You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours: how can ICB help YOU?
- Consultancies
It's one of the job descriptions ICB is the most famous. After all, the board is the "supreme being" to interpret the APIP.
And you, as ECB chair or someone who has a legitimate question or concern, can reach them out through the link aies.ec/customersupport. Depending on the question brought to them, they can ask more questions that will help you improve your understanding of the matter at hand. In others, they can give an answer based on the APIP, AEPP, or interpretations of the meaning behind the clauses. It will definitely help you create a consultancy database of sorts, that can guide you during similar situations that may appear in the future.
- Extraordinary Approval Breaks
Imagine requiring breaks from entities that don't reply to you since 2020, asking them again and again about the follow-ups regarding the break requests?
During those hard times, the extraordinary approval break request came in handy. It allows the ECB to request an approval break directly to ICB after 10 (ten) working days have passed with no answer from the ECB abroad. All you need to do is to prove the ECB communication and, after 48 hours, the break you requested years ago is done.
ICB is active on that, sending reminders to the entity abroad to ensure they confirm it by themselves. Most of the time it's tiring for everyone involved but it's an alternative when you know the breaks need to be done and the entity abroad is being unresponsive.
- LC and ECB Cases
It's normal to feel lost once we are notified of a case. But being an ECB Chair actually puts people in a position to be proactive and solution-oriented.
And ICB can help you in this process. The APIP allows you to send a consultancy request in order to receive insights about the situation and how to proceed in negotiations and the next steps. Again, they will ask you some questions but they will help you look at the situation in a different way.
How can WE scratch ICB's back?
At first, it was mentioned how ICB helps you during the customer support journey. But, what many people seem to forget is that they also need support from us.
- Provide the needed documentation and/or proof of what you need
Even during consultancies, the questions hardly come from thin air. They're funded by real-life situations or questions we come across and bring us doubts.
In order to help the responsible to provide context to reply to our questions in a more certain way, provide proof or anything that gives substance and context. It can be an email, screenshot, or an APIP clause that needs to be written. It will definitely help them and help you in return.
- Give feedback!!
Something that helped me get closer to ICB was the action of providing feedback on their work. They always sent me an email to rate my experience with them.
And, after seeing 10, 20, 50 of those emails, how can you not thank them for their support or point out how things could be better?.
- Teach your members about ICB
Depending on the department, some ECB members won't have contact with ICB directly. But it's important to involve the members with the board so they can rely on the ICB team as well and know ECB isn't alone. We are all together with the goal of bringing integrity and compliance into AIESEC experiences.
Mayelle Souza
ECB Chair Germany