To renew or not

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Author Message ken hercenberg Senior Member Username: khercenberg Post Number: 1525 Registered: 12-2006 Posted on Monday, October 17, 2022 - 06:14 pm:    Hi there. All kidding aside, CSI has been a bit of a let-down recently. In fact the one thing they're good at is reminding me to renew my membership. Yay! This is my 40th year as a member. I never thought I would ever reach this point but I'm honestly not sure that I want to continue. Finding MasterFormat online is a constant battle. I own a hard copy but I like having access to the latest online version. I haven't looked but is the difference in cost to renew my certifications worth it? Certainly it's not worth the price I'm paying. I presume that one day we will have Crosswalk shoved down our throats; I'm not sure why. I don't know that I support this effort. If I don't renew I'll miss the folks at Charlotte CSI (we had a great meeting today) but even then it's probably cheaper for me to just pay to go to the meetings. Where's my motivation to stay? Edward R Heinen CSI CDT CCS LEED-AP Senior Member Username: edwardheinen Post Number: 10 Registered: 04-2022 Posted on Monday, October 17, 2022 - 08:01 pm:    I list my certifications after my name, and I no longer list my memberships, since anyone can pay for that and put letters after their name. If I were a fellow I would certainly list it. I've been working hard in recent years to better align credentialing maintenance (CEU's) with research efforts. For me, my master libraries are a great way to capture and put "new learning" into an immediate form of practice (and help me remember what I just learned). I know that CSI is serious about attracting new members, and a next generation of specifiers. Deltek's new "solutions" seems to be mostly related to the lack of qualified specifiers and their own license protection. I think these are both linear-thinking solutions that don't fully address complexity. Dan Helphrey Senior Member Username: dbhelphrey Post Number: 118 Registered: 12-2018 Posted on Monday, October 17, 2022 - 08:42 pm:    My employer requires me to maintain my membership, and pays for it. I've never seen enough benefit to pay my own money for it. At least in our chapter the high membership dues include a usually pretty decent dinner at chapter meetings. Loretta Sheridan Senior Member Username: leshrdn Post Number: 51 Registered: 11-2021 Posted on Tuesday, October 18, 2022 - 07:47 am:    Edward: I agree with you on the linear thinking for both CSI and Deltek. I don't think CSI has a grasp on how to attract new members. I think that they are of the opinion that sweeping out the "old" will attract the "new." But I am skeptical of that approach. All it does is get rid of a layer of acquired knowledge. And I admit that I have no idea what attracts younger-ish people. I know when I was new to an area or a career switch, I joined a professional organization, went to meetings, and became involved as a way to network and get a job, or get a *better* job. That does NOT seem to be a consideration any more. My experience with younger people is they don't think about the NEXT job. And when I say "younger" I mean anyone under 50. Ronald J. Ray, RA, CCS, CCCA, CSI, SCIP Senior Member Username: rjray Post Number: 214 Registered: 04-2004 Posted on Tuesday, October 18, 2022 - 09:05 am:    Dan, there are no longer local Chapter dues. Every dollar you pay in membership dues goes to the national organization, who, if they feel like it, or feel like they can afford it, may forward some of the dues they collect to local CSI Chapters. When all this national mandate started, they said $100 of an individual's dues would go to their local Chapter. Now, each Chapter is required to sign an agreement that ignores that earlier statement. So, your employer may now be paying less in dues for your membership, and you may be paying your own meal cost if you choose to attend meetings, unless your employer will reimburse you for the meal cost. ken hercenberg Senior Member Username: khercenberg Post Number: 1526 Registered: 12-2006 Posted on Tuesday, October 18, 2022 - 09:51 am:    My employer pays for one membership of my choice. They encourage membership in organizations that we are involved in. I'm thinking about switching back to ASTM. I see value in that despite the pain involved when dealing with some of their committees. Similar to many others who have spent years involved in CSI's Chapter, Regional, and Institute activities I never cared to apply for the "F" despite encouragement years ago from other Fellows. Not my speed. Very grateful for those who did pursue it and how received the recognition they truly deserve. CSI was a great organization. We did a lot of very good things in addition to creating and maintaining the Formats and educational content. Providing a venue designed to cross pollinate the industry was a great idea. We didn't do a great job at bringing in many developers, lawyers, insurance representatives, engineers or contractors but we managed some representation across the board. We had fun. We challenged ourselves and each other. We developed great relationships regardless of the roles we played at work. We were a team; mostly dysfunctional but it still worked for the most part. Don't get me wrong. It's a volunteer organization and I'm presuming that the leadership still doesn't benefit monetarily from their positions so kudos to them for putting in the time, thought, and effort. I guess I'm not "feeling" it anymore.