Western Region Conferring and Presidential Address

This evening I was the kind guest of the Western Region at their professional conferring ceremony in the Clayton Hotel in Galway.  I was particularly delighted that amongst the twenty members conferred tonight,  three were to Fellowship. of registered status (Fellow,  Chartered and Associate) on a number of their members.  I also gave my Presidential Address,  and took questions from the audience afterwards.

Midlands Region Conferring and Presidential Address

Yesterday evening I was the kind guest of the Midlands Region at their conferring of registered status (Chartered and Associate) on a number of their members,  at the Clonmore House hotel in Tullamore.  I also gave my Presidential Address which stimulated quite a lot of discussion and questions afterwards.

World Intellectual Property Day

This evening,  I gave a guest presentation as President of Engineers Ireland at an event organised by William Frys to celebrate World Intellectual Property Day.   I spoke about some of my experiences and thoughts on intellectual property,  arising from my career at IONA.   There was also some discussion during the Q&A on the innovation taskforce.

DIT Bolton Street

This afternoon,  I gave a guest lecture via the  kind invitation of Mike Murphy of DIT to about 350 engineering students at DIT Bolton Street.  I spoke briefly about my own career,  and then addressed the importance of Chartered Engineering status,   and the role of Engineers Ireland.   We had a pretty lively Q&A afterwards,  with people interested in entrepreneurship,  Chartered status,  Jobseekers,  and the transition in 2013 to Masters level for Chartered Engineers.

TCD-UCD Innovation Alliance

TCD & UCD hosted an all-day design innovation today at Foster Place.  As President of Engineers Ireland, I chaired a one hour discussion panel at lunch time with Mark Dyer,  Tony Fagan,  Eugene O'Brien,  Gregory O'Hare, Feargal O'Morain and Richard Reilly.   The main emphasis of the Q&A with the audience was on even more efficient mechanisms for technology transfer including intellectual property.

Bicentennial of Robert Mallet, the father of seismology

This evening,  I had the pleasure of chairing a meeting of the Heritage Society at Clyde Rd,  and also streamed to the internet and will soon be available for playback on Engineers TV.

The presentation was by Dr Ron Cox,  historical author and former Dean of the TCD Engineering School. His subject,  Robert Mallet,  1810-1881,  was an observationalist, experimentalist,  polymath and engineering scientist.  Amongst his many achievements, he is widely internationally regarded as the father of seismology,  writing his seminal work on the dynamics of earthquakes in 1846 and coining both the terms "sesimology" and "epicentre".  Three of his descendants travelled from the UK this evening to join us.

Launch of HSE Medical Device & Equipment Management Policy

I attended by invitation and spoke at the launch this morning at the HSE Phoenix house building, of the HSE's new policy document on medical device and equipment, covering procurement, operation and maintenance. The event was hosted by Brian Gilroy of the HSE. Minister Mary Harney was the guest of honour and spoke of the importance of the new policy.

I used the opportunity to highlight the role of engineers in the medical profession, and how engineering mistakes can be more dangerous than medical ones. This of course gave me a segue to talk about registration and licensing of Chartered Engineers in Ireland.

Annual Conference

Well,  the dust has settled after a great annual conference in Cork last thursday and friday.  Well over 300 people attended,  and I suspect the final figure may be as high as 350.

Last monday (19th),  I was very concerned since we had lost four featured speakers due to Eyjafjallajökull - Minister Conor Lenihan, Craig Barrett, Ian Quinn and Bertrand Barré. Conor was stuck in Dubai;  Craig on US east coast;  Ian on US west coast and Bertrand in Paris.  Bertrand very kindly agreed to do a video conference instead.  I approached Ian's CEO,  Helen Ryan who happened to be in the country, and she very kindly agreed to take his place.  But both Conor and Craig were completely unavailable.

ICE Presidential Address

On Friday 16th last,  we were honoured to have Prof. Paul Jowitt of the Institution of Civil Engineers,  visit us and deliver his presidential address.  I had previously met Paul in Belfast and he was kind enough to attend my own presidential address in London.

Paul and his wife June had a challenging time reaching us,  leaving Glasgow at 9.30am,  and travelling via Stranraer,  Larne and Belfast,  to reach us by 7pm.  I am very grateful for their determination!

Joint Council & Executive Meeting

This morning we held a scheduled joint meeting of Executive and Council at Clyde Rd,  from 10am-1pm.

Finance Committee Meeting

Yesterday evening,  we held a scheduled meeting of the Finance Committee at Clyde Rd.