Frankfurt, February 6th
Once per year, the association invites all its members to the AGM, the Annual General Meeting, where the member companies exercise their rights. According to its statutes, ERA Global* is a Belgium Asbl. (Association sans but lucrative) a non-profit organisation, for the members and by the members. The highest body of the association is the General Assembly. Every two years it elects its delegates, the board of directors and, on a yearly basis, it decides about the finances, admits new members to the organisation and has the right to be informed about all relevant issues taking place.
The Global Membership is Growing
The member YOY development was very positive. ERA Global saw a growth of approx. 30% in members, of which only 67% come from the EMEA region (the former ERA Europe territory). The member development strongly reflects the global approach of our association.
Financial Planning
The 2020 meeting key learnings were that ERA GLOBAL missed its 2019 financial goals by some 100€ and has decided on a 2020 budget planning with a surplus of 1.000€. The General Assembly approved an alternative budget, in case the board finds it wise to extend the event activities already planned in 2020 beyond Europe.
Public Affairs and Self-Regulation
Most importantly, the members were informed about the future Public affairs and Self-Regulation projects. Especially the Self-Regulation programme will be submitted to fundamental changes. All members do have to submit themselves to our industry code of ethics. Their compliance was and will be monitored by an independent Self-Regulation office. With the new global structure, ERA GLOBAL cannot maintain its B2C referral programme. i.e. in the past, customers could refer to the Self-Regulation Officer indicating that a member company was not in line with the self-regulation programme and this was then cleared with the respective member company. Rendering this service on a global and sustainable scale is not possible. For that reason the board has decided to transform the process to a B2B referral process only.
Member Dinner
In the evening, all members met at the Frankfurter Botschaft for the member dinner. Perfect ambiance, great food and wine, best company and inspiring conversation with your industry colleagues and friends can be the summary of that dinner. Later more members joined us in the famous Jimmy´s Bar at our membership venue.
What a great start for a very peculiar year.
