Should I Renew my ASQ membership?

[amanbhai]

Folks Next month I have renew my ASQ membership. I want to know positively should I do that.

[Steve Prevette]

Originally Posted by amanbhai

Folks Next month I have renew my ASQ membership. I want to know positively should I do that.

I can't make the decision for you. There is great opportunity, there is great frustration. I would make a personal inventory of the pluses and minuses of ASQ (both nationally and locally) and make a decision from that.

[Wes Bucey]

Yep. Ultimately, it's a personal decision. If you are considering dropping your membership, you ought to at least create a balance sheet with pluses and minuses of membership, but don't stop at just tallying the score.

Consider this: Is there anything YOU can do to change any of the minus items to plus items?

I've always been saddened to hear from ASQ members who have no opportunity to attend local Section meetings and thereby never get a feeling of being part of a "community." Most folks who drop out leave because they feel no connection to other members of the society.

I can tell you this much:
Nobody at ASQ owes you a job or a promotion - those you have to earn yourself. ASQ can help you acquire the tools which will help you get the job or promotion, but you still have to do the work.

Can you get the same tools by merely using ASQ as a publishing house?
Sure, but it seems easier when you have other folks to talk with who have been through the process - a big advantage of Section meetings, courses, seminars, and workshops. (As good as a Forum like the Cove can be, it still pales compared to hands on mentoring from fellow Section members.)

Are all Sections equally good?
Sadly, no.
I'd be interested in hearing what you finally decide and WHY.

[mjones2]

Tell me more. Have you got to section meetings? particpated in training? used their job board? contacted their placement chair? etc.

I love my section, but then again I am somewhat active in it.

Toledo section rocks!!!

Maggie Jones

[AllanJ]

Originally Posted by amanbhai

Folks Next month I have renew my ASQ membership. I want to know positively should I do that.

Before deciding you might want to consider the posts on the thread asking, "What has the ASQ done...".

After being a member for over 20 years or so, I let mine lapse a few years ago. The world did not come to an end. All that I need is available better, faster, more thoroughly, cheaper on the Internet. Having applied the same business skills and rationale I would in my daily professional life to answering the question you pose, I was unable to justify the continued expenditure on the ASQ.

This year, I will discard my nostalgic sentiments for having been an elected fellow of the IQA for almost 30 years, a past nationally elected member of its Council and so forth and move on.

What one does with one's own discretionary expenditure on an alleged not for profit is a private matter. As well as the inappropriate and untimely delivery of largely irrelevant service, personally, I cannot support egregious excess and waste for it is an anathema to my efforts and beliefs as a quality professional.

[little__cee]

Would anyone be willing to start a list of plusses and minuses in this thread? I'm curious. Am not a member and have not considered it, but still think it could be a good service to have a compilation of generic items in the forum.

[WALLACE]

Reformation is good!
The ASQ as great as it is, needs to be reformed from within. If not, it will implode.
Wallace

[AllanJ]

Originally Posted by WALLACE

Reformation is good!
The ASQ as great as it is, needs to be reformed from within. If not, it will implode.
Wallace

My dear Wallace, I heard that argument about "change from within" from the IQA twenty five years ago. I see little that has changed at its heart: if anything, the membership has been made ever more remote. I spent nearly 10 years as a Council member (nationally elected, not one of the establishment appointee ones). I eventually left as it was clear a cozy clique of what were called "safe hands" (if you are familiar with civil service jargon) were in control and would never permit any different. Indeed, the very expression "safe pair of hands" was used on more than one occasion when key positions were to be filled. Despite lofty goals and expensive brochures proclaiming 5 year plans, goals and missions, the membership has decreased in the last 5 years or so from about 15K to 12K. Of course, the 5 year plans seem to have been reissued with targets for membership growth adjusted accordingly (a la Soviet style plans). All rather touching, really!

But, I am curious to know what you considered is an "implosion"?

The ASQ has lost nearly half the membership over the last 5-6 years or so and disaffection is rampant. It certainly experienced an "explosion" of membership in the 1980s and early 1990s. So I would think such a dramatic loss of membership is an "implosion".