2014 spring boilerplate - amazon s3 · the boilerplate- volume 5 issue 1 as i prepare to write this...

11
The Boilerplate- VOLUME 5 ISSUE 1 As I prepare to write this news- letter article I find myself pon- dering over what to say. I real- ize this may be the last article I write as President. For those who don’t know me I will share President’s Message a little about myself. I first started OPPA serving on the Program Committee. I was in- vited to join by Nancy Alhbin as she was co-chair at the time. I found it very rewarding and a great experience learning something new. After serving on the Program Committee I wanted to do more with OPPA so I asked my Manager Keri Stocks if she would support my decision to run for a Board po- sition. She supported me 100% and thought it would be a great experience. I accepted the nom- ination for Director. Much to my surprise I won by a slim margin. That began my 8-year Katie Shaw, CPPB 2013-2014 OPPA President 2013-2014 OPPA BOARD President Vice President Treasurer Secretary Past President Katie Shaw, CPPB Linda Lichty, CPPB Christine Moody, CPPO Gail Carter, CPPB Robin Rickard, CPPO Comm Director Education Director Liaison Director Marketing Director Pro Outreach Director Camber Schlag, CPPB Barry Zimmerman, CPPB Erik Wicks, CPPB James Moering, CPPB Diane Wood, CPPB SPRING, 2014 devotion to OPPA. I have learned so much serving on the Board. I have grown in areas I didn’t think were possi- ble. I have made a lot of friends and possibly a few enemies, however I would not have changed this experience for anything. This organization is truly the best. We have won national awards and are recog- nized as being innovative and easy to work with. We have wonderful members who have a lot to offer. Thank you to all those members who have made my journey chal- lenging and wonderful. 2014-2015 OPPA BOARD President Vice President Treasurer Secretary Past President Linda Lichty, CPPB Christine Moody, CPPO Gail Carter, CPPB Diane Wood, CPPB Katie Shaw, CPPB 1-year Director 1-year Director 2-year Director 3-year Director 3-year Director Camber Schlag, CPPB Robin Rickard, CPPO Erik Wicks, CPPB Gretchen Harold Jennifer Jolley, CPPB WHAT’S INSIDE... Meet the Board 2 From the Members 3 The Cool Stuff 5 Committee Articles 5-7 Camber’s Corner 8 New Beginnings 9

Upload: lamcong

Post on 16-Apr-2018

213 views

Category:

Documents


0 download

TRANSCRIPT

The Boilerplate- V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

As I prepare to write this news-letter article I find myself pon-dering over what to say. I real-ize this may be the last article I write as President. For those who don’t know me I will share

President’s Message a little about myself. I first started OPPA serving on the Program Committee. I was in-vited to join by Nancy Alhbin as she was co-chair at the time. I found it very rewarding and a great experience learning something new. After serving on the Program Committee I wanted to do more with OPPA so I asked my Manager Keri Stocks if she would support my decision to run for a Board po-sition. She supported me 100% and thought it would be a great experience. I accepted the nom-ination for Director. Much to my surprise I won by a slim margin. That began my 8-year

Katie Shaw, CPPB 2013-2014 OPPA President

2013-2014 OPPA BOARD

President Vice President Treasurer Secretary Past President

Katie Shaw, CPPB Linda Lichty, CPPB Christine Moody, CPPO Gail Carter, CPPB Robin Rickard, CPPO

Comm Director Education Director Liaison Director Marketing Director Pro Outreach Director

Camber Schlag, CPPB Barry Zimmerman, CPPB Erik Wicks, CPPB James Moering, CPPB Diane Wood, CPPB

S P R I N G , 2 0 1 4

devotion to OPPA.

I have learned so much serving on the Board. I have grown in areas I didn’t think were possi-ble. I have made a lot of friends and possibly a few enemies, however I would not have changed this experience for anything. This organization is truly the best. We have won national awards and are recog-nized as being innovative and easy to work with.

We have wonderful members who have a lot to offer. Thank you to all those members who have made my journey chal-lenging and wonderful.

2014-2015 OPPA BOARD

President Vice President Treasurer Secretary Past President

Linda Lichty, CPPB Christine Moody, CPPO Gail Carter, CPPB Diane Wood, CPPB Katie Shaw, CPPB

1-year Director 1-year Director 2-year Director 3-year Director 3-year Director

Camber Schlag, CPPB Robin Rickard, CPPO Erik Wicks, CPPB Gretchen Harold Jennifer Jolley, CPPB

WHAT’S INSIDE...

Meet the Board 2 From the Members 3 The Cool Stuff 5

Committee Articles 5-7 Camber’s Corner 8 New Beginnings 9

P A G E 2

encouragement. Then I “retired”! And the most re-warding experience was that my family did not change. They still offered those smiles, hand-shakes and encourage-ment. Adjusting to “not work-ing” was a significant change. But my family was still there to give me connection and validation. I am still work-ing through this “retirement thing”. I’m not sure where it is taking me, but I know that it will include my OPPA family.

~ Rob Rickard, Immediate

Past President

Here's my what OPPA means to me: An oppor-tunity to be in-volved with a group of peers, who are also professionals, in our special-ized area of public procure-ment. I love the fact that OPPA provides an avenue for us to teach and mentor one another.

~ Camber Schlag, Communi-

cations Director

The primary reason I serve on the Board is I like sharing and helping folks who do

common work and share com-mon difficulties.

The thought that any of us has the ability to reach out to pro-curement professionals not on-ly locally but globally to solve an issue or receive training is pretty cool!

~ Barry Zimmerman,, Educa-

tion Director

OPPA means to me… the op-portunity to:

Get out of the office to net-work and collaborate, learn and advise, and improve myself for the benefit of my agency.

Use the MemberConnect tool to share ideas, gather information on hot topics, or to look for so-licitation help.

Take advantage of a profes-sional organization that helps you get out of your personal comfort zone.

~ Eric Wicks, Liaison Director

Working in the profession of public procure-ment, I have noticed it can be really easy to get sucked

into the work on my desk. If I let it, the work would make it such that I would never get myself out from under the piles of paper, gigs of e-mails, and litany of procurement needs faced by the City of Ros-es. OPPA provides me with the forum to network with my peers and connect with them statewide. OPPA lets me see the bigger picture and look at my procurement challenges from a larger perspective. Of-

OPPA means to me: an organi-zation that has a wealth of knowledge from its members as well as profes-

sionalism where you can apply the things you learn to your profession.

~ Katie Shaw, President

OPPA means "family" to me. A "family" of pro-curement pro-fessionals who support and encourage each other and are always will-ing to help out when needed.

~ Linda Lichty, Vice President

OPPA is really family to me. I have been an OP-PA member for 30 years (working on my 31st). During

that time there have been so many colleagues who have en-couraged and inspired me that it is hard to remember all of them. But OPPA has done so much to help me along my ca-reer path. OPPA colleagues have helped me find solutions for “purchasing issues” along the way as well as encourage-ment when some of those is-sues did not seem to have a so-lution. There were always smiles, a warm handshake and

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E -

V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

So, OPPA Board, quick question

for ya… What does OPPA mean

to you?

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E -

V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

Last September, Metro began researching the

use of an electronic sourcing and bidding system. That research led Metro to the Oregon Procurement Information Network also known as ORPIN. Metro implement-ed ORPIN in phases based on dol-lar value of the solicitation over a three-month period, which also included advertising in local newspapers, including minority newspapers, notification in-serts sent with checks, announce-ments at local business organiza-tions and associations, and direct emails to past and current con-tractors. As of January 2, 2014 Metro posts all solicitations over $5,000 on ORPIN. Results have exceeded expectations. More mi-nority-owned, woman-owned and emerging small businesses are responding to solicitations, new firms are doing business with Metro, visibility of Metro's

available work has increased and competition has increased as re-flected in the number of bids and proposals received.

With the great help from State of Oregon staff, Metro has achieved a new level of exposure to the 63,000 registered firms looking for project work in Oregon. Met-ro looks forward to the next step with using electronic bidding.

~ Angela Houck, Metro

“Jon Walton was asked to present more online webinars for NIGP this year, after two well-received webinars last Fall. The latest was “Debriefing Session with Ven-dors” on February 19th. Watch the listings for more later on.”

Department of Forestry created a list of the vendors they have iden-tified as service-disabled veteran-owned businesses. This list also includes a brief description of the goods and services the vendors provide.

The Veterans Benefit Act of 2003 (15 U.S.C. 657f) created the pro-curement program for small busi-ness concerns owned and con-trolled by service-disabled veter-ans (commonly referred to as the “Service-Disabled Veteran-owned Small Business (SDVOSB) Pro-curement Program”).

In 2010, the Department of Ad-ministrative Services adopted Or-egon Ad-ministrative Rule 125-246-0314, which al-lows state agencies to directly

What have you been up to lately? Have you done something new and cool? Have one of your team-mates done something

that should be shared? OPPA didn’t have room in the budget for my mobile news-van with satellite uplink capabilities

(they really tried, the money just wasn’t there). So until Boilerplate gets its news-van, I will be relying on you all letting

me know what is new and awesome in the land of Oregon public procurement!

P A G E 3

of accounting into the world of procurement without any knowledge of purchasing rules or practices. If not for OPPA the transition would have been much more challenging. The years of experience and wealth of knowledge of OPPA mem-bers is outstanding! Thank you OPPA.

~ Diane Wood, Professional

Outreach Director

ten times, a peer of mine is go-ing through a similar issue, or has a potential solution I had-n’t thought of. In this way OP-PA links me to the larger busi-ness of public procurement, by bridging the gaps that can oc-cur when one is focused on the needs of today.

~ James Moering, Marketing

Director

MEET THE BOARD

(continued)

In two words “networking” and “professional growth” OPPA has provided me with many great learning experiences, in-cluding workshops, NIGP clas-ses, and professional develop-ment. I transferred from years

award contracts to SDVOSB firms up to the not-to-exceed value of $50,000.00 without using a competitive solicitation.

Not all companies on the “Index of Companies” list provided background information on the goods and services their compa-ny provides therefore the “SDVOSB Company Information” doc-ument includes only those who responded to our information request. These documents are being provided so that other state agencies may benefit from ODF’s research and to help streamline the identification of purchases that could be made through the SDVOSB program.

If you would like to see this list, or if you have any questions or would like additional information, please feel free to contact me at [email protected].

~ Zaida Zúñiga—Forestry

P A G E 4

By Darin Matthews, FNIGP, CPPO, C.P.M.

When you think about it, those of us working in public procure-ment are pretty fortunate. We get to buy the coolest stuff. I re-member my days in the State Procurement Office working on specifications for laser speed detectors…pretty high-tech

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E -

V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

If anyone needs a subject matter expert on

Oreo cookies, I believe Lillie Gray at

Employment may know someone willing to

participate on an evaluation committee.

stuff for the 90’s. I also remem-ber receiving the paper requisi-tion from the State Police that said “see attached specifica-tions”, and then finding a color brochure of their preferred model!

When buying for a wastewater treatment plant early on in my career, I learned a new term:

ceriodaphnia du- bia (my pronounciation: Serry–Oh-Dafney-Ah–Doobie-Ah). These are tiny little water fleas that are put into the treatment pro-cess after the solids are re-moved. Apparently, these little critters like to munch out on the crap that is left in the water. You can’t make this stuff up!

Fire engines are always cool, no doubt about it. As a buyer, you get to work on something that will last for years and save countless lives. Plus, firefighters are great to work with and they bring you gifts like hats and tee shirts. At the City of Portland we had a big contract for fire equipment protested and even though it ended up in the local newspapers, it was still a fun project to work on.

Currently I have the privilege of being involved with the School

Membership

Having been a member of OPPA for nearly seventeen years I can speak from experience regard-ing the benefits of being an OP-PA member. OPPA offers mem-bers a wide range of benefits, including getting this newslet-ter. OPPA is an organization dedicated to the development of procurement and contracts em-ployees through education and career advancement opportuni-ties. But, I am preaching to the choir here, the important issue is how will you help others in the profession become familiar with the benefits of belonging to OPPA?

There are several things you can do to help your colleagues become more successful. One is talking to them about becoming an OPPA member. Over the years I have seen so many members move from entry-level positions into manage-ment due to their experiences as OPPA members. OPPA teach-es leadership skills and helps active members make valuable connections with others who have similar responsibilities and career aspirations. OPPA members willingly share their

experience and provide support and advice by helping others with difficult solicitations or supplier disputes. I myself have been thankful for the ability to pick up the phone and call someone who I know will guide me in making a good decision regarding a procurement pro-cess or decision.

OPPA helps build a strong workforce. Whether you are a manager or lead worker, engag-ing your staff in OPPA will help provide stronger more compe-tent employees. In project man-agement circles the term “Agile Project Management” is con-nected to the ability to be a strong and capable decision maker, someone who can change, adapt and achieve suc-cess for the projects they man-age. In procurement we need agile procurement profession-als at all levels in order to deal with the challenges of a rapidly changing and mobile business culture. Do you support your team by giving them the oppor-tunity to participate in OPPA? If not, you may be losing opportu-nities to develop a strong, capa-ble staff within your organiza-tion.

Last, but not least, OPPA helps build a culture of respect, re-sponsibility and accountability within the procurement profes-sion. So spread the word, OPPA membership improves both in-dividuals and organizations across Oregon. Recruit a new member today! Log onto: https://www.oppaweb.org for additional information regard-ing OPPA membership benefits and events.

Sandi Kalin is a member of the Training Team at the Department of Administrative Services, and is a member of the Membership Committee

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E - V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

of Business expansion project for my university. When com-pleted, it will triple the size of our current school, which al-ready has the most students of any business school in Oregon. Our office just awarded the de-sign contract and is currently in negotiations with a construc-tion manager/general contrac-tor to build the project. Alt-hough it is early in the design process, some of the conceptual renderings are just fantastic. It will be the coolest place to be on campus.

Ironically, I have served on the faculty of our School of Business longer than I have been director of procurement and contract-ing. As an adjunct faculty mem-ber, the only way I ended up in the Dean’s office is if I took a wrong turn to the bathroom. Now that I am working on the expansion project, I am meeting with him all the time. I even suggested to him we consider a larger lounge for the adjunct faculty and possibly a flat screen TV, which he got a good chuckle out of (I was being seri-ous though).

No matter who you are, where you work, or what you buy, I encourage you to step back and take a look at all the goods and services you procure. I bet it includes some pretty cool stuff.

Darin Matthews is director of pro-curement and contracting for Port-land State University and also teaches in the Supply Management Program for their School of Busi-ness Administration. He is past president of NIGP, the Institute for Public Pro-curement (2006) and the

P A G E 5

Program Committee

P A G E 6

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E -

V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

will be sharing with us his knowledge

on “Best Practices in Developing Pub-

lic Construction Bid Documents”,

“Impact of Electronic Communications

in Procurement”, and “Electronic Bid-

ding”. Each of Mr. Purdy’s courses are

designed to provide us, public pro-

curement professionals, with the most

up-to-date skill set and

knowledge base.

Mike Purdy’s “Best Prac-

tices in Developing Pub-

lic Construction Bid Doc-

uments” course covers

basic principles for de-

velopment of bid docu-

ments, the course un-

packs detailed provi-

sions in key components

of bid documents including advertise-

ment, instructions to bidders, the bid

form, public work contracts, general

conditions, specifications, bonds, oth-

er forms, and addenda.

Other speakers include Julie Mosier.

She will be presenting the topic “Part-

Time Purchasers”. This topic covers

how to handle purchasing when it is

less than 75% of your job responsibili-

ties. Lillie Gray’s “Extreme Makeover

Home Edition” course

has a slide show and

learned lessons on her

home makeo-

ver. Dave

Davis will be presenting the

topic “Spend Analysis” and

Rob Rickard and Camber

Schlag will be presenting

the topic “Protests”.

Not only are you able to

network after classes and

during breaks, you have the

opportunity to network

while playing in the golf

Please save the date for OPPA's Spring

Conference - Develop the Possibilities

held April 30 - May 2, 2014 at the

beautiful Kah-Nee-Ta Resort.

Our Spring Conference has been held

in Bend the last two years. This year,

our organization will enjoy the Spring

Conference located in Central Oregon

on the Warm Springs Reservation.

The Program Committee wants to en-

courage each reader to carefully con-

sider attending the 2014 Spring Con-

ference. Some of the advantages in

attending this year

include speakers

with diverse

knowledge and ex-

pertise in their

fields, facilities that

enhance the learning experience by

providing clean and comfortable

meeting rooms with plenty of lighting,

several inside and outside networking

activities, and the opportunity to give

back monetarily/charity work to the

Warm Springs Tribe.

We are especially excited to announce

our keynote speaker, Mike Purdy, who

and miniature golf tournament. Entry

fee for the 9-hole Scramble is $50.00.

The fees include green fees and a golf

cart. There will be team prizes, and on

-course prizes. The entry fee for the

miniature golf tournament is $10.00.

OPPA believes it is important to give

back to the community where we hold

our Spring confer-

ences. The charity

funds will be dis-

tributed among sev-

eral organizations

within the Warm

Springs Tribe. Mon-

ey for that charity

comes from the golf

and miniature golf

tournament and

from an auction for a packet from OP-

PA. The packet includes one free

night’s stay at the fall conference.

Again this year, OPPA will be hosting

the 2014 Exhibitor Showcase. This

gives both vendors and purchasers the

opportunity to network.

A save the date e-mail was sent out on

Monday the 10th at 4:28 announcing

the OPPA’s Spring Conference. Regis-

tration information will be sent out in

the near future to help you as you

make plans to attend the 2014 Spring

Conference.

Don Stewart is a Purchase & Contract Specialist at the Secretary of State and is a member of the Program

Committee

P A G E 7

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E - V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

But there are awards that

will be given out at this

year’s Spring Con-

ference

April 30, May 1

& 2, held at Kah-Nee

-Ta Resort.

You should have already

heard that Stepha-

nie Lehman is this

year’s OPPA Man-

ager of the Year,

and Jennifer Jolley

is this year’s Buy-

er of the Year.

But what about those other

awards? Like who will be this

year’s Volunteer of the Year, or

Mentor of the Year, and who

will get the Har-

old Vaughan

award? And who

is going to get the

President’s

award? Hey, here

is a hint: the fi-

nalists are Jana Hart, Linda

Lichty, Gretchen Harold, Toby

Giddings, Stephanie Lehman,

Keri Stocks, Greg James, Super-

Wow, this has been an exciting

Spring for the 2014 Chapter of

OPPA’s history. You probably

have already heard the Election

Results for your 2014 OPPA

Board. But in case you have

not, your new President will be

Linda Lichty, your Vice-

president will be Christine

Moody, your Treasurer will be

Gail Carter, and your Secretary

will be Diane Wood. New board

directors include one-year, Rob

Rickard, and three-year Gretch-

en Harold and Jennifer Jolley.

man, and Batman. Oops, sorry I

got carried

away: The last

two are not fi-

nalists. But if

you want to find

out who will be

receiving one of

these coveted

awards in 2014 you

have to be at the

Spring Conference. It is still not

too late to register. See you

there.

Rob Rickard is happily retired after serving pretty much every procurement role in Oregon, but he loves us so much, he just cant bear to be away from OPPA

P A G E 8

The Chapter Liaison Committee acts as a liaison between OPPA and Co-lumbia Chapter to share ideas and news between the chapters. In case you didn’t already know:

NIGP is a vibrant international asso-ciation crating a world in which pub-lic procurement practitioners are highly regarded members of a re-spected professional order1. The NIGP mission to develop, support and promote the public procurement pro-fession is co-delegated to local chap-ters like Columbia Chapter: https://columbiachapternigp.org.

The Columbia Chapter of NIGP is a local not-for-profit education and research organization dedicated to helping governments manage tax dollars wisely. The chapter consists of members from the Portland Metro-politan area and surrounding com-munities.

The Columbia Chapter of NIGP pro-vides the following benefits to mem-bers:

Education and professional devel-opment programs.

Seminar programs; conferences.

Professional certification.

Networking.

Technical information, specifica-tions.

Contract formats and methods.

Bid evaluation and award criteria.

The cost to join Columbia Chapter is $100 per year; membership entitles you to meals at chapter meetings, free access to the Intergovernmental Cooperative Purchasing (ICP) group, and discounts for additional educa-tional opportunities.

Upcoming meetings for Columbia Chapter include:

May 1, 2014 General Membership Meeting – Officer Announcement and topic TBD

May 8, 2014 OAME 26th Annual Conference and Trade Show

May 21, 2014 ICP Meeting

June 6, 2014 NWESB Summit

October, 2, 2014 General Member-ship Meeting – topic TBD

November 6, 2014 General Mem-bership Meeting – Topic TBD

December 11, 2014 Holiday Lunch-eon Meeting – the interstate fa-mous: Wine or Whine, Silent Auc-tion baskets, Sunshine Division Toy & Joy toy drive, and Oregon Food Bank can food drive

OPPA and Columbia Chapter join forces several times a year to put on joint opportunities for their mem-bers:

9th Annual Reverse Vendor Trade Show (turn the tables on vendors!)

September 19, 2014 Columbia Chapter and OPPA Joint Workshop at Holiday Inn Wilsonville

For information on any of these top-ics you can contact the OPPA Director of Chapter Relations [email protected].

NIGP Vision Statement, revised De-cember 18, 2012(www.nigp.org/eweb/docs/genlinfo/MV.pdf)

About Columbia Chapter (columbiachapternigp.org/about.php)

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E -

V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

OPPA / Columbia Chapter Liaison

Erik Wicks is the Purchasing Manager at Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue, is OPPA’s Liaison Director

NEWLY CERTIFIED

Larry Pelatt, City of Port-land

Scott Schneider, City of Portland

Darren Chilton, Multomah County

Gwendolyn Chapman, City of Bend

Teresa Roper, PERS

James Moering, City of Portland

Scott Rogers, Intermoun-tain ESD

Dion Kerlee, DAS

Julia Alpernas, Marion County

Caryn Appler, Intermoun-tain ESD

Paul Thomas, PSU

Paul Williams, Multnomah County School District #1

Lynn Faulkenberry, Multnomah County School District #1

Milliam Terry, PSU

A Girl with Opportunities sented and selects a candidate for appointment to the commit-tee. This time Diane was happi-ly appointed to the NPI (National Procurement Insti-tute) AEP Evaluation Team Committee, where they award The Achievement of Excellence in Procurement annually. Her role is NIGP’s representative and will serve a four-year term effective January 1, 2014 through December 31, 2018. In June Diane will travel to Fort Worth, Texas to attend the evaluation committee meeting.

Back at home for both Colum-bia Chapter and OPPA, Diane is the co-chair for the annual Re-verse Vendor Trade Show. This is Diane’s 6th year chairing RVTS and she has been on the steering committee since it started. She says, “It is going well.” The committees are busy planning the upcoming show being held next month on March 26th. Vendors are registering daily and the dead-line for sponsors to have their artwork in is this week. “We really need our members at the show to represent their agencies. The show can’t be successful without the agency representatives there to talk with the vendors,” Diane stat-ed. Agency representatives can split up their day with oth-ers and they get a nice lunch. The show is being held at the Memorial Coliseum again this year. It was held at the Memorial Coliseum in 2012 and was the highest at-tended show. This year will be very similar to 2012 and com-

mittees are working hard to make it the best year ever.

After serving on the OPPA Board from 2007 to 2012 and the Co-lumbia Chapter Board prior to that, Diane has not been involved with either Chapter very much except for being on the RVTS Committee, which is by no means a small task. She current-ly attends the Columbia Chapter meetings and would like to be more involved at the local level again. “OPPA is a great organiza-tion and I will help where and if needed or wanted.” Being on the Board was rewarding and a good learning experience for Diane.

So what’s the future for Diane, who has been a member of OPPA for 17 years? At this time the fu-ture looks positive and bright and full of opportunities. She would like to be on a committee with NIGP in addition to the AEP committee and has an applica-tion on file with NIGP. Diane will continue to be involved with both chapters. “I will always try to do better at my job and never stop learning. And I’m still try-ing to figure out how to balance work and my personal life…can’t quite fig-ure that one out.”

And that my friends, is a girl with opportu-nities.

“Sometimes opportunities float right past your nose. Work hard,

apply yourself, and be ready. When an opportunity comes you can grab it.” – Julie Andrews Edwards.

Opportunity is definitely some-thing that has been on Diane Seaton’s mind lately. Mrs. Sea-ton is in her 12th year as the Contracts Administrator in Fa-cilities for the City of Portland. Prior to that she spent 6 years with Multnomah County in their Facilities department. About a year ago Diane submitted an application to “Represent NIGP on Auxiliary Boards and Coun-cils”. An opportunity to serve on a committee came up at that time. Although Diane was not selected for that committee, in October, NIGP contacted her to see if she was still interested in being on an Auxiliary Board. Diane was interesting in serving and resent her applica-tion.

The Governance Committee re-views the applications and de-cides which candidate(s) to place on their slate for further consideration by the Board of Directors. The Board then re-views the application(s) pre-

Camber Schlag is a Contracts Compliance Analyst for Marion County, is a “field reporter” for the Boilerplate, and is the OPPA Communications Director

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E - V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

P A G E 9

P A G E 1 0

Here in DAS Procurement Ser-vices, we have a lot going on that is new. Our office, as well as the rest of the agency has gone through a lot of change over the last couple of years.

Our first Procurement Services all-staff meeting of 2014 be-gan with some interesting things lying around the room. Upon sit-ting, we noticed that each table had a bunch of little pieces of pa-per that looked like dryer sheets and a handful of markers. On a table at the front of the room was a fishbowl full of water and a basket of rocks.

As we sat chatting amongst our-selves waiting for the meeting to

begin, we wondered aloud what all of these items were for. After a short

time, our manager began the meeting and we covered the top-ics of the week and the meeting progressed as normal. Toward

the end, we were enlightened as to the purpose of the interesting items.

As it turned out, the papers were not dryer sheets (I was beginning to wonder if I was being given a hint about my laundry habits), but water-soluble paper. And the purpose of the

rocks was not to have a ’70’s flash-back making pet rocks (sorry Gary Dahl), but it had a much more meaningful purpose.

The first task was to take a piece of the paper and write on it some-thing that is in your past, that you need to let go of. We were told that these items could be shared, or we could keep them to ourselves. The next step was to go up to the front of the room and drop our paper in the fish-bowl and watch it dissolve.

For me, writing down the old was easy. I shared my paper work my teammates, and I will share it with you. I have a bad habit of trying to do everything myself and not ask for help. This does not lead well to a team ap-proach, so it is what I wanted to put behind me.

It was cool to watch the paper disap-pear, and see the ink remain in the water and settle to the bot-tom of the bowl. You can still see the rocks in the bottom of the fishbowl colored by all of the ink.

The second task was to select a rock and write upon it what you need to work on and do more of.

This task required more thinking, so I selected the most misshapen and cracked rock I saw and I pon-dered for the next couple of days. Finally it clicked. What drives me

every day is to help peo-ple get outside of their comfort zone and to reach toward their potential. This led me to put on my rock “Nurturing Growth.” around a flower being wa-tered.

I thought this exercise was a bril-liant illustration of letting go of old habits and focusing on new beginnings.

All of our rocks and the fishbowl (minus the water) now sit on dis-play outside of the mangers’ of-fices as reminders to us all.

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E - V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1

Toby Giddings is a State Procurement Analyst at the Department of Administrative Services, is the Chair of the Newsletter Committee and is the Boilerplate Editor.

Upcoming NIGP Courses

Topic Date City, State Presenter

Best Practices in Developing Public Con-struction Bid Documents

April 30 Warm Springs,

OR Michael Purdy

Contract Administration in the Public Sector

June 25 Wilsonville,

OR Rob Rickard

Contracting with Federal Funds/Grants “Intermediate”

July 15 Wilsonville,

OR Leslie Vallie

Effective Management of Construction Contracts

August 5 Wilsonville,

OR Darin Matthews

P A G E 1 1

Upcoming NIGP Webinars

Topic Date Presenter

Ethical Procurement April 23 Emma Scott & Danielle Goodrick

The Model Procurement Code: A Guide for Ordinance, Policy and Manual Review

April 30 Rick Berry

Top 5 Misconceptions About the Procurement of En-ergy Commodities

May 14 Bob Wooten & Scott Merrel

Construction Manager at Risk: A Viable Alternative in Tough Economic Times

May 21 Christine Rewis

Protests Happen June 18 Victor Leamer

T H E B O I L E R P L A T E -

V O L U M E 5 I S S U E 1