IIW History 1990-2015

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t the Governing Council meeting during the IIW Annual Assembly in Montreal, Canada, in 1990, the incoming President, Dr Norman Eaton (Canada) mentioned that the International Institute of Welding (IIW) faced new challenges and opportunities in a time of rapid change. In doing so he introduced a new vision for IIW – Towards 2000 . 1 This was reminiscent of when, 10 years earlier, The Netherlands delegation had a similar vision when it requested that IIW redefine its future, at the Governing Council meeting in Portugal in 1980. The need for change received further impetus following the appointment of Dr Felix Wallner (Austria) in 1984 as the President of IIW. Wallner then nominated Eaton, a fellow member of the Executive Council, to become Treasurer and work alongside him, since both these individuals were of similar disposition and outlook. In 1989 the Executive Council then decided to act more decisively

before the start of a new decade by disbanding the Working Group (WG) Commercial Strategy and replacing it with a new WG Strategic Planning with Eaton as Chair. In assuming this role Eaton gave every appearance that he was a man who had come to the conclusion that IIW had to reinvent itself or it would fast become irrelevant as a global leader in the cause of welding and its processes. There was some expectancy that significant changes were about to take place when Eaton reported the provisional findings of the first strategic planning group meeting to the Executive Council in March 1990. 2

Norman Eaton

Accompanying the rationale expressed in the findings of this report there was a feeling within IIW that it still had its roots in the past and had changed little since its inception. This feeling, in fact, had existed as far back as 1976 when a certain degree of dissatisfaction with the direction that IIWwas taking was expressed by the Director General of The Welding Institute (TWI), Dr Richard Weck (United Kingdom (UK)), in his opening address to the Public Sessions at the IIW Annual Assembly held in Sydney, Australia. He

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