What do you get?

Do you really get anything out of that?

I've heard that question more than once relating to the User Group. It's a question that has both a complex and a simple answer. I'm going to attempt both answers here.

The simple answer is yes, yes I do.

The more complex answer applies to me, but I believe it also applies to anyone that wants to attend a meeting. If you want to get something out of a meeting, particularly a user group meeting, what you get depends completely on what you put in. If you're not a contributor, if you're not actively engaged in the process of whatever you're doing, then you're not going to get much out of any meeting. The more you put in, the more you'll get back. It might not be immediate, but the effort will end with payoff.

On the 7th of February (yesterday as I write this) we had the regular user group meeting and I believe it was very successful. We ran long, about a half an hour past our intended stop time, but we answered all the questions that were put forth. Structural, architectural, program specific and philosophical all brought forth lots of ideas from the folks attending the meeting. The questions had been submitted prior to the meeting and anyone that was on the mailing list had the opportunity to check things out beforehand. If that e-mail got missed, the questions were printed out and were on hand for anyone that wanted a hard copy. That's the core of the participatory aspect - the questions. These questions covered lots of topics and ranged from details to rendering. There were quite a few folks there that were really dialed in on this program. I certainly learned a lot.

Do I work on structural models? No, I don't. Was it helpful to hear what the structure folks were struggling with? Absolutely. Project teams have a lot to learn and a lot of new working procedures to figure out. Communication is the key to this program as it is with any successful project - and that requires participation.

I'm looking forward to participating in the next meeting, how about you?