Dear CSI Albuquerque Members and Friends,

September has been a busy month for us in preparing for the 10th Annual Continuing Education Conference & Product Show on October 14th.  This is our premiere event of the year.  Our general interest in event quality was given an early preview on September 14th with the successful lunch meeting and tour of the Hotel Andaluz project in downtown Albuquerque.  Pulling off this tour, given the logistical challenges involved, was no mean feat!  Much credit goes to the hard work and planning of the Programs Committee headed by Peter Holloway.  Special kudos goes to our Arrangements ‘czarina,’ Chris Morrison and Ron Burnstein, Education Committee Chairman. Ron and his firm Studio Southwest Architects arranged permission for the tour with the owner and provided ‘tour guides’ to make sure we accessed a great deal of the project and got all our questions answered.  Chris handled the miraculous feeding of attendees at the Alvarado Transportation Center staging location two blocks away and managed the ‘orderly’ departure of tour groups.  I would also like to thank Darren Sand from Goodman Realty, who gave what I can only describe as a perfectly timed and informative pre-tour presentation.   Finally, recognition is due Victor Rosenthal and the entire communications team who effectively got the invitation message out to the membership about the event.

Member events such as these are a good example of the way our chapter can get things done in a successful manner.  The essential element is the quality of the cooperation among capable team members that inspires confidence that the communication and hard work necessary to pull these things off will happen. Our theme for the coming CEC & PS is “Quality Control in Construction Documents:  Getting it Right”.   What is there worth doing if “getting it right” is not the ultimate objective?  We think that this year’s CEC & PS will provide attendees with some good information towards that goal.  I am personally looking forward to Michael Chambers’ lunchtime keynote presentation on “Interdiscipline Coordination: Creating a Coordinated Team”.  It takes a coordinated team to pull off a highly-ambitious member tour of a downtown hotel in the last stages of major renovations.  It takes the same kind of cooperation among team members to create a successful design and construction project on a much larger scale.  That is, in essence, what CSI is all about.  We thrive upon, and live by the team approach. CSI promotes it by developing the means to organize and communicate among team members.  All that’s left is the hard work necessary to make it happen.  Please consider becoming an active participant in the CSI Albuquerque Team by joining any of the impressively capable chapter committees.

See you at the CEC & PS!