Mission Statement

By Cindy Pao, President, STC Houston

At the admin council meeting in April, we crafted an updated mission statement for STC Houston:

Creating a sense of community through education, professional development, knowledge sharing, and networking.

To come up with this marvel, we looked at the question responses from our March meeting attendees. I asked attendees, “Why does STC Houston exist?” and “What is the point?”

The interesting part of analyzing the answers is that they really were strikingly similar. We found words like support, networking, community, and local throughout the responses. It was a good feeling to know that meeting attendees have found and continue to find STC Houston useful and valuable.

We hope to provide even more value in the coming months!

In addition to the here and now, though, we are planning for the future. At the end of this article is a new prompt, this time to help create STC Houston’s vision. I hope you will add your ideas in the comments section.

Volunteers Wanted

We’re looking for a few good volunteers. Can you help with one of these positions?

• Programs Manager and Committee Members to help select topics and speakers for program meetings and other educational offerings. Involves contacting the speaker, setting the date, and publicity (with the publicity committee).
• Newsletter Editor to manage STC Houston’s online newsletter. Involves soliciting articles from authors and other online sources, as well as editing, publishing, and publicizing the newsletter and moderating article comments.
• Social Media Manager and Committee to post information to our various social media platforms. Involves using LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest.
• Membership Manager to reach out to current members, welcome new members, and invite not-yet members. Involves using email and personal contact as well as downloading membership reports.

If you would be interested in one of these positions, contact Cindy Pao (president@stc-houston.org).

Volunteer Recognition and Lightning Talks

The June program meeting is about recognition and information! Join us at the meeting to recognize our stellar volunteers and active members. Then, sit back and listen to the lightning talks – a presentation format where the speaker presents 20 slides each displayed for 15 seconds for a total talk time of 5 minutes. Will we have a ninja lightning talk? You’ll have to come to the meeting to find out!

STC Houston Vision

What is a Vision Statement?

• A picture of what STC Houston looks like in the future
• Our inspiration
• The framework for our strategic plan

STC’s vision is: Technical communication is recognized globally as an essential part of every organization’s competitive strategy.

So your questions for May are these:

• What do you think STC Houston will be for you five years from now?
• How will STC Houston help you to be recognized as an essential part of your organization’s competitive strategy?

Let’s keep the conversation going to improve our chapter. Leave a comment to this article with your answers to the questions above or send an email to president@stc-houston.org.