Welcome to an experiment. I hope it works. If it does we'll use the idea again.

Whenever I'm asked to speak about the future of our professional body I say two things: we need to get closer to our members (and potential members); and we need to make greater use of technology. I hope this experiment helps with both these aims.

Pay and status is a matter of serious concern to many people in our profession. So let's hear what you have to say - particularly about what you think the LA can do, in a constructive way, to address the issue. I'll make sure that what you say does become part of "the democratic process" (thanks for adding that topic to the list); I'll be reporting whatever comes out of today's discussion to the LA's Policy & Resources Committee when it meets next week.

I can't be online continuously all day because of other commitments in my schedule - but I'll add my comments from time to time; and I'll try to respond to everything by the end of the day.

So - over to you. I hope it's as sunny wherever you are; and I hope we can have a useful and constructive dialogue.

This is going well - some really useful comments; thank you. But I'm conscious that many people may not have the time/opportunity to comment if we cap the discussion at 4.00pm today as we originally intended. So we're extending the timeframe to noon tomorrow, 24 May. I'll still try to respond today to all comments posted by 4.00pm; and I'll respond in the morning to comments posted after that time.

Got to go folks - just time to get ready for an engagement this evening. Sorry to didn't get round to responding to everything - but I'll be back tomorrow morning to catch up then. Thanks to everyone for comments so far - let's see what else comes in overnight.

Whatever you're doing this evening - have a good one.

Morning all. Good to see the discussion is still active. I'll add a few responses now; more around lunchtime.

The noon deadline has now passed so what I'd like to do now is close down the discussion so that we can consolidate the material, reflect on it, and present it to the LA's Policy & Resources Committee next week. During the course of the afternoon I'll go through each topic area adding my final comments (where I haven't already done so). Can I thank everyone who has participated. Your comments have been really valuable and will (WILL) inform our thinking on how we address the issues around pay and status. I think the experiment has also proved the value of this process. We need to get better at it (better marketing and promotion so that more people become aware of it and can get involved; better structures to shape the discussion and reduce overlap between topic areas) - but I think it could become a usefully inclusive and democratic way of airing issues. My thanks again to you all.