AGM Minutes 2021

Zoom Meeting

22nd February 2022

TECHNICAL DIRECTORS REPORT – 2021 AGM

2021 PROGRAMME of EVENTS

February on-line Webinar and AGM
April/May 16 On-Line Lecture hours
June Annual Symposium – Webinar
September Evening Seminar Postponed
November Live Autumn Seminar at Meriden

MEMBERSHIP and RECRUITMENT

We enrolled 41 new members, with 39 leavers, and ended the year with 380 individual Members, up 2 from last year. Our Corporate membership is steady at 20, thanks to our Fabrication Group Meetings. Our membership is drawn from over 100 companies with around 70% representing Fabricators and Suppliers. Companies supporting the Industry are strongly represented at 20% and designers and design houses are also significant at 10%. We are fortunate to have Members representing four universities and a number from Assemblers and Contract Manufacturers.
We have always enjoyed a high level of support from the Industry, and this year has been no exception with over 30 companies sponsoring us at various levels.

WEBSITE and JOURNAL – www.InstCT.org
Richard Wood-Roe has completely redesigned the Journal making it more relevant and interesting to members, with regular meetings involving Richard and Lynn Houghton, who has editorial responsibility.

MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS

During 2021, we continued to have close relationships with a number of like-minded groups. Our on-line journal celebrated its fourteenth year, now under the capable hands of Richard Wood-Roe and Lynn Houghton. We are fortunate once again to be able to bring the Custer Market Outlook Columns to our members. We have always engaged in a number of publically funded projects with other Associations for the benefit of our members and the Industry, and are into our final year of the 30 month project called ReCollect.

BILL WILKIE
AGM 2021

TECHNICAL DIRECTORS REPORT NOTES for 2021 AGM
Events
We made it all the way to the end of the year using our on-line platforms before holding a live event on the 30th November. The meeting at Meriden was well attended and a great evening catching up with old friends after almost two years of restrictions.
The on-line lecture hour series was a first for us and directly replaced the Annual Foundation Course. It took a bit of setting up, but we had 39 registrations, including two from Austria and one from the States – about double the norm. Not everyone attended every lecture and some attended only the lectures specific to their job function but nevertheless everyone received an attendance certificate and a membership certificate as normal.
I’d like to thank our corporate members and in fact all our members who supported this venture and attended the lectures. They were held every Tuesday and Thursday at 4pm and when they finished, I found that I was missing them!
Recruitment is always difficult since we have a mainly static pool to draw from. Our main influx of Associate Members comes from the Foundation Course and the rest through word of mouth. We have a presence on linkedin and that brings me a daily dose of board sellers but little in the way of membership applications. At the moment we are hovering just below the 400 mark and that seems to be a natural level
Website
The website and indeed the journal is well worth a look. Brought up to date by Richard and with Lynn helping as Editor we hope to get the next edition out this month
The Custer Outlook Market Column has disappeared due to illness, but we now have a Business Outlook Column and we thank Jon Custer for permission to distribute to members.
The Recollect Project is drawing to a close after 30 months and Jack Herring of Jiva Materials, the main Partner will be talking us through the project during the webinar.
The Foundation Course this year is a live event during April, with charges kept at 2019 levels. I’d like to thank Merlin and Neil in particular for providing the venue to hold the first day and a facility tour.
The annual Symposium is also live and will be held at the National Motor Museum at Gaydon on the 8th June. Happy holden will provide the keynote talk on Smart Factories and that will be the precursor for a lecture hour series of 8 lectures on Engineer Training in September and October. Each lecture will be held every Wednesday at 4pm and be free to members and guests. We are going to link this with articles from Happy in our quarterly journal