Society of Manufacturing Engineers Member Since 1985
SMESpeaks The Society of Manufacturing Engineers Plotting the Society’s Course I
n Lewis Carroll’s novel, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Alice comes to the proverbial fork in the road and asks the Cheshire Cat “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” To which the Cheshire Cat responds, “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.” and Alice answers, “I don’t much care where.” The cat’s profound response is “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go.” As in 1865 and now, those words still hold true—we have to know where we are going and what we hope to accomplish when we get there to be successful. With that in mind, SME uses its strategic plan as a roadmap to keep the Society on track and focused on its overall mission and vision. In 2008, the SME Board of Directors approved SME
Strategic Plan 2012, which also resulted in the Society’s current mission “…to acquire and distribute manufacturing knowledge among its members and the broader manufactur- ing community” and its vision to be “Recognized globally as the premier source for manufacturing knowledge, education, and networking.” Within this strategic plan, there were six detailed goals:
Goal 1: Knowledge—SME will be the premier manufacturing knowledge resource throughout the global manufacturing community. Goal 2: Education—SME and the SME Education Foundation will be known as advocates for careers in manufacturing and a leading resource for manufacturing education. Goal 3: Membership—SME will actively engage people and companies in their communities of interest to add value for the member. Goal 4: Brand—SME’s brand creates the image of the most valued source of manufacturing knowledge. Goal 5: Lean & Effective—SME will be both lean and effective.
Goal 6: Knowledge Delivery—SME will deliver knowledge in ways that meet the needs of members and customers. Now, in 2012, the board, volunteers, and staff once again
are looking at SME’s strategic plan to determine what, if any, changes need to be made to it. The end result will be SME Stra- tegic Plan 2017, which will help clarify the Society’s priorities over the next five years so that we can best meet the needs of our members, customers, and the manufacturing community. In 2011, a consultant was hired to review SME’s current brand in the marketplace and make recommendations on what the Society needs to do in the future to enhance or update its brand. The recommendations made by the brand consultant are being taken into consideration in our strategic planning process to ensure the Society’s relevance in the marketplace for many years to come. SME’s successful past strategic plans have served the So- ciety well over the years. Some noteworthy accomplishments from Strategic Plan 2012 include: • Transforming SME’s “manufacturing knowledge” (books and videos) into an on-demand digital for- mat. This new Manufacturing Knowledge Resource System includes e-books, streaming video, custom publishing (make your own book), subscription op- tions, and more.
• The nine-volume Tool & Manufacturing Engineers Handbook (TMEH) encyclopedic reference set for manufacturing has been converted into an interactive WIKI environment.
• SME purchased Tooling University (Tooling U) in Sep- tember 2010. The leading provider of online training is now providing a wide range of training programs to companies to help them train and prepare their work- force to meet their business needs.