BCS HCI Group has new Chair at the Helm

The BCS HCI group has a new chair; me!

I’ve taken over from Gilbert Cockton, who has done a great job over the past few years, in particular in steering the group through some major changes in structure and organisation, and in aiding the formation of one of our most prominent voices in the wider world, UsabilityNews. I’d like to thank him, on behalf of the group, for all his work and with him all the many people that supported him.

As to my plans for the HCI Group – much of it is working well, and I quite like the maxim of ‘if it aint broke, don’t fix it’. So I don’t anticipate major structural or organisational changes. However, one of the key assets of the group are the volunteers who assist us to actually do anything, and I’m planning on coordinating and communicating with them more effectively so that it becomes easier and more rewarding to volunteer to do things with us.

I’m also working with the others in the group, and the HCI community in general, to review what our priorities should be, where we should focus our efforts, and what are the key issues we need to address are, so that we can allocate resources, time and effort in the right places.

If you have views about what the group can or should do for you, then please email me at bcs-hci.chair@cs.bham.ac.uk to let me know your views. The core group will meet sometime quite soon to discuss these things, so we’ll be able to give you more detail about any new initiatives in the near future. I am looking forward to the challenges, once I’ve worked out what they are, and I hope that we can make the group a dynamic, resourceful, strong and insightful voice for HCI right across the spectrum, from academics and practitioners to researchers and students.

Russell Beale
University of Birmingham

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