b'Member News November 2020 25VolunteersExcellence AwardIve always felt I wanted to contributeCVA Excellence winner Eur Ing Bob Shanks has more than 30 years volunteering experience under his belt, including two decades as Chair of the Imagineering Foundation, a STEM-based charity for childrenfrom the age of seven. Throughout, he has remained committed to enhancing the role of all engineers. Ive always felt I wanted to contribute, somehow or other, he said.During the 80s and 90s Bob helped create a group that has evolved to become IET Coventry & Warwickshire Midlands Manufacturing Network, which he chaired from 2006 to 2010 and is still heavily involved with today. His award nomination states:contacts when putting on events. The younger members of the committees look up to him for guidance and advice, Whether or not Bob iswhich he is always willing to share.involved in organising IETHaving led many IET committees events, hes always theand subgroups over the years, Bob is practised in the art of motivation. I like to first to help or stand in andallow members the scope and headroom lead an event if the currentto explore opportunities, he said. Its Chair is unable to attend. about letting people come up with their own ideasalthough they might not have much substance, talking them through motivates the individual and may well We rely on his broad experience,spark new ideas in others. Sometimes you detailed knowledge of the industry andneed courage to let things unravel a bit!Eur Ing Bob ShanksTeamwork AwardA foundation of mutualcommunity. We get a lot ofcommittee members and the innovative ideas and we areextended members of our Local always open to constructiveNetwork, said Dr Devaraj MIET.respect and trust feedback. During the COVID-19 lockdown, To help keep spirits high duringto support young professionals Indias Chennai Local Network (LN) is the worthy winnerlockdown, the committeewe set up a virtual factory visit of the CVA for Teamwork. The Network is more than 50members took part in funto Nokia. We also launched the years old and has 16 committee members and around 3,200biweekly teambuilding activitiesSpace and Rocket Engineering members. Chair Dr Dhanasekaran Devaraj MIET said:on Zoom and held regular syncProgramme, enabling them up meetings. We always askedto learn more about space about the wellbeing of fellowentrepreneurship.The committee is diverse in Our team works on aboth expertise and experience. We encourage everyone to foundation of mutualbring their respective skills respect and trust forand knowledge to the table, to help us achieve our common all members. goal of bridging academia and industry for students andWinning team: (from left) Rajkumar Ramareddi MIET, Prasanna Bharathi Sankara Raghavan young professionals in ourMIET, Dr Dhanasekaran Devaraj MIET, Dr Cloudin Swamynathan MIET, Dr Rathinam Ananthanarayanan MIET and Vivek Ram Vasan MIETFind out more about all our latest winners at: theiet.org/meet-our-volunteers'