By Jenna Moore, Chapter President

This year we have put a great effort into building our community. We have reached out to the NCSU student chapter of STC. We’ve connected with the Write 2 Publish Meetup group. Our meeting topics have ranged from communicating in China to networking on the Web. Our attendees have had excellent networking opportunities with each other, recruiters, managers, and other professionals.

If you haven’t attended one of our meetings recently, you might not remember that one of our introductory pieces includes asking our attendees who needs a job and who knows of an open position. This is a great opportunity for those seeking work to announce their specialties and get some notice. It has been a pleasure to me this year to watch the process as some of our members have moved from unemployed status, to interviewing, to getting re-employed. This is only one of the many benefits we offer our members and attendees.

Variety is the Spice of Life

Part of our effort to build our community is reaching out in new directions. We need to build not a small community, but a large network that includes many other organizations. We’ve started that this year by reaching out to the Write 2 Publish Meetup group. I look forward to a strong and lasting relationship between us that will be nurtured in the coming years. We are also working on casting out strands to the American Medical Writer’s Association and other professional organizations. The more variety we build into this web, the stronger it will be. To help with this effort, I’m asking all of our members and attendees to share your professional connections. If you are a member of another professional organization, let us know. We need liaisons to connect us and help us build that relationship. The time commitment to such volunteering is small, but the impact is huge. The more connections we have, the better we can serve our members with new learning opportunities and more networking opportunities. In these times of layoffs and a failing economy, these assets are essential to strengthening our entire community.

More than Just Writing

As hard as we work to strengthen our relationships with other technical communicators, that’s not enough by itself. Building this community also means recruiting new members that can benefit from our services. There are many ways we can expand our membership including networking, marketing, and service projects. One of our most exciting service projects going is our program to edit resumes for returning veterans. By doing this we not only help these hard-working men and women move back into the civilian work force, but we also help ourselves. We help them learn about STC as well as the current job market. This is a recruiting opportunity for those who are in compatible fields. By recruiting new members we again expand our diversity. That diversity leads to more connections and we strengthen our network even more.

What It All Means The best way to be able to expand our diversity is with new volunteers. Each volunteer brings a unique perspective to our chapter. These perspectives lead to exciting new ideas to build our community and strengthen our network. I am happy to say that we will soon hold our elections for the 2009-2010 administrative council. Please keep an eye out for updates on the ballot. Remember: If you’re not ready to join the council, you can still help out as part of a committee. Whether you are able to volunteer or not, make your voice heard. Make sure you vote in the upcoming elections and help us steer the chapter into the next part of our journey. Our chapter is only as strong as the people that are a part of it. Make your voice heard by sharing your connections to be part of the larger community. STC Carolina members can join our LinkedIn group for updates and discussions. Any interested professional is welcome to also join the STC Carolina FaceBook group. Keep an eye on the calendar on the stc-carolina.org Web site as well. Help us continue to build a stronger network. Jenna can be reached at president at stc-carolina dot org.