Happy New Year to all! On behalf of your Executive Committee, I wish all of you good health and much happiness in the coming year!
The downturn has and will continue to affect all aspects of our industry, including AAPG.
As some of you know, we made a difficult decision to offer a voluntary opportunity for selected qualified segment of our staff to leave AAPG in the fourth quarter of 2015, and 13 out of 20 of the eligible staff accepted the opportunity and left the Association.
To those staff – many of whom have provided decades of service to AAPG and the membership – I personally want to thank all of you for making AAPG a world leader in petroleum geoscience and wish you all success in your future endeavors. You will always be part of the AAPG Family and will be missed, but not forgotten.
In the fourth quarter, the Executive Committee requested the Executive Directors to review the structure of the AAPG with a specific focus on realignment of our staff on the business of AAPG.
The new alignment, developed by the directors, will see AAPG focused on three corporate areas: business-revenue, marketing and Association administration; we will also maintain a corporate shared services group.
The business-revenue group will focus on the areas in which AAPG generates revenue for the Association: conferences, education, publications, our international offices and our wholly-owned subsidiary, Datapages.
Marketing will be a new primary focus for AAPG – not that we have never had marketing in the past, but now we will place all marketing components in one group to build a stronger and more consistent branding for AAPG.
The Association administration group will encompass all of the governance within AAPG: the Executive Committee, Advisory Council and the House of Delegates, and our programs such as Imperial Barrel Award, Visiting Geoscientist Program, Distinguished Lecture Program, the GEO-DC office. Corporate shared services will include accounting, information technology, our human resources functions, and a new member and customer experience center.
This new organizational structure will be rolled out through the next two quarters and your Executive Committee is confident this will provide a consistent alignment for the downturn and for moving into AAPG’s next century.
As I move into the second half of my presidency I would like to thank the membership again for electing me to serve as your president.
It has been a wonderful experience filled with meeting and engaging with many members around the world, including students and young professionals who all are eager to be future leaders in our Industry.
I personally feel very good about the future after meeting so many amazing people, and when the price does recover, we will have the means to continue providing energy to the world in an environmentally responsible manner.
The new alignment, developed by the directors, will see AAPG focused on three corporate areas: business-revenue, marketing and Association administration.