Working groups, General
The 5th SEC board (2023–2025) had noticed in many conversations, particularly with new members, that the SEC structure, which had evolved historically over two decades with old and new projects, “had become somewhat confusing”. As we also wanted to make it easier to get involved, we have, based on our experience of the past three years, divided our activities and all projects into ten working groups. We describe the process—the “what, why” and “how”, in other words the working groups—below.
This brings us to the “who”: we invite you to take an active part and help shape our work. We would be delighted if you contacted us, also as a guest.
And we look forward to a lively exchange, e.g. at our General Assemblies, at our SEC annual meetings, following our monthly SEC Online lectures, and at the annual Working Groups Day.
We are, of course, also happy to receive your questions in advance.
Eva E. Wille
on behalf of the SEC board
The “Branding and Strategy” Board team, appointed by the SEC board at the end of 2024, was already able to report significant results in mid-2025: A new mission, a new vision and—derived from these—overarching goals for the SEC were presented as fundamental milestones in the development of the strategy. These results were documented in the new SEC flyer, which was presented to all members with the June newsletter.
Senior Expert Chemists have always been open to change. Since their foundation, the structure has been regularly adapted to meet members’ needs and respond to new political and social challenges. Working groups have been established and subsequently discontinued or merged.
It was therefore only logical to analyse the SEC structure in the next step of developing the strategy: Alongside the Board, the SEC Division was supported until 2025 by the two working groups for public relations and school, education and careers. The members of the working groups form a vibrant community and inspire one another. The aim is to give chemistry-related topics greater visibility in our society. This is to be retained and further strengthened in the revised structure.
The SEC aims to support the GDCh’s strategy, while also taking up new topics and working with other Divisions and working groups of the GDCh. Contacts are to be established and joint projects developed. Key objectives of further development are a greater diversity of topics and the continuous recruitment of younger members for greater engagement, so that all projects can be handled in a targeted manner.
The barrier for all SEC members to participate in activities is to be lowered. The new structure must make it possible to work flexibly on projects that are limited in time, including in cooperation with other GDCh Divisions. This will be easier in smaller, more agile working groups than in the two large working groups to date. Our positive experience with pragmatic, small Online meetings on the projects “Chemistry studies in the past”, “Branding and Strategy” and “Social media posts for occasions”, as well as the newsletter team, encouraged us to take this approach.
The core of the transformation therefore consists in further developing the two working groups and the ongoing projects into ten working groups. Each working group will develop clear objectives agreed with the SEC board. Progress on the work is to be reported regularly to the SEC board and to one another.
To facilitate the transformation and launch of the new structure, the “Branding and Strategy” Board team initially prepared a profile for each of the ten working groups around the turn of 2025/2026. Each profile contains information on the status quo, objectives, planned projects and the members of the working group who have so far decided to participate. The profile is rounded off by identifying opportunities for cooperation with other GDCh Divisions. An initial revision was carried out for the first SEC Working Groups Day on 11 June 2026.
Every opportunity to motivate members to participate in the ten working groups will be used, beginning with the General Assembly held as part of the 10th SEC annual meeting in Bayreuth from 4–6 May 2026 and the annual meeting itself.
For practical reasons, the new working groups will generally arrange Online meetings. Once a year, there will be an in-person event, the “Working Groups Day”. On this day, the working groups will present their results to one another and to the SEC board, and jointly agree on the next steps.
From now on, it is up to SEC members themselves to get the new working groups up and running. You are all invited to participate in one or more working groups of your choice. Read the profiles and contact a spokesperson for the working group. Work in the groups will begin with an Online kick-off meeting, to which you will receive an invitation in February or March 2026. By the next SEC board meeting at the beginning of April 2026 at the latest, all working groups will have been constituted and exchanged ideas once.
The date for the first “Working Groups Day” has been set: it is 11 June 2026, when everyone will meet at the office in Frankfurt. This will also be an opportunity to review the success of the new SEC structure for the first time.
Wolfgang Gerhartz,
Petra Schultheiß-Reimann,
Franz Schütz,
Eva Wille