ACS’s 3-day crash course in leadership

Over 400 American Chemical Society members gathered in Houston Jan. 31–Feb. 2 for a weekend packed with leadership workshops, networking, and learning how the society can help volunteers be successful—and vice versa. The ACS Leadership Institute is an invitation-only conference that teaches ACS leaders skills to become more successful in their roles.

Over 1,700 people participate in governance within the society, including over 730 committee volunteers, 428 elected councilors, and 342 local section councilors.

Wayne E. Jones Jr., chair of the ACS Board of Directors, spoke at lunch on Saturday about how the board thinks about ACS. “One of the things we think about the most is leadership. We think about, how do we find those members—and nonmembers—those associates, that can help us lead the society.”

Jones reminded the room that ACS is in its 149th year, and the board is already planning celebrations for 150 years in 2026.

“But it’s also a time for us to double down on our commitment—our commitment to improve all lives through the transforming power of chemistry,” Jones said. This commitment has been in some form in ACS’s strategic plan for a number of years, and Jones said it was important to keep. “That is a commitment that is going to be core to the way we think about things. . . . These are the guiding forces for all of our activities: whether you’re on the board or you’re in your local section or a division or even in your day job.”

Jones continued by emphasizing that ACS is a global community of over 230,000 participants that represent many facets of chemistry, including community associates, members, journal authors, division members, and more. “They are folks that care about chemistry, and the board is committed to try and support all of them.”

“That is one of the reasons you all are here today. You are a part of that bigger puzzle,” Jones said.

Those in attendance at the leadership institute included undergraduates, younger chemists, new committee chairs, division chairs, local section leaders, the ACS presidential succession, board members, workshop facilitators, and more.

A one-stop-shop for graduate school readiness

Zyla Castañon, a biochemistry major at California State University, Sacramento, took part in the graduate student readiness boot camp and said she got good advice from multiple perspectives, which was important to her. “We did a roundtable and got to talk more in smaller groups to professors at different universities and learn things like having a balance between doing your research and what you can be doing for yourself.” Castañon said the conference also covered topics like the admission and application process for graduate school, and everyone was able to have a one-on-one meeting with a professor to discuss their personal statements. “It’s good to have one place to get all that information, because if you’re doing it by yourself, it can get confusing.”

She said that not all schools offer help like that to undergraduates and can afford the time to answer in-depth questions, like what the facilitators have been able to do with the readiness boot camp. The one thing Castañon is taking back with her is that even when things get hard, she’s going to try to do what she’s passionate about and interested in. “Being interested in what you’re doing is a good reason to go [to graduate school].”

Collaborating across boundaries

Ajay Mallia, a professor of chemistry at Georgia Gwinnett College, came to the institute as a workshop facilitator, so he was able to share his leadership experience and knowledge around collaborating across boundaries with 25 attendees, including younger chemists, experienced professionals, and those in various ACS member roles.

He shared a key takeaway: “One of the important things, when we all try to do something and we need more resources—resources mean we need more time, and we need more people. But one of the important things to remember is that if we collaborate with each other, we can achieve a lot.” Those who attended the workshop left with a metaphorical toolbox of ways to facilitate collaboration, which can be used in their day job or volunteer work as an ACS member.

Who’s behind those emails?

Lee Nagao, from the Chemical Society of Washington local section, found the most value in meeting other leaders from local sections across the US. While everyone is from a different location with different experiences, she found herself taking notes about experiences from others that she can apply to her local section. One of those examples was successful collaboration with academics and local K–12 students.

“One of the reasons I initially got involved with our local section is because they were doing some outreach to some of the local schools in DC,” Nagao said. “I’m not in academia, so I’ve been trying to think of ways that I can more effectively work with some of the academics in our group, as well as thinking through how to engage more K–12 students, especially those in underserved communities.” She’d love to see how partnering with local universities and industries can help support those efforts. “For Washington, especially, ’cause it’s a very diverse community as far as the types of chemists, you see—it’s academics, it’s industry, it’s government. We have so much that we can offer students [locally] as far as them being exposed and understanding what you can do with chemistry, beyond academia or medical school.”

Another lesson for Nagao was how local sections interact and work. She said much of their processes were previously unclear to her—including the meaning behind emails from ACS. “It was great to actually meet some of these people and get a lot of questions clarified around process.”

Pick and choose; you can’t do everything

Matt Gordon, a postdoctoral research fellow at Savannah River National Laboratory and a leader in the Committee on Younger Chemists, came to the leadership institute through a travel scholarship from the ACS Division of Professional Relations (PROF), a committee that he has done some volunteer work through. “Dorothy [Phillips] said to us yesterday to kind of pick your committee, your division, or something, and to work hard at that thing. You can’t do everything. And I think PROF is going to be that for me, so I’m trying to get even more involved.”

Gordon sees conferences like the leadership institute as great opportunities to network, meet folks, and learn from others who can share the path they’ve taken to get to where they are—and they can even potentially help you. “I think the big professional society seems [to younger folks] a little bit in the past. And I understand the value of it, and it’s unfortunate that it’s kind of like that.” Gordon thinks young people today want to pick and choose what they’re involved in, a process that becomes challenging when you’re a member of a big organization. “I think connecting them to the bigger picture is really important.” Showing the next generation resources and making introductions can go a long way. Gordon remembers meeting somebody who worked at the lab he is currently doing his postdoctoral research at during an ACS conference, and he was able to ask them about their experience beforehand, which Gordon found valuable.

“ACS as a whole is kind of like a ‘no matter where I go’ [organization],” Gordon said. When he left university to go to his postdoc in a different state, where he knew no one, he joined the local section there, and the experience has left him feeling that no matter where he ends up—which for someone coming to the end of a postdoc could be anywhere—he’ll be reaching out to his local section in that area. “At least you have some starting point of knowing, OK, these people are in your same field, and they can help you make connections.” Gordon explained that that’s an example of how he can lean on ACS and make it work for him, which in turn makes him want to put in the work for ACS as an active volunteer. “I think that is what makes it all happen,” he said. “I like that ACS is a member-run thing. It doesn’t feel like programming is created for me; it’s more created for us—we’re doing it for ourselves.”