Professional Memberships & Clubs

I was thinking of rejoining IEEE and TSPE. Is there really any benefit to joining and participating in these societies?

SuperAlpha said:

I was thinking of rejoining IEEE and TSPE. Is there really any benefit to joining and participating in these societies?

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I joined the IEEE a couple of years ago. My company pays for the membership fees. Still have to find a benefit. If it was up to me, would not be a member.

That is why I dropped it in the first place. They did have some nice formal networking dinners though.

Networking mostly. Most of the people I know who get anything out of these clubs end up dedicating quite a bit of time to be active. If you only pay the fees to be a member, but dont do anything, how can you expect to get much out of them?

On the other hand, several of these clubs just dont have much to offer to begin with.

I'm not a joiner.

Are you a planer?

More of a router.

I would think it depneds on your business. As a consultant it is benefial to have memberships and activities in professional societies as a credential. It demonstrates that your presence in the field and that you stay current with accepted/typical practices. It is the intent of these societies to keep practices up to the state of the art and to share knowledge about the profession. As Dex said the society, and subsequently its benefits, are only as good as the effort and participation in the society.

Maintaining numerous memberships can get expense so each individual needs to evaluate the organization properly to make sure you're getting your money's worth.

A few quality memberships are better than numerous memberships in lackluster/semi-dormant clubs.

I get lots of junk mail from all the Civil eng groups...even though I'm not even close to civil eng. I never get anything from AIChE...