Objectives
The board of the Land Use and Water Management Department has defined the following wish list:
- Strengthen the contribution of the Dutch engineer to water management and place it in a social context.
- Promote professional affiliation of engineers.
- Encourage members to take initiatives.
- Exchange experiences with and learn from other engineers, other professional groups and colleagues from other countries.
- Be an umbrella for members and non-members.
Mission
In doing so, we have formulated the department's mission as follows:
To shape the social importance of the technician (engineer) for water management and to strengthen pride in the management of water in the Netherlands.
In order to realise the mission and fulfil the vision, a programme of concrete actions is needed. To flesh out that programme of action, we desperately need the input of our members. We have formulated a number of focal points that we believe should be taken into account when drawing up the action programme. The main five are:
- Fulfilling the department's networking function at national level (This primarily requires that communication about what you do and find is in order; furthermore, there are more organisations active in the field of water management, so there must be cooperation; furthermore, in the field of technology, strive to be a network hub, and finally: be pivotal in profiling the water engineer.
- Strengthening contacts between members (Point of attention: declining numbers of practitioners attending meetings.).
- Contributing to the professionalism and professional quality of the water engineer (Teaching engineers to communicate: two-way traffic; not only transferring knowledge, but also building trust; unlocking and deploying knowledge.).
- Increasing pride in the water engineering profession (I.e. lobbying + member recruitment and retention; revaluing the profession and knowledge present).