Sean Murphy Joins IEEE-CNSV Board of Directors

I was gratified to be elected to the board of directors for the IEEE Consultants’ Network of Silicon Valley as an at-large director and chair of the marketing committee for 2015. My specific focus will be on initiatives to increase awareness of the CNSV Project Bank and to foster programs–including special interest group meetings, clinics, and workshops–that encourage and assist members to upgrade their on-line presence on the CNSV website, on LinkedIn, their consulting practice website, and other forums and sites that are appropriate for their specific skills and experience. The board has a strategic offsite planned at the end of February to finalize plans for 2015 and I will blog about programs that may also be of interest to bootstrapping entrepreneurs as they announced.

IEEE Consultants' Network of Silicon Valley

IEEE Consultants’ Network of Silicon Valley

The Silicon Valley chapter of the IEEE Consultants’ Networks, has a membership of over 200 engineers. Members’ skill profiles can be found by visitors to its website or by popular search engines. CNSV sponsors monthly meetings and periodic seminar/webinar events that cover technical topics as well as issues related to consulting. CNSV was recognized as the 2015 Best Chapter in IEEE Region 6, which encompasses the 10 western US states.  IEEE membership is not required for membership in CNSV.

I have been a member for a decade

I have been a member for a decade and met a number of extremely talented and accomplished at different meetings over the years. Meetings and membership have grown to where an average meeting has 60-90 attendees and the paid membership is over 200. The meetings have a unique feature “Seven Seconds of Fame” where everyone has a chance to make a brief introduction and there is then a ten minute break where you can have a short conversation and exchange business cards with other engineers who have skills you may need or have a project you may be able to assist on. There is also a very active mailing list for members that been a source of a number of practical suggestions and insights on business and technical topics.

I became acquainted with Debra Willrett, the inventor of MacProject, through her attendance for many years at CNSV meetings.  She built and managed the CNSV website that is still in use today and I was delighted to have her as a guest speaker at a July 2008 Bootstrapper Breakfast. One thing I still remember from her talk: she surprised the Apple team by hitting all of her development deadlines and earning the on time performance bonuses that they had happily agreed to during negotiations. They had apparently encountered few developers who could plan and deliver a project on schedule and had blithely agreed to terms they never expected to pay.

One member I miss is Mike Silverman, who passed away last year. Mike worked harder than any three people I know, building Ops A La Carte into a very successful reliability engineering consulting firm. He was an effective public speaker who could cut to the heart of an issue in a small group or a large one, and foster a working consensus that would move things forward.

Related Blog Posts

I have been invited to speak, take part in panels, or moderate events a number of times in the last decade, here are some related blog posts:

 

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top