I realize I’ve been remiss in filling you in on my week in Vancouver. I was there to attend the CUPE National Convention — a gathering every two years (the location changes each time) of representatives from every CUPE local in Canada. This year, it was held at the Vancouver Conference Centre West (the building on the left of this image):
I was one of four delegates from our local and it was my second time attending convention, the first was 1999 in Montreal. At the 2011 Convention, there were close to 3000 delegates, staff, observers, and guests on the floor. While not everyone gets to speak, I made it to the mic once where I spoke about social media. The Strategic Directions document focused one section on outreach through social media:
A social media strategy and program will be developed to mobilize CUPE members, staff and the public on issues. CUPE’s web strategy, CUPE’s website cupe.ca, and social media (Facebook, Twitter, and other forms of electronic contact) will be assessed and appropriate changes made to support the goal of reaching the membership
After thanking the committee and the executive board for making engagement a key priority, I took a deep breath and said,
As we wade into this ocean of social media, we need to beware of the riptides and the sharks.
I continued on that note, reminding the committee that these platforms were operated by private corporations who owned and sold any content therein. More critical on a strategic planning note is the transient nature of social media. I reminded them that Twitter was almost a non issue at the last convention and might be again by the next. What locals needed, I suggested, was a best practices document and some guidelines on appropriate use of social media so that those who were ready to go could get started right now.
On the last day of Convention, the final version of the plan was released and it included this sentence, largely encapsulating my argument:
We will develop materials on both best practices and the potential pitfalls of social media as it is used by our enemies as well as our allies.
I am very pleased to have contributed to a blueprint that will be used to guide the union over the next two years. The remainder of the convention involved the debate and voting on about 50 of the submitted resolutions plus some key changes to the National Constitution — the most exciting of which was its translation into clear language (no, really, clear language is cool!).
OK, so what did I do aside from all that?
- I took a lot of photos; some are now online at Flickr, in a set called Vancouver Fall 2011. Some of the shots are impressive due to the room I had on the 28th floor of the Sheraton Wall Centre — a view of which I did not tire.
- I sat in on the Dyscultured podcast; you can listen to the episode online (Episode 158, Caffeinated Meat Sticks) but, as I was sharing a mic with Shane and clearly didn’t have my game voice on, I’m a little hard to hear. I have to admit it was also a bit challenging to get a word in edgewise — the hosts are lightning-fast with their repartee! Still, it was a fun diversion, even if I had to bail back to the hotel as soon as recording was done because I was exhausted and had to get up early the next day.
- I had a little bit of everything food-wise — from crappy McDonalds to amazingly tasty comfort food from Fresh Local Wild, a food truck not far from the VCC. Also, the best gelato ever from Bella Gelateria (one of the locales recommended to me prior to my visit); I had the espresso and the hazelnut and while the espresso was good, the hazelnut was ridiculously good.
- I spent the balance of my time hanging out in the hotel room, reading, writing and websurfing.