Blogging AI 0708: September 2005

Getting the delivery of a most welcome thank you present of chocolates and sweets from our good friends at Cadbury Schweppes has really sweetened the office environment on a Friday afternoon....

On the last Friday afternoon before all the directors travel away on country visits, it was a sweet surprise.....

Posted by Tom Gara at 15:06 | 4 comments

September 28, 2005

1 motion on the table

From AI mailing list
______________________________________________________________________

The motion reads:
AIESEC International should keep external in our office to ensure our boys wear formal every day. They look gorgeous!

Proposer: Jingwei
Seconder: Lanchanie

Girls, let’s pass by acclaimation.

Posted by Romas Mažeika at 13:35 | 1 comments

September 27, 2005

Virtual punching

At IC, I made an open offer to the organisation that whenever AIESEC.net goes down, feel free to come and punch me in the stomach, virtually or physically. At the time, we had installed some new hardware and software, and the system was nice and stable, so I was confident that I would remain relatively unpunched.

Ahh, the optimism. After a pretty serious hardware failure on Sunday, aiesec.net is taking a little holiday in the Carribean, and I am left here getting virtual emailed stomach punches from all across the network

Posted by Tom Gara at 13:35 | 0 comments

September 26, 2005

SEPTEMBER TEAM DAYS

Each month AIESEC International teams run team days. Team days is a practice that may MCs and LC members around the world might know and have, then it is simply a periodic plan tracking methodology ... but in a team as AI, with 20 people and such an ambitious plan, Team days are quite an important thing.

AI September Team Days, AI Board Room

Today, 26.09.05 was the first Team Day of AI 05 06! From now on, each month the team will continue this practice to ensure a sucessful achievement of our plan.

Objectives were:

Evaluate progress on scoreboard and plans
Capture and incorporate feedback received so far
Set priorities for coming month
Innovate around one area of functioning to excel
Evaluate delivery on team stand and standards

Brainstorming priorities

I just can say, it was a great day and expect amazing stuff coming from your AI team!

Posted by Oriana Torres at 19:35 | 0 comments

September 19, 2005

Director Country Visits - 2 weeks to go!

One of the most exiting chapters of being a member of AIESEC International, are those, where you have direct physical interaction with people of the network ... the best examples for that (sadly there are not MANY, that's why they're so precious!) are international conferences (as the fantastic IC we closed two weeks ago) and OF COURSE COUNTRY VISITS!

We, GN directors, are VERY lucky to have as part of our responsibilities country development. I personally think it's the "toughest", but more beautiful focus that the director role has. This year is not an exception, and as part of the country development strategy 2005 2006 the first round of country visits is starting the 1st of October of 2005!

If you approach the AI directors these days, our lifes are swinging between VISA APPLICATIONS, REVISION OF COUNTRY PLANS, BOOKING FLIGHT TICKETS (and trying to get the best air fares!) as well as getting personally and professionally prepared to live one of the most experiences of our lifes. In my case ... I am wondering when it's gonna be the next time that I will have the chance to visit 6 countries in 3 months ...

5 out of the 6 countries I will be visiting I've never been before and
3 out of the 6 countries have not received an AI VISIT in the past 5, 6 o more years? they do not even remember of even find in their registries and AI visit! This challenges me totally, it is such a big responsibility to represent as good as I can AI, and what is most important, make a difference in the way the country will be developing this year and the years to come.

Today - I was again, in a consulate, asking for a visa. It's was so funny how the guy of the embassy when he saw the invitation letter of the AIESEC country and told me: "Wow, these are the best universities of the country the ones you will be visiting!" and "wow the place of the city where you will be hosted, is one of the best sectors to live in" ... then I said to myself - if the environment there is so cool, it needs to be easy for AIESEC there to increase their capacity to have more impact, and provide more and more AIESEC Experiences ... I need to make a difference in this country visit! And it's always like that, embassies are amazed with the kind of job we do, and the kind of mission we say we will do in these countries. Tell it to me, that as colombian, I got here an US visa (to visit one of my caribbean countries that is an US state :)) in one day, and US embassies that have the reputation of sometimes being quite rude or exceptical providing visas, this time they were just amazed with what we as director do - specially when they look ate your passport and say: God, you are only twenty-four years old!

Country Visits - more than a pass with a couple of new visas!

And yes :) you can laugh about my picture, ugly as it can be - I wish you could see the ones of the other of the team, hehe!

I just can't wait and I think that the more days pass, the more exited we all directors are. Almost all of us we'll leave the office and just come back in January - this is also a bit scary! But in then end we are going to meet the "Bread and Salt" of AIESEC (for those who were at IC 2005 know what I mean). More news coming soo, for now, I go back to work!

Posted by Oriana Torres at 18:41 | 2 comments

AI webpage update

We've just updated our webpage at aiesec.org/ai. Check it out, and let us know what could be even better.

Posted by Romas Mažeika at 11:41 | 0 comments