Yo, it’s been a while. I can officially say that my second
year as an academic was in no way easier than my first year, even though I had
most of my classes already prepared. I found other things to fill the time I
thought I would have – most of the things were some form of service or
volunteering.
I spent the morning hand writing thank you cards (yes, I am
someone who still does that!) to my guest speakers from winter and spring
quarter, and was reflecting on how important volunteer work has been to my
growth as an occupational health and safety (OHS) professional.
Back in 2010, when I was four years out of college and just
getting a handle on my career, my local Arizona Chapter of the American Society of Safety Engineers (ASSE) had a Healthcare Section. The primary clients I
served as an OHS consultant were healthcare facilities, so I started out as the
Secretary of the Healthcare Section and then became the Chair. In this role, I
learned how to use MailChimp, how to take decent meeting minutes, how to market
our educational meetings to members and non-members, and had the opportunity to
network with healthcare OHS professionals from all over the U.S.
After almost four years in that role, I switched my focus to
volunteering with the Industrial Hygiene Practice Specialty (IHPS) of ASSE,
starting as their Social Media and Website person, and moving into the
Publications Chair role after a year or so. In my three years as Publications
Chair (now called the Content Coordinator), I became proficient with LinkedIn
networking, soliciting articles from members and non-members for our web-based
publication, writing articles for the publication, editing submitted articles
for the publication, and understanding the role of social media in OHS advocacy.
Within IHPS, I have served (officially and unofficially) in
many roles, but my favorite role was Executive Secretary – it felt like I was
at the heart of everything IHPS was doing. As Executive Secretary, I kept the
minutes from our Volunteer Advisory Committee meetings and was able to help
organize and participate in two free webinars (we call them “open calls”) for
our membership, one on healthcare safety and another on hazardous drugs handling, spill clean-up and exposure assessment. I was also able to help with
ASSE’s comments to NIOSH about the occupational exposure banding guidance.
Thanks to my involvement in IHPS, I was able to participate
in the House of Delegates and Council on Practices and Standards (CoPS). I was
also selected to speak at Safety 2016 in Atlanta and Safety 2017 in Denver. I
don’t know if I would have been brave enough to submit a proposal to speak if I
was not so involved in ASSE. Thanks to the local and regional events I spoke at
in Arizona, I felt I was ready to take things to the next level.
In 2016, I took on an even more daunting role. After losing
the election for Assistant Administrator for IHPS, I emailed ASSE staff and
asked them which practice specialty needed help – where my efforts could do the
most good. I ran for Assistant Administrator of the Training and Communications Practice Specialty (TCPS) and won. I take over as Administrator of TCPS in July
2018, which is pretty exciting.
So, to sum up, this academic year I served ASSE in the following
roles:
- Assistant Administrator of TCPS
- Executive Secretary of IHPS for half the year, and now Professional Development Chair of IHPS
- Puget Sound ASSE PDC planning committee
- Faculty Advisor for CWU ASSE Student Section
In return for my volunteer efforts with ASSE, I have:
- Made lifelong friends who I love seeing at conferences
- Built an impressive network of excellent OHS professionals
- Improved my technical writing and editing skills
- Become comfortable living part of my professional life online
- Gained experience organizing seminars and conferences
- Learned consensus building and conflict management
- Had the opportunity to speak at local, regional, and national-level events
- Been published in Professional Safety (March 2018 issue, useful summary here)
- And much more!
Why the long post sharing my experience volunteering for
ASSE? I’ve been volunteering for 8 years now, and I’m looking forward to the
next 8. Or 20, or however long my professional career in OHS lasts. I want to
encourage the next generation to get involved with ASSE early in their career,
like I did, and reap the personal and professional benefits.
All of the skills I obtained through my volunteer work have
benefited my career. If it hadn’t been
for some careful nudging by my various mentors through the years, I might not
have “put myself out there” and started volunteering.
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The Industrious Hygienist is back and more determined than ever! |
Will you answer the call? Will you share your experience and your expertise, and help build the future of OHS practice through advocacy and volunteer leadership? Or will you just watch it happen? #NextGenSafety #IndustriousHygienist #TalkSafetyWithUs