For 90 years, ITE has been an individual member organization providing transportation professionals with the knowledge, practices, skills, and connections needed to serve the needs of their communities. ITE also recognizes the importance of connecting with the organizations that the majority of our members work for—public agencies, industry, consultants—so that we can be in tune with the needs of these organizations as well as our individual members. In the past, an Industry Division and an organization-based Consultants Council existed, but for various reasons we moved away from those models. I am pleased to announce that in 2020, ITE will be transitioning back to an organization-based model for our Industry, Consultants, and Public Agency Councils.
The 2018–2020 Strategic Plan adopted by the International Board of Direction identified the need to strengthen ITE’s ties to industry and public sector member organizations. Moving to an organization-based model will help better engage senior representatives from our member organizations and provide a forum for identifying and advancing the issues most important to them.
Over the past two years, ITE leadership has engaged with industry representatives from both the solution-provider and consulting communities. In January 2019, a new Industry Council was established under the leadership of Abbas Mohaddes, president and COO of Econolite, providing a home for companies that offer solutions in the traffic control, new mobility, communications, and data analytics spaces. The Council focused its initial efforts on updating procurement guidance so that potential buyers of industry products can most effectively engage in the marketplace. A recent Industry Council-sponsored webinar featured a member company, demonstrating how their products and services were being used by a public agency member. Future efforts will focus on educating public sector members and consultancies on emerging solutions.
Starting in January 2020, ITE will transition the Consultants Council and Public Agency Council to similar models with new participation requirements, providing opportunities for members to join the Council Executive Committees and developing new agendas that are in line with the priorities of member organizations. Modest membership fees from the Industry and Consulting Councils will support the priority products identified by the members of these Councils. Public agency members will not pay any additional membership fees. Organizations with an ITE Public Agency membership will be considered members of the Public Agency Council, and senior representatives from these agencies will be invited to sit on the Public Agency Council Executive Committee. All public sector members will be invited to participate in the Council activities.
Next year, 2020, will serve as a transition year as we recruit new members to these Employer- based Councils, and create strong Executive Committees to develop new agendas. We expect that there will be significant collaboration across these three Employer-based Councils.
I am excited about the new energy, ideas, and opportunities that our revised Employer-based Councils will bring to ITE. I encourage you to learn more about our new Council structure and how your organization can participate at: http://www.ite.org/employercouncils.
As always you can reach me at jpaniati@ite.org or on Twitter, @JeffPaniatiITE.
This blog post is from the Director's Message in the December 2019 issue of ITE Journal.
https://staging.nxtbook.com/ygsreprints/ITE/ITE_December2019/