Presentation

Introduction

EDI’s working groups aim to provide a structured way of developing the organisation’s objectives, encouraging the exchange of best practices, developing reference documentation, creating dissemination or training materials and promoting the guild in general.

What are the working groups?

These working groups can be internal (only for EDI members), external (organized by a third party, with the participation of EDI delegates), or a mix of both types (organized by EDI and open to other participants, such as related stakeholders, partner organizations,…).

Depending on their lifecycle, the working groups can be permanent or temporary.

The working groups will generally only meet in person occasionally, with most of the meetings held by video conference.

In general, the meetings in person will be, most probably, at the EDI Annual Convention.

Each working group will be asked to present a list of topics and keep it updated with any ideas/comments that may come.

From that list, the leaders of the working group, together with all the professionals involved, will choose a topic or a set of topics and will define deliverables with clear dates, scope and support needed.

How do they operate?

Generally, working groups will only meet in person occasionally, and most meetings will be held via videoconference.

The working groups are meant to be composed of volunteer professionals from the industry and the leadership of one spokesperson.

All the meetings and proceedings of the working groups will generally follow a defined process, with clear and transparent communication to all the members, within the budget of the organization itself and standardized documentation handling,

The EDI Secretariat serves as assistance to organize the meetings, follow-up of tasks and support in the preparation of deliverables.

All the reference documentation of groups and subgroups will be posted on the EDI website, within the private contents sections (Intranet).

What do they do?

Each EDI working group/subgroup should always have a detailed agenda for every meeting or a project description for every deliverable, as well as a summary of the meetings and a report of the results related to any deliverable pursued by the organization.

The concept of deliverable is something that can be used or transferred to someone else.

Some examples of deliverables are a working document, a printed publication, an education session, an activity/event, …