Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/819981
84 The PCB Magazine • May 2017 and then take the CES, I think they call it, the Certified ESD Specialist program. They can de- liver it through EDGE at their facility and then they add on their own company-specific con- tent and it's customizable for the companies. I know that one is a fairly new model of how we've been delivering things. I haven't seen the numbers, but from what I understand it's been well-received. Also, Ayana Nickerson, our Senior Certifi- cation Director, asks, "OK guys, what do you need? What are you really seeing? Where do we need to focus? What can we do to help?" We're getting feedback from the industry that allows us to see the gaps. We at IPC can hear all sorts of things anec- dotally, but if we don't go out there and talk to people we won't get the actual needs, which is something that I'd love to see even out of this interview after it's posted—if people have ideas, send them to us: "We see this need in our busi- ness." Send it to the IPC answers desk [2] or the IPC liaisons or the cert team. We need to know what the industry needs. IPC is here with many tools and we'd love to make those tools available as a limited-sized or- ganization. As you say, "Oh, IPC won't do this." Well, we'd love to. The problem is we would have to hire more staff, which of course, we have to pay for; this leads to the old topic of, "Oh, I pay all the time for IPC and what does it get me?" Well, there's a whole lot that IPC is doing and we can partner more easily and effi- ciently than trying to do it ourselves. Goldman: Yes, you can't just do it yourself because you could end up going down the wrong path. You need people and companies to direct the effort and to participate, and so forth. Roberson: Absolutely; it's easy to say, "Oh, I want this." Okay, great, now how can we do that? Goldman: Do either of you have any final thoughts? Bergman: I think we've hit it pretty well. I don't see the traditional face-to-face activity going away. We're still holding conferences, in fact we'll be holding them in the U.S., Europe and China so that still holds a significant place, but the real enhancement or the new activities are going to be the online learning through IPC EDGE. Since we're just at the very early stages, that's what you're going to hear most from IPC for the next year or so because we have so much work to do to lay it all out, and we want to keep it very visible so the industry knows that this new tool is available and they can help us guide the content. Goldman: This is all great information. Thank you very much, I really appreciate your time. PCB References 1. I-Connect007 Interview with Dean Ka- men, founder of FIRST. 2. IPC answer desk: answers@ipc.org. To reach David Bergman, click here. To reach Kris Roberson, click here. INDUSTRY KNOWLEDGE—PREPARING THE NEXT GENERATION Kris Roberson