My doctor friend says, half-jokingly, that if we follow what doctors say, we can live long – but if we follow what doctors do, we will die young. No other scholarly association has more communication experts than ICA does, but how well are we doing communication-wise? With approximately 7,000 members dispersed across 87 countries worldwide, there's no question that effective communication between the leadership and members, as well as among members at both the Division/Interest Group and Association levels, is crucial to ICA's successful operation, and equally challenging.
Among the various communication channels ICA currently maintains for official communications, social media platforms are probably the most widely and frequently used ones. Especially considering the recent and ongoing (not so trivial) changes in the social media landscape, it seems imperative for us to revisit how to engage with social media as a means of communication (see the Immediate Past President Noshir Contractor's Newsletter column, "Is it time for ICAstodon?"). To address this issue, we have created the Social Media Task Force to be led by Dr. François Heinderyckx (Chair), who will work closely with Drs. Aicha Adoui, Curd Knüpfer, Adrienne Massanari, and Katy Pearce. The Social Media TF is tasked with evaluating the potential long-term benefits of the current ICA platforms (i.e., Twitter, LinkedIn, Mastodon, Facebook, and Threads), based on their functionality and actual usage. This includes analyzing social media strategies of comparable academic societies, the utilization of social media by our Divisions and Interest Groups, and the use of the current member engagement platform, The Link. They are also asked to assess new social media platforms in terms of overall functionality and potential benefits, and ultimately, make recommendations on how ICA should (or should not) engage with them, for the Board's approval in June 2024. If you have any thoughts and/or experiences to share, please feel free to contact any of the TF members, so your invaluable input can be well integrated into the general guidelines for ICA's social media use.
Another newly established task force is the Data Collection & Privacy Policy TF. It was brought to our attention that there were concerns regarding sensitive personal information that was being collected during the membership renewal process. In response, we promptly removed the related questions and decided to form a task force to develop an official ICA policy that governs the collection and use of members' data. I am immensely grateful to Dr. Christian Hoffman, who will lead a team of experts including Drs. Peng Hwa Ang, Dmirty Epstein, Kelly Quinn, and Philipp Masur. Their primary responsibilities involve evaluating ICA's current practices concerning the collection, usage, and storage of members' personal data, such as those obtained during the membership renewal process and displayed as part of the member profile, and then formulating ICA's privacy standards in line with the best practices implemented by international academic associations, which fully uphold the core principles of voluntariness, transparency, and visibility. Once again, I'd like to express my sincere gratitude to those who not only alerted us to this important matter, but also graciously agreed to serve on the TF, and strongly encourage you to lend your voice to strengthen the ICA community – we're all ears.