ITE Journal January 2018 - 4

| president's message
ITE - Leading the Way

MICHAEL P. SANDERSON,
P.E., PTOE, LEED AP (F)
ITE International President

INTERNATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTION

International President
Michael P. Sanderson, P.E., PTOE, LEED AP (F)
President/CEO, Sanderson/Stewart
Billings, MT, USA

International Vice President
Bruce Belmore, P.Eng., PTOE, AVS (F)

Director, Western Canada Transportation Planning, WSP
Regina, SK, Canada

Immediate Past International President
Shawn J. Leight, P.E., PTOE, PTP (F)

Vice President, CBB Transportation Engineers + Planners
St. Louis, MO, USA

Directors
Michael J. Salatti, P.E., PTOE (F)

(Northeastern District) Senior Vice President,
Greenman-Pedersen, Inc.
Babylon, NY, USA

Abraham (Abi) Lerner, P.E. (M)

(Mid-Colonial District), Associate Manager for Special
Project Development, VDOT, Fairfax, VA, USA

Scott Knebel, P.E. (M)

(Great Lakes District) Group Manager,
Crawford, Murphy, and Tilly, Columbus, OH, USA

John A. Davis, P.E., PTOE, TSOS (F)

(Midwestern District), Manager of Traffic Engineering
Services, Ayres Associates Inc., Waukesha, WI, USA

Kirsten Tynch, P.E., PTOE, LEED AP BD+C, ENV SP (F)
(Southern District) Managing Director,
VHB, Virginia Beach, VA, USA

Karen E. Aspelin, P.E., PTOE (F)

(Western District) Principal, MaxGreen
Transportation Engineers, LLC
Colorado Springs, CO, USA

Walter Okitsu, P.E., PTP, PTOE (F)

(Western District), Principal,
KOA Corporation, Monterey Park, CA, USA

Carlos Ortiz, P.E.,TE, PTOE (M)

(Western District) COO, Advantec
Consulting Engineers, Irvine, CA, USA

Eugene (Gene) G. Chartier, P.Eng. (F)

(Canadian District), Vice President of Paradigm
Transportation Solutions Limited, Toronto, ON, Canada

Donald (Don) J. McKenzie, P.E. (M)

(International District) Director/Auckland
Branch Manager, TDG, Auckland, New Zealand

Dale Picha, P.E., PTOE (M)

(Texas District) Traffic Operations Manager,
Texas Department of Transportation, San Antonio, TX, USA

Daniel J. Beaty, AICP (M)

(Florida District) Chief Transportation
Planner, HNTB, Tallahassee, FL, USA

Representative

Leadership is a theme that runs through my ITE experience. I suspect I am not unique. ITE has
provided me many opportunities to practice, grow, and test my leadership. Beginning as a young
professional, ITE provided me my first leadership opportunity when I was invited to serve as an officer
of the fledgling Montana Chapter. From there, I kept volunteering and eventually served in leadership
roles at all levels of ITE. Each experience helped me grow my aptitude to organize people and resources
to get things accomplished. ITE has been a multiplier for my career, giving me far more opportunities
to grow as a leader than I would have had in my day job alone.
No one leads alone. It requires a network of people who can lend their experience, expertise,
and encouragement when your own is lacking. This is also where ITE can be a career multiplier.
While my leadership journey happened organically, for some it takes a more guided approach. A
few years ago, when ITE's Transportation Consultants' Council members were surveyed about their
training and development needs, leadership development was one of the most frequent responses. A
conversation started that eventually led to ITE creating its premier leadership development program,
LeadershipITE. This program gives participants leadership skills and tools to apply, but more
importantly accelerates the development of a powerful professional network. The results have been
tremendous. LeadershipITE is a multiplier of the multiplier that is ITE.
ITE is blessed with many terrific leaders working in a complicated federation of districts, local
sections, chapters, and student chapters to deliver information and to provide opportunities to network,
learn, and collaborate at the grassroots level. These local parts are varied and diverse. Our hundreds,
thousands even, of local ITE leaders-closest to our members and local transportation issues-are the
ones best equipped to lead ITE activities and deliver ITE information, education, and networking.
However, diverse and local can also mean different. Different can be desirable if the ITE experience
is customized to local needs and issues. But it can be very undesirable when those differences
create disparate value and experiences such that parts of ITE are unrecognizable as part of the same
organization. One of the challenges that we will begin to tackle this year is: How do we give our local
leaders the autonomy they need to deliver timely and locally relevant services, tailored to their local
constituents, but at the same time give them a framework of policies and tools that let them deliver an
experience that is consistently ITE to all our members? ITE members should know they are getting the
same value for their investment as other ITE members.
ITE also must provide a consistent experience in our members' opportunities to participate, and
that includes leadership at the highest levels. We have a diversity issue, and while it is an issue in our
profession overall, ITE can do better to attract and retain a diverse membership. ITE can and should
lead our profession and give all our members, from student to experienced professional, opportunities
to contribute and to lead.
These challenges of consistency, diversity, and inclusion are addressed in ITE's new strategic plan,
outlined on page 32. This strategic plan demands that we continue to lead on technical issues. It guides
us to seek partnerships that will bring even more valuable technical information to our members.
But it demands more than just technical leadership. It demands that we provide a consistently high
quality and value-added ITE experience to all members. It demands that we attract and retain a diverse
membership and provide an inclusive experience. It also demands that we lead in areas we haven't
historically, as advocates for policy that will lead to safer, healthier, and smarter communities. These
are not small endeavors, but on these and many more I am confident that ITE is Leading the Way.

Russell Brownlee, M.A. Sc., P. Eng. (F)

(Coordinating Council Representative) Managing Director
Transportation Safety Engineer, True North Safety Group
Toronto, ON, Canada

Institute of Transportation Engineers
1627 Eye Street, NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20006 USA
Telephone: +1 202-785-0060 | Fax: +1 202-785-0609

www.ite.org

J a n uar y 2018

i t e jo u rn al

Michael P. Sanderson, P.E., PTOE, LEED AP (F)
ITE International President

http://www.ite.org

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of ITE Journal January 2018