Gomez is helping engage young SPE members

Jaime Gomez knows how to have fun and connect with young people. He's a key player in the creation of the Plastics Race, the scavenger hunt that is coming again to Antec, this time in Anaheim, Calif.

Gomez, 58, has happy memories of running several scavenger hunts in his native Colombia, when he was in college there. Universities sponsored them, and they could get 200-300 cars participating in the driving events.

"You'd get a lot of sponsors," he said, and so the scavenger hunts became very popular. "You could win a lot of money."

The races excited and engaged young people, Gomez said. SPE needed an event to do that.

"The challenge was to 'localize' the race in all senses — culturally, geographically and how to make it specific to the plastics industry," he said.

Gomez has been an SPE member for 30 years. He was recently elected as vice president of events to serve from 2017 to 2019. He has been a member of the board of directors of SPE's Extrusion Division since 2011.

The Plastics Race at Antec 2017 will have teams scanning a QR code at the stations to get questions in one of five categories. They can select from areas such as "polymer chemistry," "polymer science," "extrusion," or "color and appearance."

The team decides on the category — a la "Jeopardy" — and then it can pick between easy, medium or difficult questions.

"If two teams scan the same QR code, they will not necessarily get the same categories of questions," Gomez said.

And like one of those high school academic quiz shows on TV, teams work together depending on the expertise of members on the various categories. The team must answer the question to be able to move to the next station.

Teams can include students and an engineer or quality control person.

"The race is intended to bring plastics people together, make new contacts, encourage interaction and expand networking or employment opportunities, especially for those who are just about to enter our fascinating industry or who have just a few years' experience under their belts," Gomez said. The organizers like to team people with different industry experience levels and ages.

Most four-person teams are made by randomly drawing from the pool of race registrants. But the Plastics Race is also about sharing a good time by teaming up friends and associates. Gomez said race organizers try to accommodate participants' requests in the formation of teams.

Companies that get involved get the chance to network with and mentor soon-to-graduate students. And SPE groups can scout for potential leaders for their boards of directors, which is a goal for every trade association, Gomez said.

One problem for SPE is that young people join as college students but then, when they graduate and get jobs, they let their memberships lapse. SPE also had very few events that were 100 percent dedicated to appeal to this market segment.

SPE leaders studied the issue, and a few years ago, set up a Next Generation Advisory Board (NGAB) to help find future leaders. According to Gomez, the society found that young people want several things: develop communication with a relevant tone, fun and engaging activities, provide young professionals and students with leadership opportunities, facilitate tools and provide freedom to operate, and simplify and reduce non-value added SPE programs.

And the events SPE already runs must change and adapt, Gomez said. Young professionals can get information on the internet, but in-person events "are more exciting and stimulating to these new generations who have different needs/wants/interests, and would like to have the opportunity to run activities that address them," he said.

Generation X and tmillennials don't like rigid, "straightjacketed rules and regulations," Gomez said. "They enjoy their freedom to do things their way. They appreciate guidance, but they want to 'learn by doing' even if it induces them to make mistakes."

NGAB's mission: "To drive information technology, social media and training activities that will recruit and retain young professionals, convert them into future leaders, and ensure a more sustainable future for SPE," Gomez said. The action plan includes a series of activities relevant to students and young professionals such as speed interviews (today called Career Fair), Mission Possible (today called Pilot Our Future), Panel Discussions and the Plastics Race.

The Next Generation Advisory Board called for events to be "relevant and independent to draw its own path." The group would have to find a way to finance its own activities, he said, adding that "begging for money" from headquarters and the groups, like divisions and sections, was not the answer.

"But if you develop your own product and you sell it, then you're in control of your own destiny," he said.

Soon, the framework for what was wanted evolved: a desire to create a "product" — an activity, event or service — that was "different, creative, innovative and fun," Gomez said.

"And most important, that would cater to young professionals and students and to the pillars of our society — the transfer of knowledge and information, networking and mentoring. And it had to generate funds for NGAB."

In 2013, Gomez sought help from a longtime collaborator, Everett von Frank, and they began exchanging ideas about how to adapt a Colombian-style scavenger hunt for SPE. The first Plastics Race was held at the 2014 Antec in Las Vegas.

They used paper and pencil. Racers went on a structured visit to the Las Vegas Strip while competing for prizes donated ​ by several companies and SPE groups. Race teams ventured to the Strip to solve more than 50 plastics-related riddles that could only be solved by closely observing the buildings, structures, neon signs and multiple objects. One example was a riddle located in the large obelisk in front of the Luxor Hotel.

The first race drew close to 100 participants.

The positive feedback led von Frank and Gomez to produce a race using new technology. They met almost daily to plan the 2015 event. After a review of available apps, Gomez said, it was clear that none met the functionality required to make the race successful. So the two men engaged an engineering team in India, which enthusiastically helped produce one.

"I convinced SPE to invest in it and also some of the divisions and sections to help," he said.

The second Plastics Race was run at Antec 2015, which was co-located with NPE at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla. The race took six hours, as participants visited exhibitor booths. There were 120 participants and a higher number of sponsoring companies.

SPE had planned to a Plastics Race at Antec last year but had to cancel because of technical problems.

As technology has advanced, one of the biggest challenges is creating questions that cannot be found through Google. That's a lot of work, Gomez said.

"But thanks to the collaboration of a dedicated team of four young professionals over the past years, we have developed about 200 questions that span 15 categories, each with questions of three degrees of difficulty," he said. Most are multiple choice.

"If it showed up in Google, then they would edit it and change it until it was not," Gomez said.

He said the app has the ability to include a picture with the questions — and this year, for the first time, videos.

"That makes it very difficult to Google," Gomez said.

What's new for the Plastics Race at Antec 2017? Gomez said organizers listened to both sponsors and participants and shortened the race to just two hours. Also, it will run from noon to 2 p.m. to avoid overlapping with other Antec events.

SPE owns the Plastics Race, and now the society is licensing the race system to other trade associations. SPE Managing Director Russell Broome promoted the race at a meeting of the Plastics Association Leaders group. "It was a done deal from there," Gomez said.

The first SPE-licensed race was run at the Composites and Advanced Materials Expo in Los Angeles last year. Gomez said CAMX wants to run a second race this year.