HAPPY HOLIDAYS FROM LES
Letter from Licensing Executives Society (USA and Canada) - President
As we reflect on the past year, and look forward to the one ahead, I am pleased to report that LES has enjoyed many blessings, and can expect many more in the New Year.
We have a special source of joy and optimism in the future of LES in the hiring of our very first Chief Executive Officer, Kimberly Chotkowski. Kimberly is an experienced patent attorney with many years in the practice of licensing and intellectual property law to her credit. She is an accomplished corporate executive with a proven record of successfully leading teams and executing on budget. She is a longstanding member of LES, and is devoted to the LES mission of facilitating global intellectual property commerce through education, networking, standards development, and certification. Kimberly has great passion for the work of LES, and a bold vision for enhancing its stature as a volunteer-driven professional society of influence and consequence.
This development caps an LES initiative of several years’ duration, and is a cornerstone of the LES 2020 Strategic Plan initiated by Past President Pamela Demain, and orchestrated by Immediate Past President Jeff Whittle. That Strategic Plan contemplates a more robust role for a Chief Executive Officer having extensive first-hand experience in the licensing profession. As our new CEO, Kimberly will play an important role working with the LES Board of Directors in setting strategy and implementing on initiatives that define LES as the premiere professional society in licensing. After an extensive search, and a most impressive slate of candidates, the Board unanimously selected Kimberly for this role, and she will become a member of our team January 1, 2017. Please join me in welcoming Kimberly.
The Board has identified several important priorities for Kimberly as we bring a renewed sense of community and purpose to the LES membership. Kimberly has been charged with: 1) ensuring fiscal responsibility and efficient, reliable financial reporting; 2) ensuring that the Society delivers member benefits that help you grow and improve as a licensing professional; and 3) supporting you and all of our members in creating conferences true to the LES tradition of outstanding content and widespread appeal. Kimberly’s involvement and contribution to the good works of the Society will greatly improve our reputation, influence, and value to our members. This is an exciting time to be a member of LES. We are extremely grateful for your involvement in, and contributions to, the Society.
Separately, we can expect that the changes now unfolding in Washington, DC will have profound influence on our profession. We will see consequential changes in personnel and policy in the USPTO, the ITC, the FTC, and in the US Trade Representative’s Office of Intellectual Property and Innovation, among others. A new Congress will bring new IP-oriented legislative initiatives. As the Society’s President, I assure you that LES will ensure that your voice is heard, and that the importance of preserving and protecting intellectual property rights and licensing in support of innovation and the growth of our economy will not be lost on our elected leaders.
On behalf of LES, I wish you and all our members a joyous holiday season, and a happy and prosperous new year.
--Brian P. O’Shaughnessy
President and Chair of the Board
Licensing Executives Society (USA and Canada), Inc.
Source: http://www.lesusacanada.org/news/323108/Letter-from-the-President.htm