| Jan. 2011 newsletter sponsored by First Niagara Risk Management |
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Executive Director's message
by Bob Lowe
Welcome to the January 2011 CSIA newsletter! Is it really 2011 already? My phone says it is, so it must be. Happy New Year to all. The entire CSIA staff wishes you a safe and prosperous 2011. Now my usual request: Forward this informative newsletter to others in your organization who might find it of interest.
Now that 2011 is ushered in, let's reflect on what CSIA has accomplished in 2010:
- Connected Community was launched
- Conference attendance was a record high
- Sales Training began
- Monthly webinars were started
- KPICS Statistics program was launched
- A Project Risk Assessment Calculator was developed (see the Resource Library)
- The three Integrators of the Year with Control Engineering are CSIA Certified Members
- The number of Integrator members has grown from 279 to 291
- The number of Partner members has grown from 49 to 59
- The Insurance Program completed its first year with First Niagara Risk Management with success
- CSIA Talk Radio has begun
- An international membership agreement was signed with FEDA, a Netherlands trade association
- We laid the foundation for growth in Europe, India, Southeast Asia and Latin America
- Added international members to the Best Practices and Marketing Committees
- Partner members ABB and Invensys sponsored CSIA at their events in the U.S.
- Partner member Rockwell sponsored CSIA at their events in the U.S., India and Singapore
Please know that the CSIA staff strives to provide maximum benefit to CSIA membership and a high level of service. Our hope is that you recognize the above list is an indication of our commitment. The Board of Directors and all committees must be recognized also for their volunteer contributions to the operation and advancement of CSIA.
Please take the 30-Second Survey you'll see below. It's one easy question! The results help both members and staff. If you have a survey question you'd like to have asked then send me an email at execdir@controlsys.org. |
Conference registration available soon  The CSIA staff has been working on the program for your 2011 CSIA Executive Conference in Orlando and we're happy to report that it is nearly complete. The full program will be mailed and available online later this month. Online registration will be available as well. The luxurious Portofino Bay Hotel at Universal Studios Orlando will be our host site. The hotel is just a short boat ride to Universal Studios theme park. Consider bringing the whole family! |
Automation World interviews CSIA
Wes Iversen of Automation World magazine hosted a 15-minute interview with Bob Lowe, CSIA executive director on why CSIA Certification is good for end-users. Listen to the full interview here. CSIA Certified members should consider using the interview in their marketing program. For more audio interviews, go www.controlsys.org > News & Programs > CSIA on the Air. |
| Project Management Training
Project Management Training is still being planned. The recent survey was very helpful. However it will be repeated soon with a few changes to get further insight and more respondents. Thank you to the 28 members who responded initially. Your participation is greatly appreciated. When the revised survey comes out, we ask that you complete it again so that results are fully combined. The changes are minor so it won't take you very long. |
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30-Second Survey results  December 2010
Which one CSIA Best Practice has been the most beneficial to you and contributed the most to your business success?
16% - General Management
50% - Project Management
16% - System Development Lifecycle
16% - Supporting Activities
Click the 30-Second Survey ad to the right for this month's question.
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Control Engineering 40 Under 40
Control Engineering's 40 Under 40 is a contest designed to identify and give recognition to young engineers who have made significant contributions toward the control engineering profession. Entrants came from end-users, automation and control vendors, system integrators and automation consultants from around the globe. Since this was the first year, only 19 automation professionals received the award. CSIA congratulates the following five recipients who work for CSIA member companies.
- Laurens VanPagee, Director, Branch Operations, JMP Engineering Inc.
- Ken McLaughlin, Director, Automation Systems, JMP Engineering Inc.
- Kevin Lomeli, Engineer, Matrix Technologies
- Jaime Navarro, Project Engineer, Matrix Technologies Inc.
- Dean Ford, CAP, Director Operational Consulting, Maverick Technologies
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December Webinar
Did you miss the December webinar, "Overview of Business Income Insurance" by Susan DeVries and Kurt Chapin of Chubb Insurance? There are many costs to consider after a disaster at your facility that you'll never realize unless you review this webinar. It's an eye opener. Are you prepared? This webinar is now archived on controlsys.org. Find this and all webinar archives under News & Programs. Do you have an idea for a webinar? If so drop Bob Lowe an email. ___________________________________________________ January Webinar Can a Tiger Change its Stripes? What it takes for SIs to bring commercial off-the-shelf software to the marketThursday, January 27, 2010 10:00 am to 10:30 am CT John Nichols, Managing Director of APEX Manufacturing Solutions and APEX Software DevelopmentJohn Weber, President, Software ToolboxHave you been tempted to bring a COTS (Commercial Off the Shelf Software) product to market? CSIA members APEX Manufacturing Solutions and Software Toolbox, in a strategic alliance, are doing just that. Attend this webinar and learn about the challenges and opportunities of such a venture. The presentation is interesting, entertaining, and it might just help you make (or save!) a lot of money. This is a must-see presentation for any SI considering adding volume product development to their suite of offerings. Register here. |
Here's a tip regarding your email address  Did you know that the e-mail address listed in your company profile on the CSIA Connected Community needs to be different than the email address for the primary contact person? Consider these samples when identifying an email address for your company: info@xyz.com or ceo@abc.com.
The primary contact person at each member company has the means to edit the company's profile. Instructions appear in the Nuts and Bolts resource library in the CSIA Connected Community.
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| Partners encouraged to invite integrators to 2011 Executive Conference
Attention all Partners. CSIA is pleased to announce that we have a new program available to entice your top integrators who are not currently CSIA members to participate in our annual conference. We are offering special rates to you for the conference in 2011. We want you to bring potential members of CSIA to our conference to learn more about the organization and to understand the benefits of being a member or, better yet, a CSIA Certified member. We are offering ½ price for up to 10 non-members to attend Thursday night through Saturday morning. The bill must be paid by you, the industry partner and registration made directly through the CSIA office. Please contact the CSIA office if you have any questions. |
Best Practices Committee update
by Jeff Miller, Best Practices Committee Chair
The Best Practices Committee continues to work on developing a new release of the Best Practices manual, planned for release in April 2012. This past September, a group from our committee met face-to-face in Beamsville, Ontario at Jordan Engineering's facilities, where we spent two very long days editing the document based on the feedback we had received from the CSIA membership (integrators and partners). The ultimate goal of this revision will be to add clarity to sections of the document that may have been difficult to understand. We also began the process of creating a new section that will cover best practices associated with service and support work. This new section will hopefully add value to our BPB manual by providing some additional guidance to those integrators who are currently doing non-project work such as service and support. This was a section that was mentioned in the current revision that was planned to be added in some future revision.
The next steps in moving this process forward include finalizing our changes and then presenting the revised document to a group of clients and partners from each industry sector that our integrator group serves. Each member of the Best Practices committee will present the new version of the document to at least two of their clients and one of their major partners. The goal of this feedback is to determine what our clients and partners find to be the most important aspects that an integrator should focus on to consistently deliver excellent projects for them. Once this is complete, we will use this information to validate which items are scored as well as which sections of the Best Practices are "must pass" sections. There is a lot of work to do yet to get to a final release version, but the committee is up to the task!
Our committee would like to welcome two new members who attended their first meeting in December. We now have an international member from the Netherlands, Remco Kappert from EKB Group. We also have our first partner member, Marc Vermette from Invensys out of Montreal Quebec. The addition of these two new members promises to ensure that, as we consider changes to the document, we keep in mind the needs of our partner and international community.
As always, the Best Practices committee would love to invite you to join our group and volunteer to help shape the Best Practices manual as we continue our efforts over the next 16 to 18 months.
If you are interested in joining, please call meat (712) 722-1663 x151 or email me.
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Making the news in 2011  Industry publication and website editors are looking for newsworthy articles with a from-the-trenches view. If you are a system integrator with good writing skills and a story to tell, check out the editorial calendars and submission guidelines of industry publications, several of which are listed below.
The editors plan their content a year in advance. Looking at the themes and topics may give you some ideas for how your article might fit into their editorial calendar. Before you write the entire article - only to find out that someone else just submitted an article on the same topic - send a note to the editor. Point out how your article will benefit the publication's audience. Will it save readers time? Money? Introduce them to a new, cutting-edge technology or process? You might even send one or two lead paragraphs to give the editor an idea of your writing style and the angle your article will take.
Editors are not interested in giving you free advertising space, so take care to ensure your article is not promoting specific products or services. Also, pay attention to grammar, spelling and word limit. Articles that conform to the publication's standards and don't require a lot of editing stand a better chance of making the printed or electronic page.
By the way, don't forget to mention in your author biography that you are a member of CSIA!
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Seeking Board members and committee leaders 
by Jim Campbell, Nomination Committee Chair
I sincerely appreciate the time and thought everyone contributes to CSIA. As you know, I think it is vital to our organization that we recognize our worthy contributors. Any volunteer organization thrives on committed membership, so I am counting on everyone to HELP with nominations! Again, thank you very much - I really mean it.
We have a deadline of March 15 to gather all the nominations for awards and leadership positions. Please use the Award Nomination form and send to my email address (jac@viewpointusa.com). In addition, if you have any suggestions for people to serve on committees or sit on the Board of Directors, please email me as well. Presently, there is no formal template for leadership nominations. Simply email me the contact info for the nominee, the proposed position, and a short mention on qualifications.
As an example of committed members, during this past month, the Nominating Committee has started our out-reach campaign for leadership positions and awards. We will increase this activity over the next two months just in time for the mid-March deadline. We have been polling committee chairs for their membership needs as well as seeking nominations for the Board of Directors. I know that some of you will be contacted in this out-reach as we expand our efforts.
I hope to hear from you soon!
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Do you have the right people?
by Carl Utter, President, The Training Group Inc.
Are you considering a change in how you go after revenues? Maybe you are considering a change in strategy? Perhaps you're thinking it's time to have your PMs and technical people start to drive more of the revenues. If so, you are not alone. There is a right way and a wrong way to accomplish this. All consideration should start with your people.
Here are some very important questions to ask:
- Do you have the right roles defined?
- Do you have the right people? (We always think we have the right people, until strategy fails.)
- Can they execute in order to produce the revenue goals you have?
- What are reasonable revenue expectations for a PM or other technical staff?
- What are the skills gaps preventing them from achieving the expected revenue goals?
- How much better can they get?
- What will it take to make them better?
The best training in the world won't help if you don't have the right people in the right roles. Even when you do have the right people, if they aren't supported with the appropriate management infrastructure and development, results will be slow at best.
In my work with both sales and client facing PMs, I am amazed at how many of these questions go unasked. These are tough questions. Owners and managers want to think they have the right people, but when you're asking them to take a larger role in client sales, if you are basing this on anything other than fact, it is too risky.
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| Welcome to the Newest CSIA Members | |
AG Group, San Juan, PR represented by Asdrubal Galloza
AG Group provides system integration and instrumentation construction services to the pharmaceutical and life science industry in Puerto Rico. They also provide services for the public utilities. AG Group aims to provide full automation services, from concept through start up, covering the complete project cycle.
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| Newly Certified and Recertified Members | |
The Control System Integrators Association (CSIA) is pleased to announce that the following member companies have recently earned "Certified Member" distinction:
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