Now in its fourth year of existence, the ICO position is an integral and well-established part of the executive team. Effective communication, efficient processes and procedures are essential to a productive working relationship between the AMSA executive and Convention and GHC teams.

The most important aspect of the ICO role is acting as a communication pathway between the AMSA executive and Convention and GHC committees. As our flagship events, and ones that take up by far the most of AMSA’s hours and money, it is in everyone’s best interests for the executive and the teams on the ground to be on the same page. I share the Tassie and Sydney teams’ philosophy of running the best possible events as humanly imaginable, and to make this happen, it is essential that the ICO is able to balance the social, financial and legal responsibilities of AMSA as a company and offer the organising teams any assistance they need.

Having held a variety of organisational and management roles within and outside medicine I understand the difficulties and barriers that can be faced in effectively meeting goals and targets. Through talking to Yogi, other executive members and old AMSA-hats, I’ve learned a lot about what the ICO role will entail and how I’ll go about it.

Next year, I will continue to work with the AMSA executive to help organise the NLDS and Life in the Real World Seminar. Having Steve Peterson in Canberra will expedite NLDS preparation, but it’s certainly more than an individual job and I look forward to helping put on an NLDS unlike any before.

Convention, GHC, NLDS and Life in the Real World (my favourite acronyms of all time!) represent four of the major forums for AMSA to connect, represent and inform its members. Attending various AMSA events has allowed me to appreciate the enormity of work that goes into each one, and I am excited at the prospect of building upon the work that has been put into in making these events the best that they can be and making sure the executive functions as efficiently and effectively as possible.