THE ASSOCIATE ADVANTAGE

JOE MORELLI HUSTON PATTERSON PRINTERS VICE CHAIRMAN JMORELLI@HUSTONPATTERSON.COM

PAT SZANY AMERICAN CORRUGATED MACHINE CORP. CHAIRMAN PSZANY@ACM-CORP.COM

GREG JONES SUN AUTOMATION GROUP SECRETARY GREG.JONES@SUNAUTOMATION.COM

TIM CONNELL A.G. STACKER INC. DIRECTOR TCONNELL@AGSTACKER.COM

DAVE BURGESS JB MACHINERY IMMEDIATE PAST CHAIRMAN DBURGESS@JBMACHINERY.COM

Your Association Resources

BY JOE MORELLI

When you invest and engage, AICC delivers success. That is AICC’s mission statement that you have probably heard numerous times in the last few years. The numbers behind that statement reflect it. Some of the more loyal and invested AICC members, like Bay Cities (81%), Michigan City Paper Box (88%), and SMC Packaging (122%), have all seen tremendous growth since their time as invested and engaged members of AICC. The last year has been different, though, and it’s made all of us pivot from our normal day-to-day life, including how our businesses interact with AICC. How can we still have success, engage, and invest in our Association during the COVID-19 pandemic so we can continue to see this growth?

The first resource AICC members can engage with is the Converter Think Tank, a bimonthly videoconference series established to foster peer-to-peer learning. During the COVID-19 shutdown, AICC offered insights during calls each week to help members navigate the complexities of the situation as it evolved. These calls evolved into the think tanks, which touch on a broader range of topics affecting your businesses today and beyond. During the first videoconference, Kevin Ausburn, chairman and CEO of Southern Missouri Containers and chairman of AICC’s Paperboard, Regulations, and Sheet Supply Subcommittee, along with several committee members, discussed the recent activities with paper, demand, capacity, and related issues. On the second call, the series pivoted back to COVID, but this time, the vaccine was discussed with Rhonda Bayer, vice president and general counsel of Liberty Diversified Industries, and Christine Walters, founder of FiveL. The Think Tank series is an excellent resource that offered moments of clarity during the industry chaos caused by COVID.

The second resource AICC members can engage with during the pandemic is the All Access Pass to AICC’s in-depth webinar series. When companies invest in professional development, they equip their teams with shared knowledge that helps them perform at a high level and improve their companies’ bottom lines. These webinars address a broad range of topics and dive deep into the specifics of production-related issues, human resources topics, design, customer service, and sales training courses, just to name a few—all ways to invest and engage in AICC during the pandemic.

The final AICC resource I’ll mention is the free online industry education content. These courses support the needs of production, sales, service, design, and finance departments. There is also an overarching theme of leadership development training that applies across departments. AICC provides more than 90 courses online and is developing more every month. Courses are created by industry experts and vetted by Scott Ellis, Ed.D., principal of WorkingWell. They can be taken at your leisure, with minimal disruption to your employees’ daily responsibilities, and they offer an excellent snapshot of our industry as a whole.

Combining the online education courses, the webinars, and the Converter Think Tank videoconference series, AICC will give you and your employees an excellent platform to succeed during this unprecedented time. Invest the time and engage in these resources, and you will see success on the backside of it.

Joe Morelli is vice president of sales and marketing for Huston Patterson Printers and is vice chairman of AICC’s Associate board.