TO:              All PMI Buffalo Chapter Members and Associates

FROM:        Jeff Manhardt, President, Board of Directors, PMI Buffalo Chapter

SUBJECT:   2017 Chapter Operating Results

DATE:         March 22, 2018

On behalf of your PMI Buffalo Chapter Board, it is my pleasure to share with you our 2017 Operating Results.

Why join our chapter?  Professional growth and networking opportunities… PDUs for re-certification… professional contacts… staying current with the latest PM practices…

If you chose to attend all of our events in 2017, you would have earned more than 35.5 PDUs. This is more than 1/2 of your 3-year PMP recertification requirement of 60 PDUs.

In 2017 our Professional Development and Membership teams offered the following programs:

➢     2 Professional Development Day (PDD) Events (7 PDUs each) -  provided education to our members and prospective members at an average cost of $33/PDU:

▪       Spring 2017 PDD - had 111 individuals - Speaker - Alan Mallory -  Climbing Mt Everest

▪       Fall 2017 PDD - had 183 attendees - Theme - Building Powerful Relationships.  Speaker - Stuart Knight

➢     9 Chapter Dinner Meetings (1.5 PDUs each) - These meetings attracted 176 attendees at an average cost of $20/PDU. Events included tour of Darwin Martin House Complex and the SPCA.  Education series included the Erie County fair, Risk Management Strategy by the project manager running National Synchrontron Light Source II (2016 PMI Project of the Year) and a very special event for members only with Jim Snyder - Founder of PMI who talked about the future of project management!

➢     8 Breakfast meetings (1.5 PDUs each) - held monthly at various locations around our area. Kudos to those who participated in these self-directed meetings for sharing their experiences to help one another grow professionally!

➢     February Annual Business Meeting (1.5 PDUs) - reviewed 2016 highlights and 2017 plans at Barrel Factory!

➢     Ambassador Recognition & December Networking events (.5 PDU) - our members and prospective members were able to mingle.

➢     3 PMP Preparation Classes - held in Winter/Spring and Fall with a total of 76 registrants.

Services provided by our Membership and Marketing teams included:

➢     675 members from over 100 companies  (up from 640 last year)

➢     Weekly chapter emails, pre-event presentations with updates on Chapter news, programs and events, new members, membership anniversaries, new certification achievements, volunteer awards, developments in project/program/portfolio management.

➢     Networking Opportunities prior to each meeting.

➢     New Member Welcome emails with information, gift & free dinner!

➢     Social Media networking to stay connected with Chapter events and network with other members. Members can connect through www.pmibuffalo.org and our three Chapter social media networks - LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

o      Facebook - reaching more people than through email

▪       Increased Followers 3/20/2017 = 230 - 3/14/2018 = 265

▪       5 Promotions reached 3,895 people; 76 clicked the link

o      Twitter - good but only 1k fewer followers than Rochester

▪       Tweets = 177, Followers = 1.6K

o      LinkedIn

▪       Group Members 951

➢     PDU activity logging for Dinner events was performed on your behalf with PMI Global

Giving Back to the Community:

➢     Once again, our chapter sponsored and assisted in the evaluation of local teams in the Future City Competition.

➢     Outreach continued strengthening partnerships with other organizations, including the University at Buffalo and a 5-day boot camp for engineering graduate students about project management and PMI certifications. 

➢     Our second annual education scholarship was awarded in 2017 to Darshan Odeyar - Masters student at UB

Recognizing Our Chapter Volunteers:

➢     Once again the amazing efforts of our volunteers allowed us to deliver a variety of quality services and programs to our membership and other associates. In 2017 we were fortunate to have ~120 volunteers.

➢     In addition to Volunteer of the Quarter awards, our Annual Achievement award was presented to Lydia Parent at our annual Volunteer Recognition dinner at the Twilight Room

Chapter Administration:

The PMI Buffalo Board continued to focus on the Chapter’s sustainability and fiscal stability:

➢     We held our annual strategic planning meeting in August 2017.  Annual survey results from both Buffalo and PMI Global were reviewed, and used to reaffirm our key strategies: 1) Deliver & Promote Stakeholder Value; 2) Engage & Recruit Members and Volunteers; and 3) Ensure the Chapter’s Sustainability.

➢      We invested in our Board and Directors by sending representatives to both the Regional and North America PMI Leadership Development Meetings. These forums provided us with new ideas and insights as to how to improve our chapter’s performance and increase stakeholder value.

➢     We held our annual elections for the appropriate Board positions.  Elections for 2019 are opening today, March 22nd!

➢     PMI Buffalo - re-organized!  2017 marked the year we implemented the approved changes to the Bylaws to separate the organizational structure of events into Professional Development & Certification.  This allowed us to better focus on the needs of our members and provide quality events.

Technology:

The Chapter was a leader among our peers through the implementation of technology to enable you, our members to interact in new and easier ways and to allow our volunteers to better meet your needs:

➢     We implemented Tableau - a tool to better visualize and interact with data to better serve our membership

➢     Recognized for our use of social media

Financial Operating Results:

➢     The Buffalo PMI Chapter is incorporated under a 501-C6.  Annual 990 Tax filings were successfully completed and overall the chapter was in excellent shape financially at 2017’s closing.

➢     In 2017, as we said we would, we invested every dollar - AND leveraged our reserves to provide our membership the best service while still retaining our current 1.5 years worth of operating expenses in reserve

➢     Second year of full transparency.

o      Total Income: $133,595.07, Total Expense: $149,717.22

In Summary:

The PMI Buffalo Chapter strives to deliver high value to you, our stakeholders. We value your membership, and believe that the programs and services we offered last year delivered you value you deserve and continue to provide a forum to promote PMI standards, to strengthen your knowledge, awareness and understanding of Project Management principles, tools and techniques.  We are always looking for ways to improve, so please share your suggestions with any chapter volunteer.

Thank you for your continued support. We hope to see you at our 2018 events!