AAML in the New Year

First of all, I wish you a very happy and healthy New Year and I hope to make 2012 the most memorable year possible for the AAML.

One of the exciting changes for me this year is the new Best Practices Committee, which will serve as a "think tank" of new ideas for AAML projects. The committee will consist of any and all past presidents who wish to participate on the committee. It is chaired by Immediate Past President Linda Lea Viken. It is rewarding to see virtually every past president indicate a willingness to participate on the committee. It is clear to me that past presidents have been a resource that we have neglected to utilize, much to our loss. No one knows the AAML better than a past president and without a "political agenda" as a motivation, their ideas are unbridled and creative.

This became obvious to me thanks to the idea of past president Marlene Eskind Moses, when she invited all of the past presidents to a breakfast after the 2010 November Annual meeting Dinner / Dance. The energy of that first meeting, and the ideas generated by those in attendance, was, frankly, profound.

More importantly, some of the ideas that have came out of these breakfast meetings (continued last year by Linda Lea) were inspiring. In fact, as a result of one significant discussion at last November's breakfast, I plan to implement some major changes to next November's Dinner / Dance. The past presidents universally expressed concern that by having the Dinner / Dance on Friday night, our attendance was reduced by Fellows leaving the meeting right after the final CLE on Friday. So the radical suggestion was made to consider moving the Dinner/ Dance to Thursday night instead! I, always willing to be a guinea pig, jumped on the opportunity to do something new, so I am making this change in November. ake this change in November.

The plan is to have the Dinner / Dance on Thursday night instead of Friday night. This will mean that instead of the President Elect reception on Thursday, we will have the Presidential Inauguration on Friday night (this year honoring the swearing in of Alton Abramowitz). There are some other logical reasons for this change. In the past, Friday has been somewhat schizophrenic, in that it is the outgoing president's final celebration, but also the new president's incoming parade. By having the Dinner / Dance on Thursday, that night can be exclusively the "party" of the outgoing president, while the Presidential Inauguration shall belong solely to the incoming president. Problem solved.

Based on other suggestions by the past presidents, I am going to implement some other changes. For example, although some people prefer to organize their own Dinner / Dance table, other Fellows prefer to sit at an open table and meet new Fellows, with whom they have not had a chance to connect. Therefore, I am going to develop some hybrid seating, with some Fellows being entitled to reserve an entire table if they want, but, at the same time, encouraging open seating for those interested in mixing and matching. 

Finally, as you all should know by now, our November 2012 meeting will be at the new J.W. Marriott in Chicago's financial district. We are going to use two ballrooms for the Dinner / Dance this year, holding dinner in the main ballroom and then moving upstairs to the second ballroom for desert and dancing. This way, you can enjoy dinner conversation with reduced music, stay at the more quiet ballroom after dinner if you wish, or join the dancing frenzy upstairs. The more options available the more satisfied Fellows. And that is my #1 goal! Ken