The National Plasterers Council is seeking a new leader after the resignation of Mitch Brooks, the organization’s executive director.

Brooks is the CEO of Visioneering Consultants Inc., a Port Charlotte, Fla.- based association management company that worked with NPC for 10 years. In October, Brooks advised NPC to seek new management, citing personal reasons, according to NPC officials.

NPC is forming a committee to recruit new leadership. “I have a couple of leads for head hunters who specialize in our type of organization,” said NPC Chairman Edgar Sanchez, also COO of Modern Method Gunite in Houston. “If it doesn’t look like it’s feasible for us to do [the search], then we may lean toward hiring a head hunter.” Sanchez will serve as interim executive director.

The group hopes to hire a new manager before its annual conference in early February, though this isn’t a rigid goal. “We are more concerned about making sure we have the right person or team,” Sanchez said. “If it doesn’t happen by then, we won’t force it, but if we had a goal, that would be our target.”

The organization has brought on Katie Wilke-Junker as director of the conference, to be held in Nashville. Wilke-Junker was a past staff member with the AQUA Show, before it was purchased by Hanley Wood (parent company of Pool & Spa News).

“We have someone who has run shows much larger than ours and has a tremendous amount of experience and is going to bring a different feel to the overall structure,” Sanchez said. “I’m looking forward to making [the conference] better, and the whole board is very engaged and excited about pulling off an awesome conference.”

The organization still plans to roll out a new start-up recertification course at next year’s conference. Additionally, NPC may increase the available sessions of its start-up certification class. “If it’s something we believe that strongly in, we feel like we need to more actively promote it and have more in more cities across the country,” Sanchez said.

Visioneering Consultants Inc., did not return calls by press time.