It is fitting that next week is National Volunteer Week here in the United States. The week gives us an opportunity to reflect on the importance of volunteerism across the world at a time when we’re all pulling together to help one another.
For AME, volunteers always play a crucial role in our ability to create and deliver meetings and content that help our members share, learn and grow. We are a nonprofit association, and volunteers are vital to our mission. Volunteers are the driving force behind our annual conference, Target Online, our regional events and more. They identify programming and trends that are important to our members and the organizations they serve. In any given year, we are grateful for their contribution to AME and the lean, operational excellence movement.
But this year, our volunteers’ contributions have been nothing short of amazing.
Each day during the coronavirus pandemic, I have been blown away by the contributions and ideas that our volunteers have brought forth. In the past month, we have undertaken a dramatic pivot to repurpose regional events and reschedule major events like our Atlanta Lean Summit. Our volunteers have stepped up to recreate presentations for a virtual environment. They have helped us shift programming for our annual conference to address supply chain issues we’re all experiencing. And they have explored new ideas to deliver value to the industries we serve so they can recover from the COVID-19 downturn.
Without volunteers, AME and the industries we serve – including manufacturing, health care, government and finance – would be worse off. AME is lucky to count industry experts and thought leaders among our volunteers. Because of their involvement, we’re proud to be able to offer our members an increasing number of virtual events to keep our members and practitioners at the top of their game.
None of this would be possible without volunteers. We are forever grateful.
If you’re interested in becoming an AME volunteer, please consider the opportunities available on our website. You’ll help us fulfill our mission to bring lean, continuous improvement to the world, and you’ll grow your professional network while volunteering with some of the brightest minds in the industry. If you have specific questions, please reach out to our number one volunteer, Ellen Sieminski, who leads our volunteer support efforts.
Perhaps, the biggest contribution our volunteers are currently making to the AME community is through online discussions and webinars. Because of their support, we now offer weekly virtual lean coffee breaks and webinars. We continue to add these virtual learning opportunities to our event calendar, and I encourage you to take advantage of these free offerings.
Thank you again to our volunteers!
And as always, please stay safe and keep looking out for one another.
