NECA Convention 2009 Seattle: The Blog

NECA is launching the Contractors Challenge to encourage NECA members to provide a program for their employees to participate in the educational and networking opportunities available at NECA 2010 Boston.

“The success of my company is a direct result of the things I learned at past NECA events. I think it’s a good investment to send our young people to the NECA Convention and Show. The training our people get at NECA just isn’t available anywhere else, and it gives me a chance to reward them for working hard through the year.”
- Rex Ferry, NECA President

What’s the Contractors Challenge? Find out here!

You told us what you wanted, and we listened! NECA 2010 Boston will reflect many great suggestions that will make it an even better event – for you and your company!

1. More family-friendly.
The 2010 NECA Show will be open to all children accompanied by an adult. All they need is a badge for admission!

2. More peer-to-peer networking.
The new NECA Women’s Peer Group and Safety Roundtable are just a few of the opportunities for special groups within the association to meet and discuss the special concerns they face.

3. More opportunities for your entire company.
Newly launched by NECA President Rex Ferry, the “Contractors Challenge: Motivate, Reward, Recognize” is a program any NECA member can customize to help bring talented employees to NECA 2010 Boston. More details can be found online!

4. More access to innovation.
Find more energy solutions across the entire exhibit hall. Companies offering green energy innovations will be identified with NECA Energy Solutions logos on their booths, in the Show Guide and on www.necaconvention.org. Attendees will also be asked to vote for their favorite exhibitors for the first time as part of ELECTRICAL CONTRACTOR’s Show Stoppers awards.

5. First-Timer Orientation
Will NECA 2010 Boston be your first time at NECA’s annual convention and trade show? Don’t get lost or overwhelmed. First-time attendees will have a special orientation session from NECA and Boston chapter staff about determining and following a path that makes the event work best for you.

Everyone at the airport yesterday seemed to be a face I recognized from the past four days at NECA 2009 Seattle. We were all sporting bags from NECA Show exhibitors (ELECTRICAL CONTRACTOR’s bag seemed to be the most popular), and we all looked pretty tired, but happy.

NECA 2009 Seattle closed out on Tuesday with an awesome performance by Cirque Dreams at McCaw Hall. There were lots of “ooo’s and ahhh’s” and spontaneous applause during their gravity-defying feats and high-energy performance.

Thanks to all the NECA members and chapters who joined us in Seattle and on the NECA Convention blog this year. But don’t take us off your RSS or Twitter feed just yet! We’ll have more video and photos from Seattle, along with copies of presentations for downloading. Don’t forget to retrieve your CEU certificate either!

If you have any questions about anything we covered in the NECA 2009 Seattle blog, you can always reach me by email. And check out the new site we’ve already launched for NECA 2010 Boston, Oct. 2-5, 2010.

[To answer the question, “what is that group of words thing over there in the right column?” That’s called a “tag cloud” and it’s generated by the “tags” or keywords we assign to each post. As more posts with certain tags are written, that tag shows up as bigger within the cloud, so you can tell at a glance what we’ve written about the most.]

Please click on “Share your thoughts” and tell us your favorite part of NECA 2009 Seattle! Thanks for helping us make it a great event!

NECA and ELECTRI International are running a special benefit for the Sandy Bay Alternative School in Roatan, Honduras, at the 2009 NECA Show.

Installing a solar photovoltaic system at Sandy Bay Alternative School was the student service project during this year’s Cross Border Meeting – a project that went on to win recognition from the Clinton Global Initiative.

Students from the school sent several pieces of artwork to share at NECA 2009 Seattle in gratitude. But with the students’ permission, NECA and the Foundation are taking donations for the school in exchange for their beautiful tropical drawings and paintings.

The recommended contribution is $15 for each picture, an amount that will help educate at child at the school for over half a year. Please help us support Sandy Bay Alternative School by visiting the art display at NECA (booth 10007 on the skywalk) and taking home a special memory from Seattle.

The NECA Show featuring over 240 exhibitors with products and services specifically for electrical contractors was unveiled today immediately following the Opening General Session. The Northwest Naval Band, sponsored by Helmets to Hardhats, opened the Show floor today with great fanfare, and thousands of attendees flooded the halls to see the latest and greatest.

Couldn’t make it to Seattle? Check out over 100 products in the virtual New and Featured Product Room online. Ginger Wilson is also tweeting some of the exhibitors that catch her eye on twitter.com/NECAConvention. Subscribe to her tweets today — she gets the first scope on cool prize giveaways at the booths, but you need to be on Twitter first!

The 2009 induction ceremony of new Fellows into the Academy of Electrical Contracting at the Opening General Session marks the 41th anniversary of this exceptional organization. Academy Chairman Milner Irvin introduced the nine new Fellows:

Scott Bringmann
Alcan Electrical & Engineering, Inc.
Anchorage, Alaska

Kenneth Hart
Dynalectric Company ~ Washington, DC
Dulles, Virginia

Stephen J. Kohnen
Kay-Bee Electric Company
Florissant, Missouri

Craig Martin
Frost Electric Company, Inc.
Aurora, Illinois

Ben Nevers
Nevers Electric
Bogalusa, Louisiana

William A. Powell, Jr.
Chewning & Wilmer, Inc.
Richmond, Virginia

Daniel G. Schaeffer
Schaeffer Electric Company
St. Louis, Missouri

Chris Schoolcraft
Shawver and Son Inc.
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Lanny Thomas
Allison-Smith Company
Atlanta, Georgia

Since its founding meeting in 1968, the Academy has served as the “voice of experience” for NECA and ELECTRI International – The Foundation for Electrical Construction, Inc. Fellows of the Academy are invited to join the organization based on their exceptional service to the electrical contracting industry. Each Academy Fellow authors a white page on their area of industry expertise, and they participate in issue analysis to determine trends within the industry and make recommendations.

More information about the Academy’s 2009 annual meeting, a list of Fellows and a complete archive of papers by Academy Fellows is available on NECA’s website.

NECA recognized the contributions made to electrical contracting by the National Association of Electrical Distributors (NAED) during yesterday’s Board of Governor’s meeting with the association’s 2009 Industry Partner Award.

NECA Industry Partner Award recognizes those organizations or individuals that, though not members of NECA, contribute to the electrical contracting industry’s success through their decisions, actions, or cooperation with NECA. Previous winners of the Industry Partner Award include the National Fire Protection Agency (1996), Graybar Electric Co. (2004), and University of Kansas professor and ELECTRI International researcher Thomas E. Glavinich (2007). The National Association of Electrical Distributors (NAED) and NECA have worked together for more than a century to the mutual benefit of their respective members.

Electrical distributors are essential link between companies who make electrical products and the electrical contractors who put those products to use in projects worldwide. Beyond warehousing and selling electrical products, distributors provide extensive product knowledge, technical assistance, on-time delivery to facilitate productivity, market knowledge, and extend credit to end-users.

NAED is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to serving and protecting the electrical distribution channel. Much of its work centers on helping electrical distributors develop effective working relationships with their best customers. electrical contractors.

NECA and NAED joined forces in 2009 to fight the growing number of counterfeit electrical products making their way to the market. Since its inception, the Anti-Counterfeit Products Initiative, www.counterfeitscankill.com, has educated thousands of electrical professionals and the public on the dangers and liabilities counterfeit electrical products present. “We’re proud of this initiative with the potential to save lives, and we’re proud of our ongoing partnership with NAED,” said NECA CEO John Grau.

Grau wrote in a recent editorial in Construction Today, “We’re all in this together, and we all share a common goal of keeping buildings, their owners and their occupants safe. When your electrical contractor comes to you with a concern about product quality, hear him out. You could be saving liability, property and lives.”

Local Labor Management Cooperation Committee (LMCC) language is in virtually every NECA-IBEW collective bargaining agreement, but is it effective? Local LMCCs are intended to improve communications, to solve problems, to sponsor local programs, to engage in public education, to explore new joint approaches to issues that involve NECA and IBEW members and the community and the electrical construction industry.

This Labor Relations Special Session will demonstrate what can be done through a local LMCC to build your relationship with the IBEW and to create positive marketplace reaction for your chapter and individual businesses.

The Labor Relations Special Session will be Monday, Sept. 14 at 10 a.m. at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center. Make your plans to be there!

NECA is no longer offering the whale watching tour through clipper as previously announced. If you are interested in participating in a whale watching tour, contact The Prince of Whales, toll free at 1-888-383-4884. Guests may also purchase tickets by calling 1.800.888.2535 or online at clippervacations.com.

You will need to reference the original Group Booking Code, #8120167, to purchase tickets.