On Mon, 7 Feb 2005 12:31:09 -0800, Nemchek, Lee R. <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>        Did you know that our Legal ISG has the largest membership of
> all of ARMA's ISGs?  I just did a quick search in ARMA's membership
> database using the ISG field as the search parameter, and, at 1,091
> members, Legal is the largest.

be careful with statistics. nowadays you can select as many ISGs as
you want. if we consider that 10,000 is the base number for members
then there are almost 9,000 members who are not involved with legal rm
issues. out of the approximately 1100 Legal ISG members what would be
the percentage attending the conference?


>the lack of
> ISG-related programming at the main ARMA conference comes up as an issue
> every year.

the problem lies with the fact that there is a limited amount of time
for the conference (I still think it should be lengthened by a day to
provide more time), but what folks have to realize is that the
conference is marketed to more than just a single ISG. You have
newcomers who have no idea what records management is. (An individual
from an affiliated company attended the Long Beach conference. his
background IT. his eyes were opened about record management), you have
folks who are looking for training that they cann't get anywhere else.
You have folks like myself who've been attending for umpty-ump years,
and who always finds something new and amazing or enlightening.
Basically ARMA needs to attract as many folks as possible to the
conference so they have to offer a broad range of topics.
Everyone kvetches about the topics and the overall programming. They
way to solve it is to submit an speakers application on a topic you
are interested in and that others would be interested. Make sure it
fits in with the theme of the conference.

here are the attendance figures as posted on the ARMA website

Total Attendees: 4,955, which includes attendees who registered for
both the full conference and pre-conference, pre-conference only
attendees, expo only, one-day registrants, expo personnel, and
event-only attendees

Total Paid Full Conference: 1,718
Total Comp Full Conference: 236

Total Paid Pre-Conference: 475
Total Comp Pre-Conference: 33

Total Vendors Exhibiting: 236

Total New Memberships Provided: 398
(with full reg for previous non-members)



Kim Drew wrote: " The one day I
did attend (in Montreal) I had to work really hard to find anything of
interest. "

and that is because that was a Sunday a day typically devoted to ISGs,
standards and meetings and other ARMA related business. only recently
have sessions started to be scheduled on Sundays

Kim also wrote: "...but never the complete conference because the
programming wasn't strong enough to justify the expense."

this I find hard to believe. where else are you going to find solid
records management information in one place, as well as being able to
see and touch the latest technology in our profession?

Let me suggest this. If you really want to see legal records
management issues presented at the conference you will need to put in
an application to do a presentation or a poster session for the
conference. it is too late for this year's conference, but start to
think about what you would like to see at a conference and then submit
your application.


Peter Kurilecz

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