by Geoff Robison, VAA President
VAA Life Member 12606, EAA Life Member 268346
Welcome back and thanks again for reading the EAA Vintage Aircraft Association’s Vintage Air Mail e-Newsletter.
Here we go again! I feel like I just got home from AirVenture and the planning for the 2017 event is already in full forward motion. This is not me complaining at all. What it is mostly about is the full on interaction with the membership during Convention where we consistently heard some really good ideas from you.
We always set a time aside at AirVenture to have our Annual Membership Meeting. For many years this meeting has been intended to provide an appropriate opportunity for the membership to interact with the leadership of the VAA and hopefully experience some valuable dialog between us. The problem we have long had is that this membership meeting was always scheduled on Sunday at the end of the Convention. Nowadays the bulk of our members are back on the road headed back home on Saturday or Sunday. Consequently, the Annual Membership Meeting always ended up being a re-cap of the Convention results for the VAA, but with low member attendance.
This year we changed all that. With the completion of the Vintage Tall Pines pavilion we now have a facility where we can hold our Annual Membership Meeting at in the middle of the week when we are rich with members in attendance at AirVenture. This worked out pretty well this year, but I got the impression that some members in attendance showed up not really sure what the real purpose of the Meeting was intended to be.
Yeah, it’s a good opportunity for a member to attend and learn more about what their organization is all about. I would also like to see the membership utilize this opportunity as more of a Q & A session where they can be comfortable asking us questions about why we do certain things the way we do them. This is where I believe the leadership can really cash in on new ideas that are emanating out of these remarks and questions from the membership. As you can imagine, I find myself having many one-on-one conversations with members at AirVenture each year, and these can be very thought-provoking. Imagine what the results could be with a room full of our members asking us the “why” questions, and then having the opportunity to throw out their ideas of how we could improve upon the product. Imagine the potential results of a well-attended / well-run membership session every year during Convention! I hope to see you in attendance!
“Oshkosh 2017…is going to be another great one!”
Always remember, we are better together!
Share your passion for Vintage Aircraft at every opportunity.
It is never too early to begin your planning to attend the “World’s Greatest Aviation Event”.
Thanks for being a member, and we hope to see you at Oshkosh 2017. July 24th thru the 30th.
