Boy, ISA is sure making some strange moves. I gave up on writing about ISA a couple of years ago, but these moves are way too strange to not at least make some comment on.
First, the nominee (that means the one who is going to get elected by the Council of Society Delegates) for President-Elect/Secretary is a guy who no longer works in any automation capacity. He's an investment banker, although he used to be an automation worker, and he heads ISA's investments committee. Nobody seems to care about that, either. The candidate is a good guy, he just isn't, in my opinion, qualified to be President of ISA.
Second, the new governance model looks like a Ford Pinto crossed with a Plymouth Volare'...it has to have all of the bad characteristics of the current model, but none of the redeeming features.
ISA appears to want less and less input from the membership, and over time, that will mean fewer members. That's okay, because members have been those pesky annoyances for over twenty years now.
Fewer members will mean fewer people to question when ISA spends its money propping up the Automation Federation and staff and the Executive Committee lives it up as lobbyists in Washington DC.
With a total of roughly a million automation workers in the world, and fewer than 25,000 ISA members in the world, you gotta ask exactly what ISA does. And when you find out, let me know. There are better lobbyists, there are better training companies, there are better publishers...in fact, ISA is not making such a brave showing as the International Society of Automation... so you need to tell me what ISA's future is.
Wait, I'm a futurist and a pundit...that means I have a crystal ball. Let me gaze into it, and I'll tell you what ISA's future is...
ISA will continue to do exactly what it is doing, with less member input, and fewer members, until all the money runs out. Then they will either disband or merge with some other society of similar relevance.
Automation professionals will find other ways to network, to get training, to generate community. Corporate sponsors will find fewer reasons to fork out cash, and even fewer companies will pay for their employees to be involved in the Society.
And maybe that's the good news.
