IT OTTAWA WEST SUBGROUP
MINUTES
Executive Meeting February 6, 2024, 18:00
This Meeting Was Held Virtually
Present:
Daniel Shen (President), Bobson Wong (Treasurer), Steve Anderson (Secretary), Zhidan Guan (Member at Large), Liming Sun (Member at Large), Nghia Lam (Member at Large)
Absent:
Beverley Miranda (Vice-President), Nancy Desroches (Member at Large)
The President of the IT Ottawa West Subgroup, Daniel Shen, welcomed all executives and called the meeting to order at 6:15 PM.
AGENDA
- A draft agenda was presented.
MOTION To adopt the agenda as presented. M/S Steve, Daniel. CARRIED.
PREVIOUS MEETING MINUTES
MOTION To adopt the January 11, 2024 meeting minutes as presented. M/S Steve, Daniel. CARRIED.
PRESIDENT’S REPORT
- Daniel noted that the new IT Collective Agreement has been posted. The IT Group Executive is currently meeting. The 2024 Subgroup President’s meeting will be held in Ottawa on April 6.
TREASURER’S REPORT
- Bobson is currently out of the province and unable to provide a balance amount.
ACTION: Bobson is to send a Treasurer’s Report to the Executive by email.
EXISTING BUSINESS
Cleanup of the ITOWSG membership list
ACTION: Beverley to provide an update on the ITOWSG membership list cleanup at the next meeting.
Executive Training Recording from Stacey
ACTION: Bobson to forward Stacey’s email address to Nghia.
ACTION: Nghia to follow up about the executive training recording with Stacey.
Clarification on end-of-year cheque processing
- Bobson clarified that any cheques written in 2023 count towards 2023 financials. They can be deposited in 2024, and they still apply in 2023. Any cheques written in 2023, but deposited in 2024, will not negatively affect the 2025 allocation from PIPSC.
Clarification of virtual meeting meal claims
- Bobson clarified that virtual meetings held in the evenings will trigger automatic lunch per diem amounts payable to the Executives presented in the respective meetings (based on the attendees listed as being present in the draft meeting minutes, and having attended a minimum of 90 minutes of the meeting itself). Receipts do not need to be submitted, because they will be based on lunch per diem amounts published by PIPSC Finance. The lunch per diem amounts will come out of ITOWSG funds.
Sending the promotional item logo to the vendor for production on the promotional items
- The logo was finalized with the vendor, and the ball caps and lunch bags have been produced, received, and locked in the PIPSC mail room for storage by Daniel. This storage space is free of charge and now has a mandatory sign-in/sign-out policy for the removal of stored items.
Suggested banner designs
- The designs have been finalized and the banners are now in production.
ACTION: Daniel is to pick up the banners when they have been produced.
Executive vest purchase
- Daniel has located a possible source, and there was agreement that he should ask them for a quote.
ACTION: Daniel to ask the supplier he located for a vest quote.
ACTION: Daniel to forward the vest logo to be used to PIPSC for approval.
Executive meeting schedule for 2024
- There was consensus that going forward all future ITOWSG meetings will start at 6:30 PM instead of 6:00 PM. However, any attendees at in-person meetings may continue to show up at 6:00 PM (the reservations should continue to be made for that time) and order their food ahead of the 6:30 PM meeting start time.
- Given the new meeting start time, it was agreed that our new regular meeting date will be the first Tuesday of each month (excluding the summer months if agreed by consensus). The two absent ITOWSG executives were asked for their preferences ahead of time and these were taken into account as much as possible in democratically setting this new meeting day.
Paintball event progress
- Nghia volunteered to work with Beverley on planning this event. There are a number of questions outstanding about this event, and Nghia agreed to follow up on two action items in Beverley’s absence.
ACTION: Nghia to follow up with Michael Kenny at the Ottawa Metro Subgroup to gather some tips on how to make the paintball event run as smoothly as possible.
ACTION: Steve to provide Nghia with the name of the insurance contact at PIPSC.
ACTION: Nghia to follow up on the outstanding insurance questions for the paintball event.
NEW BUSINESS
A formal vote on the paintball event
MOTION: To approve a paintball event in 2024 at Delta Force Paintballing Canada up to $5000. M/S Daniel, Steve. CARRIED.
- There was consensus that in the future, the ITOWSG shall only pay for event bookings after a proper vote is held, either in person or virtually.
How many months do no-shows remain on the no-show list?
- All agreed that a no-show list has value. It costs a lot of money when members sign up for events and then don’t show up. It also usually means someone else could have gone instead, but there wasn’t enough space. Daniel explained that the no-show list should be based on a point system and gave the example that if one person doesn’t show up it has less impact than if one person and their two guests also don’t show up.
ACTION: All to ensure that invitations sent out to register for future ITOWSG events should include words to the effect that “No-shows at events are very expensive. By signing up for this event you are agreeing that should you cancel your participation on short notice, or should you not show up without warning, you will be given a lower priority to attend future ITOWSG events.”
ACTION: Liming to update and distribute the no-show list to the ITOWSG Executives. All executives are asked to review and provide feedback to better the effectiveness of the point system used in conjunction with the no-show list.
2024 ITOWSG AGM planning
- There was a discussion of possible 2024 AGM venues. Zhidan suggested the Marconi Centre and gave an example of a similar event recently held there that was reasonably priced. There was then a discussion of possible dates for the ITOWSG AGM, but no consensus was reached. It was noted that not everyone has small children in school, and yet our AGM timing seems to be at least partly based on that. As a starting point, it was suggested that everyone update their future absences in the vacation schedule on the shared drive.
ACTION: Zhidan to obtain a quote from the Marconi Centre for the ITOWSG AGM.
ACTION: All to update the vacation schedule on the ITOWSG shared drive.
Determine the budget for the coming year
ACTION: Bobson, Daniel and Beverley to work on the budget for the next executive meeting.
ROUNDTABLE
- Steve asked for 9 tuques to distribute to his IT coworkers, having held a virtual PIPSC/ITOWSG lunch & learn for his team a few weeks ago. There was great interest in this and lots of union-related questions were answered. There was consensus of using 9 tuques for this, and Steve agreed to go through Daniel in order to pick up the tuques.
ACTION: Steve to work with Daniel to pick up 9 tuques from the PIPSC office.
NEXT MEETING
- Tuesday March 5, 2024. In-person at the Mandarin Restaurant at 150 Katimavik Road in Kanata. Daniel will make the reservation for 6:00 PM, and the meeting will start at 6:30 PM.
ACTION: Liming to book the venue for the next executive meeting.
ADJOURNMENT
MOTION Adjournment. M/S Daniel, Liming. CARRIED. 8:35 PM
- Minutes recorded by Steve Anderson, ITOWSG Secretary -
ACTION ITEM SUMMARY
Bobson, Daniel and Beverley to work on the budget for the next meeting.
All to ensure that invitations sent out to register for future ITOWSG events should include words to the effect that “No-shows at events are very expensive. By signing up for this event you are agreeing that should you cancel your participation on short notice, or should you not show up without warning, you will be given a lower priority to attend future ITOWSG events.”
All to update the vacation schedule on the ITOWSG shared drive.
Beverley to action the ITOWSG membership list cleanup for the next meeting.
Bobson to send a Treasurer’s Report to the Executives by email.
Bobson to forward Stacey’s email address to Nghia.
Daniel to pick up the banners when they have been produced.
Daniel to ask the supplier he located for a vest quote.
Daniel to forward the vest logo to be used to PIPSC for approval.
Liming to write up and distribute a draft document to the ITOWSG Executives that explains the point system to be used in conjunction with the no-show list.
Liming to book the venue for the next executive meeting.
Nghia to follow up about the executive training recording with Stacey.
Nghia to follow up with Michael Kenny at the Ottawa Metro Subgroup to gather some tips on how to make the paintball event run as smoothly as possible.
Nghia to follow up on the outstanding insurance questions for the paintball event.
Steve to provide Nghia with the name of the insurance contact at PIPSC.
Steve to work with Daniel to pick up 9 tuques from the PIPSC office.
Zhidan to obtain a quote from the Marconi Centre for the ITOWSG AGM.