If you prove yourself as a committee member, you will have opportunities to move up through the society hierarchy. Management of volunteers depends on persuasion, so the management skills you learn in such voluntary associations are powerful. To become a recognized expert in your specialty, you must publish and present papers. Professional society meetings and journals are your stage. Serving on meetings and publication committees gives you a chance to learn how material must be presented.
Authors tend to take rejection of their work very personally.
Inexperienced authors may over-react to reviews of their work and give up in frustration. Having the opportunity to see the types of criticism given to other people's papers helps authors develop perspective on the peer reviews of their own work. Even if you resist my advice to become active in your professional society, you should attend meetings. The excuse for attending a professional society meeting is usually the technical papers. However, the opportunity to meet people is at least as important.