Member Connections

Dear Member,
The 1818 Society in collaboration with the Bank is setting up a Speakers’ Bureau to promote Society members as speakers on topics related to Bank’s role and activities.

External public institutions, NGOs and other organizations often invite the Bank to send speakers to talk about the Bank. Such requests come from all over the world. It is neither always practical nor cost effective for the Bank to send speakers from Washington DC or from its local country offices, especially when invitations come from a country/city where there are no country offices. Also, Bank staff is often too busy. On the other hand, our Society members are spread all over the world and they can play this role equally as effectively, if not better.

We have discussed this possibility with the Bank (EXT) and the outcome is very positive. To start with we will have a pilot program for six months to test how it works. Also, initially we will focus on five topics, i.e., Climate Change, Governance, Energy, Education and Financial Crisis. However, we will keep the door open for speaking opportunities on any other topic relevant to the Bank, especially at locations where there is no World Bank office. At this stage, it would be too early to have a definitive idea of the likely volume and/or nature of demand for our members as speakers. Most likely, there would be a slow start, but once the Bank finds the initial experience to be satisfactory, the demand could pick up.

The Bank is willing to nominate Society members as speakers, without representing the Bank in any official capacity, and to arrange for appropriate briefing material and documents to help our members to prepare. Understandably, the Bank would like to be assured that the Society would provide high quality and non-controversial speakers. For this purpose, a small nominating committee will be set up shortly within the Society to identify appropriate speakers whenever the Bank would ask us to send speakers.

Our next step is to develop a roster of potential speakers from among our members. I have already requested Chapter and Sector Leaders to nominate suitable members willing to speak. Since there might be members not belonging to any chapter or might have missed emails from Leaders, I am reaching out to all members. If you are interested to be a speaker please fill in this form https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dEl0NWpQVURMQ2ZQcGxPYmt0ZzJZM2c6MQ

I will appreciate receiving your response by March 12, 2011.

Khalid Siraj
Member, Management Committee
1818 Society
Washington DC 20433