CEO Message

Message

from the CEO ...

This week out of nowhere it hits me I have been working at the ABGA for ten months now. As I reflect on where we fell short and where we have made gains, I still firmly believe much of what has been done recently has us better positioned to keep the ABGA viable beyond my years and there for my grandchildren – if number one son decides to bless his mom and me with some in the future. Going forward, we must continue to embrace technological changes that reduce cost and at the same time figure out ways to better serve the membership. We are near rolling out an optional paperless version of ourselves where you will receive communications from the ABGA via e-mail versus standard mail. When information comes to office that causes us to request additional information from you to complete your action, you will receive an e-mail the same day as compared to waiting for a correction from the end user before we are forced to return it to you often taking an additional three to seven days of mail time for you to receive information about an uncompleted action that lacked details for the office to bring it to completion.

Given your original mailing and wait time, the time it takes to get a request for information back to you if there is a problem, plus what it takes for you to return your work back to the office, plus the wait time to get it back to the front of the work line once it is returned to the office, in many cases we should improve your turn around time by as much as 17 to 25 working days when work is submitted that lacks detail for completion, for those who chose to conduct business by the new paperless method. At the same time, this will save the ABGA and you the cost of another envelope and stamp. We see it as a win-win situation.

I must admit that after working hand-in-hand with many of those that made this year’s National Show a reality nothing would have prepared me for what it took the office staff, the committees, volunteers, superintendents, ABGA and JABGA leadership, and our judges to pull this off. To all involved I want to personally thank each and every one of you for a job well done. I would also like to thank all vendors, advertisers, the supporters of the JABGA’s fund raising efforts and sponsors for their generosity as it plays a big part in making this show possible. Having the advantage of working through one of these shows from the other side, there is little doubt in my mind going forward we can make some changes that will make the 2017 show even better.

I would like to commend all the National show exhibitors for showing up with a world class set of goats. I had not been on hand to witness the last two National shows and the improvement to the depths of quality in each class over this period has greatly improved. There were no easy paths to the top of any class. I felt our judges did an outstanding job of recognizing and identifying for you a set of Champions that if given opportunity will improve this great breed. I know we do not all evaluate goats the same way and our individual needs vary and do not always parallel each other equally, but I believe anyone present at the National Show could have found what they were looking for amongst the 2016 offering.

I will miss working with the Board of Directors who are leaving us, who I shared this last year with and thank each of you for your valuable service. It will be interesting to see what these newly elected board members will bring to the table as we realign for this upcoming year. I feel I should remind each of you that these sixteen directors are your voice so be sure that they are hearing from you so that they are aware of the goals we need to work towards as we move into the future.

If all goes as planned we will have a survey mailed out to the membership by July first seeking your feedback on a number of potential action items for you to recommend for the board to move forward with as well as some you may allow the board should abandon so be sure to let them know where you stand on these items.