“To give away money is an easy matter … and in any man’s power. But to decide to whom to give it, and how large and when, for what purpose and how, is neither in every man’s power nor an easy matter. Hence it is that such excellence is rare, praiseworthy and noble.” – Aristotle
I’d like to start off this month with thanking our previous years’ annual sponsors, our new annual sponsors who have come on board and especially those who return year over year. IFMA may be for and focused around the Professional Member, but we would not be able to have the programs, events and scholarships that we do without our Associate Member Companies who financially support us each year. I have served as the Sponsorship lead for the past few years and been witness first hand to the generosity of our Annual Sponsors, and I must say it is awe-inspiring. In times of financial trouble in the economy, our sponsors have not only continued to support our chapter but have grown in number and increased their contribution size. In talking with similar size chapters across the country, we have come to realize that our chapter exceeds most others in sponsorship. We are beyond lucky to have the financial support that we do. In fact, this year we are going to exceed last year and come in above our goal for sponsorship and number of sponsors! We have steadily increased over the past 4 years, and I’m excited to be able to plan a great year of programs, events and scholarships due to the overwhelming generosity of our annual sponsors. Thank you all for your support; we greatly appreciate it!
The next few things I have to mention are also tied into our financial success. As I said at the July monthly meeting, each year we give to the IFMA Foundation. The scholarship funds are a direct result of our annual sponsorships and golf tournament. As many of us know, the golf tournament is a huge success and sells out very quickly. Our Gold, Platinum, Onyx and Ruby sponsors get tickets as part of the sponsorship and part of their annual contribution goes to running the tournament. Because the tournament is so successful each year and we have so many high level sponsors, we are able to donate to the IFMA Foundation without our local chapter losing any benefits. I was honored to announce at the meeting that beginning this year our annual IFMA Foundation scholarship will be named for Buck Fisher. The Buck Fisher Greater Triangle Chapter Annual Foundation Scholarship will be presented at World Workplace each year by a member of our chapter. Buck has served our Chapter, IFMA National and the Foundation tirelessly for years, and we felt the scholarship should carry his name! Congratulations again Buck!
Another win from our increased annual sponsorship is our scholarship program for chapter members. We are currently taking applications for scholarships for World Workplace and Chapter Membership for FMs who are out of work. In the future there will be opportunities for Facility Fusion and CFM, SFP, FMP courses. If you have any questions or concerns regarding our scholarships, please reach out to anyone on the Board or Professional Development committee and continue to check out the Education section of our website. https://www.ifmatriangle.org/education/scholarships We are always looking for feedback on the needs of our professional members.
Lastly and again due to our financial stability, we have hired our Chapter Administrator! I’d like to welcome Candi McDowell to our IFMA family. You may have already seen emails from ifmacandi@gmail.com coming through! Candi has supported BOMA and IREM for years and came to us highly recommended by folks in both groups as well as our bookkeeper. We are fortunate to be able to financially support this position to help our board and committee chairs with the day to day tasks of running a large chapter. We will be leaning on Candi for best practices and how to work smarter not harder. We are very fortunate she was available, and we look forward to having a very successful year with her assistance.
I am looking forward to seeing everyone at the August monthly meeting and excited to hear about the Quintiles restack! Keep enjoying the summer and the heat; it will be over before we know it! (At least football will be starting soon!) Thank you again for allowing me the opportunity to serve as your president this year, and please do not hesitate to contact me if I can assist in making your IFMA membership better in any way!
Laura Shaw
2014-2015 President
