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What do I expect from IET – Community - France & Paris.

Former Community Member
Former Community Member
Firstly who are the IET Fr MIET members?

I joined this PEI in 1980 from Grenoble. I was on substantive leave from MoD. I decided to stay for a longer period and got married here. At that time we were the first to come over with the EU agreements of that period.

There were already ex-patriot UK people with huge benefits living here, there were the UK EU adventurers with no objectives but work was abundant, there were the first student exchanges, and some had married into French families. I did not meet any UK people who simply came here to live and work at that time.

 

Most of us found the difference between the UK and France as difficult as between the UK and China. They just did not live, eat or drink like us.

 

I was advised by the first UK settlers to just join in and enjoy myself, which I did.

I first met French culture when I organised the “entente cordiale” between the Concorde R&D groups of UK RAE and French ONERA. It was unbelievable, when the opportunity to have a job and career change came, I took up nuclear engineering in France.

 

I returned to the UK which had drastically changed – Thatcher, strikes, riots. My name  was plagiarised in my work. I had to leave the UK after my employers failed to protect me. I returned to France.

The first time every one talked of the quality of life in France, the second time it was the Iraqi wars and crisis.

 

So what do you need to work and survive in France now and how can the IET French Community help.

France is huge; it is not realistic to travel from SE or SW France for a meeting in Paris.

Maybe we need a newcomers guide such as most French towns give to new arrivals.

France is still totally different from the UK.

We have different categories of IET members who are at least engineering & technology related.

 -Ex-patriot, UK enterprise sales & marketing staff, Erasmus students, Enterprises from the UK that have delocalised with their staff, those that have married into families, entrepreneurs and SMEs in IT technology and those that now just want to work and live in France etc.

What would you advise
  • Should we have a MIET arrivals’ guide

  • Should we have guides to French language courses

  • Should we have guides to CPD in France

  • Should we give advice on French administration

  • What about the dos and don’ts of French culture.


Or should we just mind our own business and keep it to ourselves?

 

I recommend reading : Stephen Clarke – 1000 years of annoying the French and other titles and most of his references. French English history is not as taught in schools.
  •  Out of season hotels in France are cheap, maybe one or two visits with IET families or friends to E&T venues could be affordable.


And the French Community AGM & voting should be on line and at distance.

I’m retiring from E&T have fun in France

 

Give Rob McCann some help

 

John Gowman MIET (ex ITEME Grenobl 1980)

 

  • 0
    Keith Parr‍ - Auto joining members to the relevant LN group is something we passed by our DP Officer before we implemented the feature to ensure we were not in breach of any DPA requirements there.


    However, as I understand it, the issue here is that you're asking for the IET to hand over its members personal data to volunteers in order for those volunteers to create their own mailing lists kept on their own personal computers of members contact details in order to send email out to those members from their own email accounts (gmail, hotmail or whatever email provider the volunteer is using). 


    As an IET member myself (and I also have a connection with France as I have a home there too) I would NOT be comfortable with volunteers who are not beholden to the same security processes as IET Staff having access to my personal data.  IET Staff also have to adhere to strict Privacy and Confidentiality laws and can be prosecuted if they are found to be in breach of those. Data Protection is something that has become stricter and stricter over recent years and the halcyon days of the LN Secretary having a copy of the members data for their area has long gone.


    As my colleagues have also said, the simple way of sending an email to the active members (and interested non-members) in France is to either contact your IET Staff contact and ask for assistance in sending a message to the members locally, or for one of the committee to apply to use the Adestra email service themselves and complete the necessary Data Protection training that all IET staff also have to complete. It's that simple...


    Just to also note, your Staff contact can also perform analysis of the membership data for France and give you a multitude of useful statistics and information which is why I always recommend speaking frequently with, and having a close relationship with, your Staff contact. 


    They are here to help....smiley


  • 0
    Lisa Miles  I sense a certain defensiveness which I would like to think was not called for <smile>.  As I think you know I have always enjoyed excellent support from the LN staff (eg Deborah and of course yourself!) so I fully support your plea for LN committees frequently to talk to staff contacts.


    you're asking for the IET to hand over it's members personal data



    No.  To the extent I am asking for anything, it is for the IET not to prevent LNs accumulating name, address, and contact details (and NOT "personal data" which is both emotive and all-encompassing) freely given by members (and non-members) to the LN for the purposes of keeping such people abreast of those things that the LN committee consider to be of interest.


    Data Protection is something that has become stricter and stricter over recent years and the halcyon days of the LN Secretary having a copy of the members data for their area has long gone



    I know, I know, no need to remind me.  And if I interpret what I read in the press correctly, it's about to get even stricter ...  But I'm glad you, too, see them as halcyon days <grin>.


    I did follow the DP training, but I'm no longer sure for how long my "certificate" is valid!


    Might you be able to tell us the number of members in the French LN, the number of those who we believe are reached by Adestra mailings, and the proportion which is considered opened / read?


    Keith

  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    To all MIET who reside in France.


    I think that I have got my point over.


    There were some good industrial visits in the last few years, but I was not aware of them.


    The Paris EPR meeting was very good, I met Rob after the meeting, I did not meet any other IET member, I asked to be introduced but no one knew who they were.


    It is up to French resident IET members to say what they expect from IET France,and for the Paris based committee to push the IET HQ Committees team to be more supportive.


    Technology visits or conferences should be open to all.


    This site has been pretty silent in the past, I have got the ball rolling; now Iam dropping out of engineering & technology.


    If all members want is E&T, and a title, then save money and close down EU communities.


    I believe that living in a European country before BREXIT was a tremendous challenge, even more so if you were not posted here.

    PEs need advice on the rules, customs and procedures to live & work over here, they need to know the structure of science and technology in each european country.

    They need to know how to change employers and how to educate their children and espouses / partners.


    So i'll let you carry on but make communities and HQ be more responsive -

      -why not reissue the IET Web, Communities France ( & other communities in europe) site details to al MIET's resident in each country and use a once a year call by email for members to attend the annual meeting and publish the minutes of each AGM?


    If members are not interested or have other interests, then just carry on as before.


    We have had our say on "What do I expect from IET – Community - France & Paris."


    Let's see some positive action.
    This blog should end now,


    John Gowman


  • 0
    Keith Parr‍ - as David has also said, there is no issue with volunteers obtaining their own personal contacts and sending their own personal emails to those contacts as long as it's not done in the name of the IET.  "Hi my name is Keith, can I have your business card so I can contact you about some events I think you may be interested in hearing about?" wink

    But when IET Staff can send out emails to the current active membership in France, why not use them? Or as I said, utilise the Adestra system to bulk email? I'm not sure that I understand the percieved need for volunteers to maintain personal contact lists of IET members and the burden that brings too! As you've pointed out there are around 100 IET Local Networks, 40% of them outside the UK and many of them have no problems with utilising the services provided by the Communities Team.  


    Re the data you've asked for, I'm no longer the Community Manager for IET France (and haven't been for some time now... sad) so I don't have direct access to the France LN membership statistics. However I believe Lynsay Callaghan‍ (the current CM for France) will be able to find that data for you. wink


    Lisa
  • 0
    Hi everyone,

    Recently my inbox has been filled with your posts on this discussion topic, well done :)


    I am a CEng MIET working in France. I work on the ITER project so my position is probably different from most other MIETs in France - if I leave ITER I don't intend to stay in France.


    What do I expext from the IET? Well, John's last post of ideas is one I generally agree with. Many other good suggestions have also been posted. However here's a summary of my feelings on the subject:
    • EC(UK) registration and the IET are generally irrelevant in France, only other people registered with EC(UK) know what it is. In terms of career mobility in France, it is probably only useful in rare circumstances

    • Is it useful for the IET to promote the IET as a brand in France? Promotion of EC(UK) registration in France would be more useful, but must be done with a single voice in combination with the other EC(UK) institutions

    • I've no idea how to contact other MIETs in my area, so even if I wanted to organise an informal meetup to see if we could start some local regular functions I don't know how I would do this.

    • In most of France the density of MIETs is probablty too low to permit local area meetups; I personally would struggle to justify more than 1 hour drive from where I live, and that would have to be for an exceptionally interesting meeting - remember we have to drive home too!

    • Therefore meetings in Paris, Lyon, Grenoble, even Nice, are not of interest to me - but please don't let that stop you organising them for everyone else!

    • The most useful thing the IET could do in France is make it easy for us to contact other MIETs and members of other EC(UK) institutions in our local area - ICE, IMechE, BCS, even smaller ones like the Nuclear Institute and the Institution of Measurement and Control - otherwise I have to become a non-paying member of all these other institutions, and I don't even know if that is possible.


    Personally I would prefer that there was a single professional engineering institution for EC(UK) registration, not split up into IET, BCS, IMechE, ICE, etc. A separate institution for each engineering discipline is just overly complicated and dilutes the community and public voice of our profession. Even if we can't manage this in the UK, please can we at least make this possible in other countries?


    Cheers,

    Will

  • 0
    Brilliant William!


    However, a word in the ear of those who manage this line. The Post button stubbornly refuses to cooperate on my Windows phone. This is unacceptable! Last weekend I spent more than half an hour Replying only to find that I was unable to Post. Ok it was raining so we weren't sailing anyway but please GET IT FIXED
  • 0
    >snip

     "Hi my name is Keith, can I have your business card so I can contact you about some events I think you may be interested in hearing about?" wink

    But when IET Staff can send out emails to the current active membership in France, why not use them? Or as I said, utilise the Adestra system to bulk email? I'm not sure that I understand the percieved need for volunteers to maintain personal contact lists of IET members and the burden that brings too! As you've pointed out there are around 100 IET Local Networks, 40% of them outside the UK and many of them have no problems with utilising the services provided by the Communities Team.

    >unsnip

    Why am I thinking of ostriches with heads in the sand? (And do I perceive a problem with the English language?) Things ain't working like you think and it would be as well to recognise this and FIX IT
  • 0
    To John Gowman and all those in galactic HQ

    John wrote "There were some good industrial visits in the last few years, but I was not aware of them."

    Nuff said. John is one of those hundreds who never learn about events.
  • 0
    William Davis

    There is a model which is used in Malta (and at least one other place, ...?) called the "group".  The PEI LNs are jointly operated and jointly funded so effectively you have one organisation for a number of PEIs (in Malta it's three IIRC).  There is no fundamental obstacle of which I am aware to adopting such a structure in other geographies.


    I suspect that if you were to ask Rob McCann (LN committee) or Linsay Callagan (staff) they would do their best to put you in touch with other IET members around you.


    Keith

  • 0
    Reply to Lisa Miles

    I suspect that your response has to follow party lines. In any case it is pretty defensive.

    I belong to several i-groups where the initial contact is via an e-mail address. We enjoy "CC" status in our exchanges and plan to keep it that way. Without this possibility there is no further interest.


    Also, I think it unreasonable to expect anyone in the UK, even with a pad in another territory, to understand local geography. In fact I'm not sure that they need to. In the past year I've attended IET meetings in Prague (no sweat), Stuttgart and Salzburg. Try setting up a filter for that!


    The IET has to bite the bullet and cater for Members' needs. Point! (That last word is in French coz I don't know how to say it in English)

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