Think Tank at Summer Annual Meeting to showcase new conference model

ASME will debut a two-day symposium, the ASME Think Tank Summit, this June during the Society’s Summer Annual Meeting in Toronto. The event, which will bring together leaders of industry, government, academia, and ASME in three 90-minute town-hall-style discussions, will showcase a different approach to holding a general membership conference.

The Think Tank Summit, which takes place June 10-11, will serve as a preview of the types of events that the Society would plan for a General Annual Meeting, which is expected to take the place of the current Summer Annual Meeting, said Vickie Rockwell, a member of the ASME Board of Governors and member of the committee that is developing the new conference model.

“The idea is to build this into a program that engineers want to attend,” Rockwell said. “Most career professionals, including engineering professionals, want help managing their careers. We’ve also found that these professionals want plenary sessions and targeted workshops addressing hot topics.”

Such current issues as women and engineering education, product lifecycle management, and the “human factor” of design engineering will be the foundation of the upcoming Think Tank Summit. Mechanical Engineering magazine is the media sponsor for the event.

In addition to Rockwell, the committee to develop the Think Tank Summit includes ASME volunteers ASME Fellow Mike Askew and ASME Senior Vice President-Elect Richard Laudenat, both of whom have been heavily involved in ASME conference committees for many years, Ozden Ochoa, another member of ASME’s Board of Governors, and staff members John Corcoran, the managing director of ASME’s Services sector, and Phyllis Klasky, the director of events management. John Falcioni, the editor of Mechanical Engineering magazine, is an adviser.

The Summit will begin at 4:30 p.m. on June 10 with the opening session, “Teaching Women Engineering: A Double Standard?” This discussion was inspired by the recent report by the National Academies, “Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering,” that suggested colleges and universities are outmoded in their approach to teaching women engineering and that eliminating gender bias in academia requires overaching reform now.

A second plenary session, “Fruits and Pitfalls of Product Lifecycle Management (PLM),” will follow the next morning at 8 a.m. This session will provide an overview of PLM, which has become a key tool to manage a company’s information systems. It also facilitates communication and collaboration across the entire product lifecycle. This discussion will be followed by two concurrent workshops on PLM: “What’s It All About,” for PLM users, and “What Lies Ahead,” geared toward managers.

That afternoon, a third plenary discussion, “Human Factor Engineering: Designing for the User,” will be held from 1-2:30 p.m. Two 90-minute workshops “Design Challenges,” and “Change Management,” for users and managers, respectively, will follow at 3 p.m.

The Think Tank Summit will help the Summer Annual Meeting evolve into an annual event where members can attend some interesting plenary sessions, attend leadership and professional development workshops, learn to manage their careers — and have the ability to learn about the inner workings of ASME by sitting in on a few governance meetings, Rockwell added.

“Many people aren’t aware of the depth and breadth of what ASME does,” she said. “The new meeting would also give attendees an opportunity to pop into various governance meetings to see what goes on. I think they’ll be amazed and astounded at what ASME does.”

For more information, visit www.asmeconferences.org/SAM07/ThinkTank.cfm.

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