many sectors, you, our member group volunteers, have continued to hold events and provided an external (albeit virtual) presence for the BCS. I doubt a thank you is good enough, but it is what we can do today. So, thank you.
We are currently planning for our next convention. It will still be virtual - and short - but we hope to start celebrating your efforts very soon. In PPP, we have tried to keep busy. With the retirement of Garfield Southall as chair of PPP, the Community Board has asked me to sit as an interim chair. At the same time, CB is rethinking the purpose of PPP. Our work continues, however. For example, Adam Leon Smith's Communication's Working Group is progressing recommendations that will hopefully improve how the Community Team support groups. Likewise, Charlie Houston-Brown's Member Group Working Group will soon be looking for feedback on their proposals to enhance the work of member groups. So a sense of continuous improvement is beginning. But please ensure you keep telling us what is and isn't working at groups@bcs.uk.
I hope you all enjoy whatever this summer brings you. Continue to stay safe. And thank you once again.
Kevin Chalmers Interim Chair, Programme, Practice and Policy (PPP) Committee
Annual Chair Reports Update
This year is the first full year where we used the new Chairs' Report format, and it appears to be more popular. Almost 60% of member groups have returned a report this year compared to 13% in 2019/20. Some are using the old template, but we see the new template as a success. The new format also enables more straightforward coding of themes to understand common issues we can support.
The new report asks each group to define their successes, plans and impediments. We have undertaken some preliminary analysis of those that came in promptly. It has become clear that the main successes groups report is around events. Events may be regular or one-off, but fundamentally member groups see these as their success. Whether this is due to the pandemic, we will discover in future years. Areas from the achievements we are examining are the hosting of events.
For plans, a similar pattern emerges, with events being the main driver for the coming year. Competitions also feature in many upcoming plans.
Impediments were somewhat more mixed, although the common theme was COVID. We want to get as many obstacles out of your way as possible, but unfortunately, we cannot solve this one directly. However, we have recognised many feel engaging with membership a problem. Likewise, technology issues are recurring (e.g., GoTo Webinar vs Zoom). And committee member recruitment seems a pinch point.
We hope to share some deeper analysis with you soon and show how it is influencing our plans.
PPP Committee
Volunteer Awards & Recognition
BCS recognises its volunteers for their hard work, dedication and achievement through its volunteer awards.
BCS depends on the good services of its volunteer force of members for many of its activities, enabling it to meet its charter and its charitable objects. These volunteers are IT professionals, many of them chartered, who care enough about the profession and BCS’s role to give their own time to furthering BCS’s aims and fostering relationships with other organisations. Volunteers play many roles within BCS, from its president, trustees, board and committee members, through assessors and accreditors, to the huge ‘front line’ of member group committees who organise events for our members.
The PPP Committee want to give more of these awards, so please consider individuals who go above and beyond the volunteer call of duty. The process and nomination form is on the Volunteer Portal.
Researching, or interested in the history of information risk management and assurance? IRMA, one of the oldest MGs within the Institute, has put its back-catalogue of Journals into the public domain.
Published quarterly, between 1990 and 2008, the Journal was IRMA’s main communication arm with its members before the advent of the World Wide Web made it easier for them to remain current with risk and assurance matters.
EVA London’s focus is on developing and applying visualisation technologies to various domains, including art, music, dance, theatre, and the sciences.
BCS Edinburgh Branch Sidney Michaelson Memorial Lecture
In this talk, Kevlin Henney will explore examples of failures in software and its application and how they affect us at different scales, from user to society.
BCS Competitions 2021
All extended to the end of June 2021
There are five competitions organised by the BCS GreenIT, BCS e-Learning, BCS Animation and Games Development and BCS Cybercrime Forensics SGs.
Come and join the Community on Basecamp. It's a great place to chat with like-minded individuals, share best practice and engage with the BCS Swindon Team.
We currently have 10% of the community represented. However, we want to see an increase in the community's representation, so please encourage at least one of your committee members to sign up.
We're making people aware that they can level up their digital skills, change their job prospects and ultimately their lives – all at their local training centre, at no cost to themselves but their time.
So we're running our Digital Learning for Work campaign across 11 cities on billboards, bus stops and socialites in some of the most underprivileged areas in England.
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