Biennium report 2023

INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR PROSTHETICS AND ORTHOTICS 21 New ideas came forth to achieve a larger membership number. The membership committee worked on a strategy to implement in the new biennium. We want to include students as they are the future for ISPO and the benefits for different categories of memberships were developed. What were the major activities and projects undertaken by the committee during this period? When communicating with the presidents, we want to obtain the information on what challenges each society faced when joining ISPO and renewing their membership. There are different options for members to join and to pay for membership of ISPO, however it stays the decision of each membership society of how they would like to proceed in future regarding payment methods. ISPO held several IC meetings online where the challenges could be discussed, and any contributions and suggestions were taken into consideration. The committee’s major role is to support the head office and membership in their administrative role to produce a streamline process for the societies when joining, renewing, paying, and communicating with us. This includes updating information on the system. How does the committee use the new ISPO Community? The membership committee have to rely on good links and relationships within the ISPO community. To achieve the goal to reach more people to become members we do need the members to convey the message within each country of the benefits of being an ISPO member and the benefits that it may have to the people with disabilities when the association is stronger. Within the different committees within ISPO, there is a strong awareness of the needs of each committee and there is an effort to assist other committees where the need occurs. What was the main challenge/s faced by the committee during the biennium and how were they addressed? The challenges that we as a committee faced was parallel with what other committees experienced. The pandemic has caused a loss in membership. One conference was changed to an online conference because of the pandemic and the membership numbers were affected as well. Membership numbers usually increase during a congress year, but it was not the case during the pandemic. The data-basis that ISPO had was not entirely correct and updated. This made it extremely difficult for the committee members to reach the correct people in each membership society. Although several mails were received to adjust this information, some did get lost, and this caused a lot of frustration. A new website was launched, and information has been updated. Although this was a challenging time period, most growing pains were resolved and if members still have queries, it is dealt with on a “one on one” basis. What lessons were learned during the biennium that can inform future activities and projects for members? Our committee relies on teamwork. As in everything we believe that commitment in what we strive to achieve will unite people. We realised that the only way to improve our membership numbers is to review the benefits and invest in students. Although ISPO is open and available for any stakeholder to join, we believe that a better strategy to include the multi- disciplinary team could change our numbers drastically. Involvement in ISPO starts with being involved in your own country. It is the benefit of a discount for a congress that convinces people to stay members of ISPO. Some of the national memberships are strong and they have a lot of activities arranged. This creates a culture of working towards the same goals and objectives and we see these societies grow each year. Our CPD committee brought a new dimension to the platform as CPD activities could be a strong motivation to be a ISPO member. What’s your outlook/committee outlook for the next biennium? The Membership Committee should always streamline the communication between the national membership societies and the executive board. This committee have to recruit members from different fields. Our future lies with our young upcoming professionals, and we have to include them with their ideas into our strategy. Membership Committee 2021-2023 Mariette Deist (Chair) Luai Sablaban Tjerk De Ruiter Andrea Quintanilla Hung-Hei Kwan Favio Montané Anarème Kpandressi Amer Ayman Vibhor Agrawal