George Klassen from the Supreme Group spoke on risk management at the technical meeting. This meeting was fairly well attended, and the opportunities to share past, present and future activities between local manufacturing professionals and international staff were numerous. It also had the extra challenge of competing with game seven of the Stanley Cup Final. By the way — congratulations to the Boston Bruins for their win over the Vancouver Canucks!

The two half-day workshops, one on lean manufacturing and the second on elastomers, were delivered by local manufacturing professionals. The lean manufacturing workshop was an introduction to world-class manufacturing techniques. The workshop on elastomers was an insightful look on the technologies used in the manufacturing of elastomer products for the oil and gas market.

Janine Saperson, SME event manager, coordinated a town hall panel discussion on factory automation with topic and speaker inputs from local manufacturing research professionals — NRC Industrial Research Assistance Program. All four speakers were from local companies. Marvin Mishio, vice-chair, WMTS 2011, who was also involved in acknowledging several of the other speakers, moderated this panel discussion.

Networking with others was a primary objective. Of course, if this can be done over food and refreshments all the better! As such, several chapter officers attended the breakfast and evening networking sessions as well as volunteering to staff the SME display booth. At times, there were up to 10 past chapter chairs in attendance.

The chapter’s objective was to support and align itself with a larger event so that it could be exposed to a larger audience/market. One source stated that there were more than 25 members recruited at this event, some on which would be assigned to other chapters.

The seeds for chapter participation were planted at 2009 WMTS, where the event took on a greater conference component such as robotic welding. In 2010, SME Headquarters, other regional chapters and Northern Lights No. 370 entered into serious negotiations on the role of the chapters at the event. After discussions with Toronto No. 26, the Northern Lights No. 370 chapter made a commitment to the shows being held in 2011, 2013 and 2015. The 2011 show was definitely a learning experience, especially for the novice chapter officers. In the future, the chapter will increase the number of educational events it offers, which will hopefully result in having more members ready to get involved.

The first WMTS event in Edmonton was approximately 20 years ago by McGregor. In the earlier shows, the chapter had a small display booth at the trade show, but was unable to contribute to an educational component. In 2007, when SME purchased several Canadian shows, including WMTS, it opened the doors for greater chapter participation. Several favorable comments were received from those SME members who attended and/or volunteered at this event.

For more information on the chapter’s involvement in WMTS, please contact Marvin Mishio, vice-chair, WMTS 2011, at 780.297.1143 or andotech@shaw.ca.

Courtesy of: www.sme.org

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