THE Australian Computer Society is so committed to professional, technical, and marketing excellence that one of its major steps in the 1990s was to axe 30 per cent of its members.
This membership slice was made up of affiliates, IT users with a strong interest in computer, but not necessarily qualified by experience or education or both to attain the professional members' level that was now the minimum requirements.
Affiliates committed to remaining in the society were able to study and take examinations to qualify them for continuing membership higher levels.
Pruning the affiliate membership in the past year has produced a spurt in growth at the society's professional levels.
"I continue to be amazed by what I'm learning about ACS," says society president, John Ridge.
"India and Sri Lanka are using our examinations, the Australian Government recognises us as the appropriate body to test prospective migrants, and I gather that our success in achieving professional status for all our members is unmatched in the world.
"There is professional recognition in some countries for specific expertise such as software engineering, but our professionalism is acknowledged on a broader front that this.
"It's a thrill being ACS president. It's a double thrill holding the position for the Australian Council of Professions."
That acceptance was achieved last December in the closing days of the ACS presidency of Prins Ralston. Former president also of the South-East Asia Regional Computer Conference (SEARCC), and this year leading the SEARCC team researching issues connected with e-business, Mr Ralston started in electrical engineering, moved into data processing and is at present studying for his doctorate in law.
"A lot of us drifted into IT from other professions in the early days," he says.
Pretty quickly we all recognised that this was a completely new area of learning and that it would grow at an exponential rate, not like other professions that have had time to grow and establish themselves over centuries.
"we could see that we would not be given the luxury of time to adapt and shape the profession. We had to grab at the things we recognised, and move forward.
"We learned what we could from the accounting medical, legal and engineering professions.
"and we were fortunate in the quality of our forefathers of the early 1960s. Reading the commentaries they left gives me goosebumps. These people were true visionaries."
Designing the new professional environment involved discovery of answers to questions, many of which were not obvious when ACS started to move toward 2000. If IT people were truly professionals, should they be disciplined by ACS? How? How could ACS address the interests of employers who were paying good money, and wanted good results?
"There are some specific areas where government regulation seems close at hand, for what are known as 'safety-critical' activities: think air traffic control, but also other traffic control, and a variety of health, educational and social service operations," Mr Ridge says. "We will be working closely with state and federal governments to achieve appropriate regulation of safety-critical system."
Neither Mr Ridge nor Mr Ralston sees the possibility of meeting the increasing hunger and thirst for IT bodies solely by increasing university places.
Recognition of prior (i.e. not IT or not academic at all) learning remains an important, though shrinking, function of the ACP's certification responsibility. Not surrendering to the first sight of a university degree is another.
"Business and industry often say to us: 'Who are these people?' when they look at new graduates," says Mr Ralston. We need to be conscious that people who invest their faith and money in IT professionals are going to get appropriate results.
"One thing we've ensured is that we retain an avenue for those people who for whatever reason haven't pursued a purely educational avenue but have the experiential and knowledge base to fit the profession.
"Sort of the Bill Gates option, if you like." (Mr Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, a software company, did not complete his first year of university education. He is regarded as knowledgeable about IT.)
This is not decry the value of formal tertiary education in IT.
Mr Ralston points to the "former whizzes" in terms of programming or other skills who are now in their 40s and 50s and don't have the education qualification to get a job.
'Flinders University has long regarded IT as an exciting and rewarding profession. Our graduates are well equipped to participate actively in the ongoing training development to which ACS actively contributes'
--Colin Rudd, Flinders University
"In 10 or 20 years it's going to be even harder to place these people in that age bracket unless they have the professional qualification that augments their technical skills."
"Besides this, exclusions not an appropriate message from us," says Mr Ridge.
"There are many roads to Rome, and we recognise prior learning. Industry entrants with an IT-related university degree can obtain a provisional associate rank thereafter and full membership after three years of work experience and a pass in two components of our core body of knowledge examinations."
The ACS's dynamic core body of knowledge will continue to occupy many ACS resources, many of them supplied unpaid.
"We have many people who have put extraordinary effort into this whole process," Mr Ridge says.
"The ACS core body will continue to evolve in an environment marked by many attractive fads, trends, fantasies that can cost organisations a lot of money.
"It's not easy to assess technologies when things change so rapidly."
So far, however, the coordinated approach led by the ACS's commitment to professionalism seems to be paying off for members and for Australia.
Mr Ridge recounts with satisfaction the recent incident when IBM and other organisations were invited to see students working with core-compatible subjects. IBM liked the demonstration so much, it hired all the students on the spot.
Code of ethics is our cornerstone
By DENNIS FURINI Chief executive, ACS
THE Australian Computer Society is a professional organis-ation, and it is also a practical one.
We require acceptance of our code of ethics as a key for entry to membership, and this is one of many advantages for our mem-bers. With more and more organisations using contract staff, we see it as an advantage in the marketplace.
As well, our ethics committee, chaired by an ACS Fellow, presents a conciliation tool that can resolve disagreements between practitioners and clients.
There are now nearly 100 major organisations in Australia that tell us they give preference to ACS members, and a number of the leading IT employment agencies call us from time to time when seeking specialised skills.
Another practical advantage of ACS membership is the networking that’s so important for contractors and consultants, plus the special-interest groups for members who want to contribute — and receive — more.
In the past few years, ACS has developed a spirit of get-up-and-go that shows in higher-quality speakers at our branch meetings, a revamp of our Information Age magazine and plans to produce
Web-design editions later this year, that will complement the Web versions of the current print
magazine.
On the level of financial benefits, ACS members can receive a Commonwealth Gold Visa card
free of charge and pay any interest at half a per cent less than standard rates, and can obtain
Commonwealth home loans at lower than the public rate.
We are negotiating a number of insurance possibilities, including health insurance, and enhanced
income protection and indemnity insurance.
But at the heart of our activities is our recognition that the best way to attract and serve members is to provide high-level participative programmes, and we continue to ensure that our energy and our programme levels remain high.
It’s obvious to us at many IT professional Australians could benefit richly from ACS membership,
and we can send explanatory material to anybody who contacts us.
We’re also eager to renew acquaintance with those former members who have moved home or employment and not kept us up to date with their new address.
Many members who have signed up in the past year are people who formerly belonged to the society and let their membership lapse for one reason or another. They’ve become aware of the new, vigorous face of their professional association.
This is news that we’d really like to get around even further.
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