Consumer expectations are on the rise — and that includes what your members expect from you and your organization. Consider an outside-of-the-box live experience event for your association. People crave live experiences and human connection, and there are tons of different activities to choose from.
True there’s extra cost and effort involved with organizing a live experience activity, but it might be worth holding one occasionally. Doing so will certainly provide an opportunity for members to have fun, and deliver a memorable, team-bonding experience.
1. Topgolf
This franchise is becoming a fast favorite for get-togethers. Each Topgolf location offers fun and competitive golf games with climate-controlled playing “bays” similar to a bowling lane. Plus, there’s food and drink, TVs, and music to make it extra festive.
Escape Rooms are a sure way to get members engaged and working as a team. Typically, all participants are locked in a room and are given a set amount of time to find clues and solve puzzles to complete the challenge and “escape” the room.
Many corporate organizations take advantage of this type of activity since it’s a fun way to bond, problem solve together, and be successful together.
Google “escape room near me” for a list of Escape Rooms in your area.
3. Paint Nite
Here’s a fun twist on the usual social happy hour. With 2 hours of guided instruction, each person in your group creates a one-of-a-kind painting, while enjoying drinks and each other’s company. The bonus here is that each participant gets to keep their painting as memorabilia from their fun night.
This is only a small sample of what’s available. There are plenty of other live experience activities to choose from.
Start planning your live experience event today by getting your members input. In your post-event survey, include a drop-down, multiple-choice question that lists the events you’re considering. Ask members to rank them in order of preference. Include a multi-line text box too where members can enter their own suggestion for live experience events.
Not only will running a survey help gauge member interest, surveying shows members that you value their input and satisfaction with your organization.
Sweating through his pale-yellow shirt, Todd reluctantly shuffles his way into the meeting room. He lo-o-o-a-a-thes this time of year. Dreads it. Would like to be doing anything but reminding members to pay.
Caty is late with her dues … again. Not a peep from Mark since the renewal period began. Amy said she’d bring her payment to tonight’s meeting — but she also said that 3 meetings ago.
No doubt collecting dues is about as much fun as getting a tooth pulled. The good news? There are ways to make the renewal process much more effective and efficient — and way less painful.
Having worked with so many professional and trade associations for nearly 20 years, we’ve seen many renewal campaigns. Some highly-effective. Others not so much.
One thing is certain: those that do work share common elements — and those tactics can be easily replicated.
Tip #1: Review past renewal performance
Take a look at your last renewal period. Run a list of members that were up for renewal, then note when members renewed.
Did most members renew after your first email notice was sent? After an announcement was made during a group meeting? After the second email notice, or the last?
Make adjustments to your communication plan based on what you find. For example, if most members renew after the last notice goes out, and you would like more upfront renewals, make improvements. Consider adding incentives and highlighting benefits in your other notices and communication channels.
Tip #2: Clear up ALL roadblocks
Be sure to look at the data in its entirety. Think back to the last campaign.
Why was Caty late with her payment, as she is every renewal period? Maybe Caty doesn’t check her email regularly. Maybe sending reminders through another channel, like text messaging, would be better for her.
Why did Amy keep forgetting to bring her payment to the meetings? Perhaps offering different ways to pay online would be more convenient for her versus remembering to bring in cash or a check.
All circumstances and scenarios should be factored into how you design your renewal campaign going forward.
Tip #3: Review payment methods
While there are organizations that accept check and cash, utilizing online methods to take payment should be used, or at the very least, considered.
Not only is taking payments online quicker and less work for your association or organization’s treasurer, it’s much more convenient for members.
Many of the associations we work with utilize the 123Signup online membership applications for taking credit card payments for renewals. These webpages can be styled to match your organization’s brand and integrated with your website for a seamless member experience.
Once you have the renewal webpage set up, you can include the link in your email reminders. Having an online payment method for your renewals gives members an easy way to renew and pay online whenever is most convenient for them.
Tip #4: Consider an incentive for renewals
To expedite renewals, consider adding an incentive such as a discount.
Through 123Signup, you can create membership promotion codes with a fixed discount (a flat amount) or a percentage discount to be applied to the total. You can also control the total number of times a code can be used, which member types are eligible to use the code, and you can limit the dates the code can be used.
Tip #5: Develop a communication plan and stick to it
Don’t let this overwhelm you. A communication plan is simply a plan in writing of what communications you’ll send and when. It’s proven that the more the information about a renewal dues period is communicated — whether in person or online — the smoother and quicker the process.
Tip #6: Include the option to renew membership while signing up for an event
123Signup’s integrated registration and renewals functionality allows you to include a membership renewal option on your event signup forms — making it simple for members to register for an event, and at the same time, pay their dues.
Tip #7: Set up automated email renewal reminders
While you never want to annoy your members, it’s a fact that many simply forget to renew, or need an extra nudge beyond the meeting announcement, making it worth sending a series of email reminders.
Most associations we work with send 3-4 renewal reminders.
If you don’t have a good association management software that automates this task for you, it’s a good reason to investigate low-cost technology options that will enable you to set up a series without further work or intervention.
You can create as many templates as you’d like and further customize your messaging by creating templates for each member type. For example, your message to your student members may differ from your message to regular members.
We’ve found that organizations that combine in-person announcements with automated email renewal reminders to expiring members run the most effective membership renewal campaigns.
123… Takeaway!
It’s coming. A great big bear hug from your treasurer. (Fill in your treasurer’s name here) is much happier these days since improving the renewal dues collection process.
Whether you use one or all 7 of these tips, you’re bound to improve your renewal dues collection process — and make your treasurer, and members’ lives, a bit brighter.
Kim just left her club’s spring networking event. Instead of feeling excited and alive, she feels flat.
“What went wrong?,” she wonders. “The meeting room was cozy. The meeting itself well-organized. Food was great.”
Then it hits her. Her cousin Theresa’s wedding last summer! Kim had the same feeling then.
At the wedding reception, Kim was seated with Theresa’s cousins, Josh and Tim, and their wives, from the other side of the family. It was a l-o-o-n-n-n-g, excruciating hour of vapid small talk. Even the delicious meal couldn’t make up for the incredibly awkward, meaningless chatter. Kim still winces when she thinks back to the reception that happened 9 months ago.
“Yup, that’s it.” Kim realizes. That’s went wrong. All conversations at tonight’s event felt forced. The format a bit too formal, traditional. Kim spent 2 hours fighting through strained chit-chat, not making any real connections.
Sound familiar? As an event organizer, it’s important you take steps to make sure those in attendance are comfortable to mingle, comfortable to connect, and have fun doing so. The good thing is it doesn’t take too much effort to make a meaningful difference — and make the meeting memorable and effective.
Here are some simple ways to turn drab networking events into unforgettable fun.
A Twist on Ice Breakers
We’re all familiar with ice breakers — a way to get your attendees talking and learning about one another. I have yet, though, to meet a person that loves the traditional form of ice breakers. You know the one:You go around the room, introduce yourself, your role, and your goals. Why not revamp the old-school ice breaker to make it more fun, and less stressful?
Here are some ideas:
1. Badge Breakers
Before your networking meeting, pull your event registration data. Create sub-groups based on interests. Say you have a group of people that enjoy reading. Or a subset of attendees that enjoy rock climbing.
Color-code the badges with ribbons to denote which subgroup the attendees belong to. When attendees arrive, give them their badges. Once everyone is there and the meeting begins, explain the rules: pair up with like-colored badges and try to determine what you all have in common (besides being a part of your organization).
This activity gets your groups working together and discussing what they enjoy, rather than putting members through the obligatory, nerve-racking, and many times boring, usual ice breaker activity.
2. Scavenger Hunt
Not the kind you’re used to where you’re looking for objects or landmarks. This scavenger hunt involves the people in the meeting room.
Give your members a list of members’ names in a column along the left side of a sheet of paper and a column of interests that they need to match up on the right side of the paper. Example: Find the person that loves baseball. Find the person that loves hiking.
This exercise gets everyone in the room moving and talking to one another. The person that gets all the matches first wins a small prize. The prize for the others? They learn a little something about every member through a quick, fun, interactive exercise.
3. Whiteboard/Chalkboard Display
Have a white board or chalkboard in your meeting room? Use it! Get attendees to write down their name and a goal, or their name and their most favorite food, pastime activity, color, whatever. Members can gather around the display and talk about each other’s interests.
Don’t have a chalkboard or whiteboard? Bring an iPad or tablet and pass it around the room. Have people gather to review everyone’s answers. Your attendees are bound to connect on mutual interests and share stories with one another, which fosters communication and connection and can certainly facilitate member engagement and a sense of belonging.
123… Takeaway!
1. When is your next networking event? A month from now? Next week? Even if you’re short on time, you can easily add one of the ice breaker twists to your agenda. Pick one and do it!
2. Include a question about your new activity in your post-event survey or ask the open-ended question what attendees liked best about your event. There’s a good chance they’ll remember your fun new twist on ice breakers.
Have your own fun twist on ice breakers? Share it below.
Kristen Campbell is the Brand Manager at 123Signup. She is responsible for developing, implementing, and managing all marketing initiatives and programs for 123Signup.
The response rate for web surveys is 8 to 12%. Why so low? One of the biggest reasons is poor design and execution.
So how do you increase participation?
Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to. For some reason, a lot of surveyors love to ask demographic questions that cover information they already have in their databases. This leads to unnecessarily long surveys, and respondents jumping ship before answering all the questions.Consider embedding a unique identifier on your survey link instead so that you can link up the data on you back end. That way you can focus on questions that are going to help you drive change in your organization.
Pre-notify your members. Get in touch with them in advance to tell them why you’re conducting the research, and how you’re going to use it – whether it’s part of a strategic planning exercise, or you’re trying to improve the value you give them. Tell them who it’s going to be coming from, when it will launch, and how long they will have to complete it.
Be honest about the survey length. Don’t say it’s going to be brief if it’s actually going to take 20-30 minutes to complete. Give them the ability to save and continue at a later date. It will help your participation rate in the long run.
Be disciplined about the number of surveys you send out. It’s too easy to send surveys out on a whim. Think about who you’re sending to, and set up a limit on how many surveys your members receive on an annual or quarterly basis. Make your surveys targeted. If you’re interested in surveying millennials, don’t send it to your older members. Being more diligent about your prep will reduce the chances of your members experiencing survey fatigue.
Imagine going to a party. You walk into a large, cold, unfamiliar room. You see lots of people, but no one you know. No one greets you. No one cracks a smile. No one even looks your way. You feel lost. Alone.
Now imagine going to another party. As soon as you step through the door, you connect with Jon, the host. He welcomes you with a warm hug. Jon shows you where the food and drinks are. Not long after, you discover you both have a penchant for puns. You begin exchanging dad jokes. You feel happy inside. Connected.
That’s “engagement”. It isn’t just a concept — engagement is a feeling. A feeling of connection. A feeling of belonging, excitement.
Do your members get that feeling? Do they feel that they belong? Do they get excited to attend your meetings and trainings?
It’s important that they do. The greater your engagement level, the more likely your members will maintain their membership, and refer their friends, which ultimately means a healthy, growing membership base and higher renewal rates for your association.
So how do you raise member engagement? How do you get the guy that’s at every meeting, but won’t participate in any roles or utter a word, more engaged?
Start here. We’ve compiled a list of some simple ways to attract new members and get your existing members excited, inspired, and involved with the help of association management software.
1. Dig into Data to Grade Engagement
What’s your current membership count? Your renewal rate? You can probably rattle off those numbers quite easily. But what about your engagement score?
Many associations grade their engagement level to provide a current reading on their engagement level and pinpoint groups of members that need extra special attention.
In the article, To Increase Member Retention, Rate and Score Engagement, the Florida Association of Insurance Agents breaks down its membership into tiers. Tier 1 is the most engaged (8 points or better), tier 2 somewhat engaged (4 to 8 points), and tier 3 the least engaged (less than 4 points). The association then puts effort towards tiers 2 and 3 to increase engagement and involvement with those specific members.
Your first step? Run your active membership list using your association management software. Print the list, make copies, then get together with your team. Define what engagement means to your organization. Group members into specific engagement categories and develop an action plan for each member type.
2. Communicate Goals with Members
Your members believe in your organization and its mission. That’s what attracted them to join in first place. Knowing that, there’s an extremely good chance they’ll back your association’s growth plan without hesitation.
Be transparent.
Let your members know just how many members your organization is planning to enroll in each membership tier, the renewal rate it seeks, and other goals you’ve set to achieve.
Let members know why each goal is important, how it impacts them, what happens if the goals are met, and what happens if the membership goals aren’t met.
Make sure you refer to the goals often — not just in one meeting. Repeat your goals in each meeting, and give updates on numbers in emails and newsletters. Frequently communicating your goals ensures those numbers are always top of mind and strengthens members’ involvement and commitment in helping you achieve those goals.
3. Host Special Events Like a “Bring a Friend” Meeting
Give your members an opportunity to get involved, show their pride, and at the same time, increase your chance of enrolling new members.
A “Bring a Friend” meeting is an opportunity to review all the great benefits of belonging to your organization and pique guests’ interest in becoming members themselves.
If you use 123Signup association management software, the registration page for your “Bring a Friend” meeting can be created in seconds through the simple event tool.
After you’ve set up the event registration, get the word out by sending an email to all members with the registration link.
Point out the social sharing buttons on the registration page too, so that members know they can easily share the event on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.
To ensure the event isn’t forgotten about, members can easily add the event to their calendar from the event page, as shown in the image below by selecting the “Add to my Calendar” button. If you use 123Signup association management software, links for members to add the event to their calendar also appear in the registration confirmation email.
4. Track Professional Development, Award CEU Certificates
Your members work hard to learn new skills and advance their career. You can provide extra value by giving them the tools to log courses and credits, and track event history.
If you use 123Signup association management software, members can view their professional development status at a glance very easily in their member profile. Through 123Signup, you also have the option to develop custom CEU certificates for members to print themselves on demand. Certificates are a great way to acknowledge member achievement and make your members feel valued.
5. Gamify Your Next Conference or Meeting
Gamification is an effective way to educate your attendees and increase engagement at the same time. You could award points to attendees for attending sessions, for taking and posting a selfie on your social networks during the conference — anything you can think of that will get your attendees involved.
Create a leaderboard that you showcase at the conference. The attendee with the highest score wins.
Remember it’s best to fill your members in ahead of time to create buzz and excitement. Send an email out to registrants prior to your next meeting or conference to let them know about the game elements being added to your program.
Most association management software includes a built-in email communication tool. Through 123Signup, you simply choose your event list directly from the existing database and can get your message out the door with minimal effort.
6. Hold a Membership-Building Contest
It’s extremely likely that each of your members has a friend or co-worker with mutual interests. Which means it’s almost guaranteed that each of your members has someone — possibly even a handful of people — they would refer to your organization.
Why not hold a contest to jumpstart referrals? Many 123Signup clients host referral contests and provide a variety of incentives. Some associations reduce the member’s renewal fee for each referral that successfully becomes a member.
Other associations enter the referrer into a raffle for a chance to win a quarterly prize like an iPad, a gift card, or a free membership that they can use for renewal or gift to a friend.
Some organizations provide a reward for every successful referral and enter the referrer into a raffle. The rules of your membership-building contest are entirely up to you!
Whatever you choose, be sure to put a time limit to your contest to create urgency (Example: run the contest from February 1 – March 31.)
It’s best to get the word out initially about your contest by sending an email to all your members. You can easily do that through your association management software and then increase your email frequency as the deadline approaches to build momentum.
Make sure that you also continue to drum up excitement throughout the contest period by mentioning the challenge and the results in meetings and ongoing communications, like newsletters.
7. Host an Online Meeting Series
You probably hold several in-person conferences and meetings throughout the year, but what about webinars? Online educational seminars — webinars — are convenient for both you and your participants because no one has to travel to get to the meeting.
Another benefit is that the webinar can be recorded, so that those that miss the meeting can watch it on their own time. Plus, you can host the recording on your website and share on social media if you choose.
Here’s an example of the ADAP Advocacy Association utilizing 123Signup association management software’s event registration page to promote a webinar series they held May 31, 2017 to Sept. 27, 2017. This event registration page was integrated with their website to provide a seamless online experience to all website visitors.
8. Publish a Member Directory
The more connected your members are to one another, the greater their sense of belonging and overall enjoyment as a member.
Give your members added exposure and an easy way to connect with one another by providing a member directory.
With 123Signup, you can easily provide a searchable member directory that pulls records from the software database.
9. Promote Member Renewals Early
The fewer members you lose, the easier it will be to achieve your annual growth goal. That’s why we always advocate starting your renewal process as early as possible. Many of our clients start as early as three months before expiration.
With 123Signup’s automated renewal feature, you can set up as many email templates as you need and schedule them to be sent to expiring members at specific times.
10. List Your Membership Levels Online
It’s a good practice to offer membership levels to appeal to a wider audience. It’s an even better idea to have those membership levels listed on your website and tied to an easy signup or renewal process.
In this example, the San Francisco Neurological Society shows their Active Member, Associate Member, Nurse, Retired Member, and Industry membership types on a 123Signup hosted enrollment page that’s part of their website. If someone is interested in joining, they simply click the enroll button and go through an easy online signup and payment process.
It’s worth mentioning here that the 123Signup system is completely configurable to specific business rules. Many of our clients require approval with memberships. The 123Signup system can be configured to accept applications upon approval.
11. Increase Self-Service to Increase Satisfaction and Convenience
Self-check-out at Target. Fueling your car. Placing an online order for pizza delivery. Self-service technology isn’t anything new. In fact, it’s a given in today’s world. People expect it.
Enabling self-service tools where your members can enroll online, pay renewal dues online, keep personal contact information up to date online, and signup and pay for an event online provides major convenience for your members — not to mention lowers your association’s overhead admin costs.
Through association management software, like 123Signup, you can easily integrate membership and event pages with your organization’s website to take membership enrollments, renewals, donations, membership add-ons like journal subscriptions, event registrations, and payments securely online. Plus, the pages can be formatted to match your brand for a seamless online user experience.
Here the International Association of Certified Home Inspectors, New Jersey Chapter uses a 123Signup event listing page to make signing up for its Holiday Meeting easy.
Turning Up Member Engagement for Your Association
The ability to retain existing members and gain new members is essential to your success. But just like you can’t bake a cake without flour, you can’t maintain and grow your organization without the vital ingredient of member engagement. And you can’t create a meaningful, measurable difference in engagement without a recipe to provide direction.
Look at your membership. Grade your member engagement level. Then put these tips and others into action to move the member engagement needle forward.
Kristen Campbell is the Brand Manager at 123Signup. She is responsible for developing, implementing, and managing all marketing initiatives and programs for 123Signup.
Crank Up Engagement with 123Signup Association Management Software From online event registration and payment, CEU tracking and certificates, to self-service enrollment and renewal, 123Signup association management software gives you a host of tools to turn up member engagement. Signup for a free personalized tour today!
Today’s Thursday. The day John picks up his kids from school. He pulls into the parking lot and realizes he’s early — a whole 5 minutes early. He thinks back through his day.
“Oh yeah, I need to sign up for the holiday party the chamber of commerce is throwing.”
John takes out his phone, gets to the local chamber of commerce’s events page, but the page is only set up for desktop.
After scrolling and scrolling, 5 minutes passes in a flash. John’s kids, Aaron and Jacob, are now in the backseat exchanging jokes they heard during lunch period. “Signing up for the holiday party is going to have to wait”. John groans. Maybe later tonight he’ll register. Maybe Monday. Maybe …
Your members — like all of society — like John — are constantly seeking information from their smartphones. And they’re quick to click away from your site if it isn’t easy to navigate and doesn’t load within seconds.
The Greater the User Experience, the Greater the Results
A poor online user experience equates to poor results, while a seamless, intuitive user experience leads to greater results.
When members or prospective members come to your site, they do so to get information. They may also visit your site to become a member, renew their membership, or sign up for an event. You want them to be able to take action quickly and easily. The last thing you want is for them to scroll endlessly through pages, get frustrated, and abandon their transaction — like John.
Get on the Brand-wagon
Branding on your web pages is equally important as is ease of navigation and a mobile-friendly design. Your members already recognize and trust your brand, believe in your association, and stand behind its mission.
That means it’s critical to include your branding through and through on your website where members are taking actions like signing up for a new membership, paying their annual dues, or signing up for that holiday party.
Optimizing the Experience for 123Signup End Users
To improve the user experience, 123Signup’s enrollment, renewal, and registration application pages went through extensive user testing. Then based on data and feedback, the pages were redesigned to optimize navigation and make transactions, like renewing a membership, intuitive and simple. The result is a better user experience which translates into more memberships, renewals, and event signups for our clients.
And because branding is so important, we’ve expanded our page customization options. The application pages can be tailored to reflect the software users’ brands so that their end users — their members and prospective members — get a seamless online experience no matter what action they’re taking on your website.
Speaking of Brand …
You may have noticed that we refreshed our own brand. We’ve always been committed to delivering the most feature-rich and flexible AMS software on the market. We needed a logo — and fresh, clean, modern site — to reflect our evolution over time. Be sure to check out our site and let us know what you think by sending an email to [email protected].
123 … Takeaway!
1. Have a friend or family member — someone far removed from your organization — review your website. Is it easy for them to find where to go to renew? Can they find where your events are? Take their feedback into consideration to improve the user experience and improve your results.
2. Review your application pages. Do they adequately reflect your brand? This simple exercise could make all the difference from someone enrolling in your association or stopping dead in their tracks because the page doesn’t look like it’s part of your association or that it’s trustworthy.
Time to Take Another Look
Over the past several months, we’ve been hard at work redesigning our Enrollment, Renewal, Registration and Edit Profile application pages — with expanded options to reflect your brand. See how we can improve your members’ user experience — and improve your association’s results. Signup for a free personalized tour today!
Post-event surveys are a must if you want to continue to grow attendance in future events. They can be simple and once you have a general template, you can adapt and reuse them to save time. Plus, if you’re using a good online event registration software, you probably have a built-in event survey feature that will enable you to quickly create and distribute it to participants.
The trick to getting good response rates is to keep your event survey short and accessible – and to make it obvious up front that participating will only take a few minutes.
If you want to collect more information than you can get from 10 questions or so, think about gathering feedback from attendees in chunks throughout the event, rather than through one long survey at the end. There are some natural times during your event when it makes sense to ask your participants what they think …
At the Time of Registration
Get some quick feedback at the time of registration just by adding a couple of questions at the end of your form, or including a link to a short survey in the registration confirmation that your participants receive. Include questions like:
Where did you hear about this event?
How have you found the online registration process?
Why are you attending the event? (Networking, learning, etc)
While Your Event Is Happening
Take advantage of technology, and use a real-time mobile polling app like Zwoor or QuickTap to collect feedback from your attendees throughout your event. Not only will it give you a true picture of what they’re thinking right then and there, but it will also keep them engaged and remind them that you value their opinion. Here are a few ideas of what to ask while your event is actually taking place…
After Each Workshop, Session, or Activity (for Conferences and Conventions)
How informative/valuable did you find the session overall?
How would you rate the presenter?
How would you rate the content?
Would you recommend the session to a friend or colleague?
On the Last Day of the Event
Was the duration of the event just right, too long, or too short?
Was the price of the event just right, expensive, or inexpensive?
How would you rate your overall experience?
What were your key takeaways from the event?
What suggestions do you have for improving future events?
If You Don’t Use Mobile Polling at Your Event
Be sure to put an event survey out as soon as you can after your event. By incorporating mini-surveys while the event is fresh in the minds of your participants, you’ll increase your response rate and get a more accurate picture of their opinions.
Who’s responsible for strategy development? Is it the Board, the CEO, or the Receptionist?
The best strategy in the world isn’t a good strategy unless it can be communicated and executed. Although the CEO is responsible for leading the strategy development process, and the Board has ultimate fiduciary responsibility for determining strategic direction, an organization is missing an opportunity if it doesn’t engage the entire staff in the development of strategy.
Engaging the receptionist in the process is laying the seeds for strategic communication and strategy execution. But, this involvement does so much more by:
Expanding the diversity of input and providing valuable insight. As the gatekeeper to our organizations, the “moments of truth” the receptionist encounters are invaluable;
Contributing to our responsibility as leaders to develop our staff and building the strategic capacity of our organizations. In today’s competitive environment, the organizations where strategic thinking permeates the culture will always have the competitive edge over those organizations that aren’t strategic thinking entities.
Creating ownership in the strategy and realizing that buy-in will pay off leaps and bounds in strategy execution and in continual strategy improvement.
Communicating in a very visible way that we value the input of everyone on our team, including the team member that should be on the top of the organizational chart.
The bigger takeaway here is that when developing strategies, whether they are organizational strategies, issues management strategies or problem-solving strategies, significant strategic thought must be given to who we should have “on the bus” and at what stop they board.
Who do you engage in strategy development and what criteria do you use for selecting the strategy development team?
About the Author
Robert Nelson, a Certified Association Executive (CAE), brings over a quarter-century of successful executive leadership experience, working with Boards and high-powered CEOs in a not-for-profit setting. He is the founder of Nelson Strategic Consulting and brings hands-on experience guiding and facilitating the design of strategy development processes and think tanks. His focus on organizational strategies and strategic solutions to complex organizational and global grand challenges for national as well as international organizations.
Contact Robert through his website, or learn more about Nelson Strategic Consulting at www.nscstrategies.com.
Web surveys have surged in popularity in recent years, and for many associations, they’ve become the go-to tool for measuring member engagement. So when and why is it appropriate to choose good old paper or phone-based surveys over electronic?
A lot of organizations automatically opt for the cheapest and easiest method, but it’s more important to consider which tool will help you get the information and insights you want to get out of your survey.
Response rates and the size of your membership are two of the key factors to consider when choosing your survey tool. In a recent 123Signup webinar with Matt Braun of Loyalty Research, he estimated that response rates for phone interviews are the highest (50-60%), paper surveys tend to get a response rate of around 20%, and web-based surveys get the lowest response rates of 8-12%.
A web-based survey sent to 10,000 people with a response rate of 10% gives you 1000 responses – a big enough sample size to give you good insights on your members’ attitudes and behaviors. But sending the same survey to 100 people would result in only 10 responses, and that’s just not enough to give you reliable, actionable data.
For smaller organizations looking to get more detailed information, a phone survey may well be the way to go – there’s more to think about before choosing your methodology. Here are some of the pros and cons of each survey tool to help you choose the right method for your next research project.
Paper Surveys
Pros:
Easy to design as a Word document.
Can be easy to collect by mail or if handed out at an event.
Cons:
Entering data from the back end can be time consuming and result in error.
People can write in answers that are difficult to interpret and categorize.
May get a lower response rate among younger members.
Phone Surveys
Pros:
Information quality is the best of all the methods because it captures the true voice of the member. Phone interviewers have the ability to probe respondents and get them to expand on their answers so you get more in-depth answers and insights.
Better participation than paper or web-based surveys, and a good choice for smaller memberships.
Cons:
The most difficult method to get right.
Cost is high as it may require that you higher an external company to help to design and implement it.
It takes longer to collect information.
Can be difficult to reach people at a convenient time for a 10 to 20 minute survey.
Web Surveys
Pros:
Highest value for the cost.
Inexpensive applications make it easy to design and collect information.
Can be distributed through various channels, including email, social media, and on your website.
Many applications offer basic analysis and reporting tools to help you get insights from your data.
Gives every member with access to the web the ability to participate.
Allows for longer surveys, and give respondents the ability to save and continue.
Gives you the ability to assign a unique identifier to each respondent for tracking purposes.
Cons:
Have lower response rates than paper or phone surveys, which may not be ideal for smaller organizations.
This week’s blog post on speaker coaching is re-posted with permission from Aaron D. Wolowiec, founder and president of Event Garde, a professional development consulting firm based in Grand Rapids, Mich. Website: www.eventgarde.com.
When’s the last time your organization’s education committee was asked to identify the three to five greatest challenges currently inhibiting its industry speakers from reaching their fullest potential during the annual conference? I recently did this for a client and following were the responses that bubbled to the surface:
Attendee engagement within presentations is often minimal or formulaic.
Facilitators have difficulty reeling in discussion in the allotted time to cover all topics planned within their presentation outlines.
PowerPoint slides are overwhelmed by too much content.
Presentations often hit on the “This is what we do at…” but do not identify how the idea may be adapted within other contexts.
Do these sound familiar? What would comprise your organization’s “watch list”? Based upon these areas of focus, we then developed a one-page resource and shared it with all selected speakers, requesting they use this document in designing their conference presentation experiences. Specifically, we:
Provided 20 different brain-centric attendee engagement strategies ranging from “Write learning objectives into participant materials” to “Schedule post-session touch points.”
Encourage speakers to limit their content and slide decks, plan appropriately for practice and feedback time, park unrelated topics and leave time at the end of their sessions for questions, feedback, and evaluations.
Assembled 10 slide tips intended to help speakers overcome death by PowerPoint. Key insights ranged from “Limit bullet points and text” to “Use video or audio.”
Asked speakers to share with attendees not only their experiences but also how their ideas might be adapted to other organizations with differing resources.
But this is just the first step.
Next year we intend to offer a training webinar (or a series of shorter training webinars) that helps illuminate these and other strategies and provide individualized coaching that allows for more robust reflection, planning, practice, and feedback.
Additional ideas for investing in conference speakers might include one or more of the following:
Personal feedback from professional development/learning staff sitting in on conference presentations.
Key insights from an outside consultant conducting an education audit during the conference.
Aggregate feedback from attendee evaluations focused more on learning outcomes than on attendee reactions.
Self-evaluations conducted by speakers and peer-reviewed by staff/volunteers.
An online community devoted to questions, answers and other resources intended to support speaker development.
Growth in the delivery of conference presentations is an iterative process. Mastery does not occur overnight. Rather, repeat industry speakers should be provided ongoing learning guidance, opportunities to practice new knowledge and skills, meaningful feedback from seasoned colleagues and staff and job aids that enhance retention and transfer.
What strategies have you found most successful in mentoring your industry speakers in the design and delivery of top-rated conference sessions?
This week’s blog post on association marketing is re-posted with permission from Aaron D. Wolowiec, founder and president of Event Garde, a professional development consulting firm based in Grand Rapids, Mich. Website: www.eventgarde.com.
In a traditional call for presentations, a general invitation is released to an organization’s key constituents to submit topic ideas for a program. This call provides detailed instructions for submission of papers for assessment and selection by a review committee. Ultimately, constituent submissions are returned to the committee for review, scoring, and selection.
In a content curation process, a committee comprised of a cross-section of the organization’s key constituents first identifies the topics of greatest interest or concern to the industry. In some instances, this committee may rely on a content outline such as the one created for the Certified Association Executive (CAE) exam.
If no outline is available, the committee will consider current trends, future trends (five to 10 years or more into the future) and other hot topics likely keeping the industry up at night. Once content is reviewed, ranked and confirmed, the result is a makeshift content outline the committee can use to disseminate speaker asks.
Ultimately, staff inherent speakers from one of these two methods. Via the call for presentations approach, speakers self-represent their content expertise and speaking prowess and are selected accordingly. Via the content curation approach, speaker asks may be more deliberate (e.g., based on credentials or demonstrated know-how); however, they are limited by the committee’s network.
Regardless of the method used, there really is no guarantee speakers will be successful. Your candidate may be an experienced and skilled face-to-face presenter, a 30-year industry veteran and a world-renowned practitioner, but still may not be ready to present utilizing a digital platform.
Before selecting a speaker for your next digital presentation, consider that individual’s digital presentation experience. Additionally, request evaluation data. Where possible, it’s best if the speaker has previously presented (successfully) using the same digital platform you intend to use. Remember, not all digital platforms are created equal.
And regardless of experience, speakers should be open to furthering their presentation skills. Following are 11 challenges and possible solutions you may use when coaching speakers in delivering quality digital presentations. Of course, practice is still the best strategy for mentoring speakers who have no previous digital presentation experience.
Challenge: Attendees seem disconnected from the speaker/learning experience. Solution: Utilize a webcam to deliver the presentation; care should be taken to look directly into the camera throughout the program.
Challenge: With no facial expressions/body language to draw from, the speaker is uncertain attendees are “getting” the content. Solution: Consider pausing the presentation periodically to ask an assessment question via the digital platform’s poll function.
Challenge: When joining remotely, participants are constantly distracted by email and other visual cues. Solution: Set ground rules for participants early in the program and ask attendees to follow along in a pre-printed participant guide where they can complete assignments and take notes.
Challenge: Reflection activities cause a lot of dead space/air time during the program. Solution: Convert the reflection activity into a pre- or post-program assignment.
Challenge: Practice activities facilitated during face-to-face programs don’t seem to translate into a digital environment. Solution: Encourage multiple registrants from the same office or gather attendees at centralized locations to participate in the program together; arm them with a supplies list, directions and plenty of activity time.
Challenge: Four or more hours of content may be required to teach a particular skill. Solution: Segment and sequence content into smaller modules. No more than 60 minutes is suggested, though even shorter is preferred.
Challenge: Learners want to share their experiences, but this is difficult to facilitate when all of the lines are muted for optimal sound quality. Solution: Allow attendees to demonstrate their interest in speaking and then open up only their phone lines. Alternatively, gather attendee stories in advance of the program and have the moderator read them aloud.
Challenge: Participants are easily bored by digital presentations. Solution: Incorporate different instructional strategies into the program beyond lecture (e.g., video, poll, chat).
Challenge: The chat function is difficult to moderate so it often goes unused/is turned off. Solution: Participants crave interaction with their peers. They also learn a lot from these conversations. Utilize a separate chat moderator who can prompt discussion with attendees, respond to questions and pose trending questions to the speaker.
Challenge: The digital platform makes it difficult for the speaker to provide personalized attendee feedback. Solution: Allow participants the opportunity within 30 days to follow-up with the speaker directly (e.g., ask a question, gain clarification).
Challenge: It’s challenging to ensure retention and job transfer post-program. Solution: Encourage action planning to focus learner ideas and next steps; create a job aid to guide future performance; or schedule post-session touch points (e.g., 30, 60 and 90 days).
Assessing your organization’s strengths and weaknesses along with the barriers to achieving your goals is an essential – yet often overlooked – step on the path to growing your membership. Be warned: you won’t like everything you see. That’s a good thing because it will help you identify where you need to improve.
First, start off by asking yourself questions like:
What are the primary benefits of being a member of your organization?
What are the most-used programs?
What sets you apart from your competitors?
How are you perceived by your members and prospects?
What are the barriers to joining or renewing?
How long does it take you to respond to member phone calls and emails, to process requests, and to complete transactions?
What kinks in your day-to-day processes are holding you back from providing better services?
Resist the urge to jump to conclusions based on what you think you know about your association. Making assumptions can create disconnect between what you believe is valuable to members, and what actually is valuable.
Understanding how well your association is meeting the needs of its members and fulfilling its mission requires time, research, objectivity, and long-term commitment.
Assessing Your Organization: How to Perform a Thorough Evaluation of Your Business
1. Write out your mission statement.
This will remind you of your organization’s core purpose. Later, you will compare how your mission statement aligns with the benefits and programs you offer, and your members’ needs.
2. Make a list of all of your current services, programs, and benefits.
Rank the most valuable benefit as “#1” and continue from there. What is the unique selling point for each of them? What sets your organization apart from your competitors? Note the answers to these questions next to each benefit.
3. Audit your information management processes.
All the things that happen behind the scenes can have a huge impact on your customer service and overall performance.
For a week or two, every time you feel yourself getting frustrated by a time-consuming task or you’re having a hard time accessing needed information, write it down. Get all of your staff members to do the same. When you put all of the information together, you should be able to see some obvious aspects of your processes that need improvement. Issues with finding information about your members quickly, or needing to update the same information in several different places could mean you may need to improve your membership management process.
4. Crunch your numbers.
Good data should be the foundation of your decision-making process. If you have decent member management software, you should be able to get the information you need fairly quickly. If not, you may need to estimate for the time being.
5. Analyze your Membership Stats.
Compare your membership statistics from the past two years. You could go back even further if you have access to significant historical information. Looking at trends over time can be very useful. For starters, record the following data segmented by membership type:
Percentage change in membership
Percentage change in new member acquisition
Percentage change in membership renewal rate
Percentage change in event participation
Percentage change in program and benefits usage
Percentage of your revenue coming from membership
Percentage of revenue coming from other income streams
6. Research your competitors.
Go through this process as a prospective member would. Search online for other competing organizations as well as employers or companies that offer similar products or services for free or at a lower cost. Compare benefits individually and also consider how your packages stack up to your competitors.
TIP: Track and compare benefits and costs on a spreadsheet. Determine your 3 to 5 most valuable and unique products. If you discover that some of your products don’t seem as valuable as those offered by your competitors, make a note of how you can improve or enhance those products.
7. Define your business objectives.
Once you have a better understanding of your strengths and weaknesses and how you stack up to your competitors, you can define your goals and objectives. Are you looking to expand your market share? Expand into new markets? Increase your revenue? Increase participation and engagement?
Your objectives will ultimately guide the way you shape your membership structure, pricing, and marketing efforts. For this reason, carefully assessing your organization with your business objectives in mind is undoubtedly worth taking the time to do.
Think about the old 80/20 rule – you get 80% of your results from 20% of your effort. As an association with limited resources, you can’t be all things to all people. So it makes sense to be strategic about where you’re investing your time, energy, and resources when working on growing membership.
If you survey your members and conduct ongoing research, you should be able to segment them by their perceived value of your organization, and then by how much they are investing on an annual basis. You’ll want to group them by:
Members who have low perceived value of their membership, but are making large investments in your organization.
This can be the attrition danger zone, and there are countless reasons why these members don’t value what you are offering. Unless you want to risk losing them, you’ll need to figure out where your organization is falling short and take action quickly.
Members who have high perceived value and are making large investments.
Look at your membership survey responses to identify the benefits that are most used by this group and determine if there are any shortcomings or areas of improvement that could enhance the benefits that matter most to them. The name of the game is keeping this group engaged. Making small changes and additions – and then communicating the improvements you’ve made – can go a long way to keeping these members engaged.
Members who have high perceived value, but are making small investments.
The key for this group is to identify value-ads that could generate additional revenue streams. These kinds of members have staying power, but you’ll want to be careful not to neglect them. As you have the resources available, adding and bundling products that appeal to lower-level members can help you retain, and even upgrade these members.
Members who have low perceived value, and are making small investments.
If this is a small group in comparison to your overall membership, you can focus on these members last. They may fall off eventually, but if that happens, you stand to lose a lot less from this group than you do from your higher income generators. If this category comprises a large portion of your membership, this could signal a big problem in your membership strategies.
If you’ve come to the conclusion that certain members just aren’t a match, that’s not necessarily a negative thing. It’s better to focus on keeping and attracting the right kind of members than to stretch your resources too thin in an effort to cater to everyone.
Now that you’ve classified your members into these groups, it’s time to dive a little deeper into figuring out what makes them tick and identifying the kinds of members that will help you build your organization.
Stay tuned for our next post on creating member profiles to determine your “perfect” members.
For associations, continuing education has become increasingly important as a membership benefit. In a recent study from Pew Research Center, 73% of respondents identified themselves as lifelong learners.
That means that there’s a huge and growing opportunity for your association to engage with both members and non-members.
Most people are constantly looking to learn, but with the plethora of learning opportunities that exist out there, how do they choose what training they’ll undertake? Earning continuing education units (CEUs) is a big incentive. Tracking CEUs for your members is an important function of your association – and has come to be an expected benefit for members. (123Signup Association Management Software makes tracking CEUs a piece of cake).
If your membership growth is stunted and you’re having difficulty retaining the members you already have, revamping your continuing education programs and offering more courses that count for CEUs can do wonders to revitalize your organization.
Evaluating your existing programs and determining what needs to be changed, and what additional courses would add value for your members, requires research and thought. The best place to start is by asking your existing members what they think about your existing courses, where they feel they need to up-skill, and what knowledge and capabilities they feel they need to do their jobs better.
If you’re not already, you should be surveying every participant in every one of your courses. Start by looking back on the responses you’ve received regarding these courses in recent years.
You should also have a record of people who have attended any of your training programs in the past. Since they’ve already shown interest in continuing to learn, surveying just that segment of your membership is a great place to start.
Once you’ve gained some insights on what your members are looking for, you might even host a small focus group to brainstorm on potential future training topics and structures.
The next step? Create an action plan on how you will bring your ideas to fruition, and the people and resources that will be required.
Before you begin to redesign your governance system, invest adequate time in analyzing your current system. After all, this is what Einstein would do!
Einstein has been quoted as having said “if I had an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first 55 minutes determining the proper question to ask, for once I know the proper question, I could solve the problem in less than five minutes. In other words, he would spend significant time figuring out what the problem is.
If your current governance system isn’t performing up to par, it’s important to understand why not. Depending on what the “real” problems are, the solutions may lie in making actual structural changes (reformulating the committee structure or size of board, for example) or they may lie in changing the practices the board engages in (agenda design or meeting design, for example). Investing the time to adequately define and redefine the problem will:
Ensure that you are addressing the root (right) problems;
Generate information specific to the issue(s) at hand that will be useful in solving the problem(s) and developing a sound governance system; and,
Lead to group consensus on what the problem actually is, which is vital to the creation and execution of sound solutions.
Although a problem might be complex, the processes used to solve a problem are not complex. The first step is properly defining the problem and this begins with challenging assumptions and breaking the problem down to ensure you are focused on the root problem.
ROOT PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION
Determining the root cause(s) of an underperforming or ill performing governance system is one of the first steps in governance system redesign. Often what is first identified is a symptom of the problem, not the root cause. As such, it is important to challenge one’s assumptions and not get “locked” into the first “problem” that is identified.
When analyzing a governance system, two methodologies are useful: Ishikawa Diagram and Toyoda’s 5 Whys.
Ishikawa Diagram
An Ishikawa Diagram takes a systems approach to problem identification. The diagram is used to identify all possible root cause categories, under which actual root causes are listed. This approach forces one to consider all of the different parts of the governance system as one analyzes the problem.
An Ishikawa Diagram looks like a fish skeleton, with the initial problem being the head and possible root cause categories represented by the rib bones, under which root causes are listed. The illustration below uses lack an underperforming board as the initial problem, and then identifies six possible root cause categories, which become the rib bones of the diagram. Actual potential root causes are then listed along each rib bone. A more comprehensive list of root categories for governance system analysis is provided further below.
Five Step Process
Insert the initial problem statement in the problem statement box.
Brainstorm possible root cause categories.
Brainstorm potential root causes in each category
Analyze the potential root causes to clarify / define the real problem(s).
Develop consensus around the root problem(s)
GOVERNANCE SYSTEM ROOT CAUSE CATEGORIES
As mentioned above, the Ishikawa process starts with brainstorming all of the potential root cause categories. These are comprised of all of the parts of the “system.” Following is a list of root cause categories for governance issues. All or some of these may apply to your organization. You can use this list as a starting place to identify additional root cause categories that are applicable in your situation as you build out your Ishikawa Diagram.
Board Meeting Design
Nominating Process
Committee Structure
Board Size / Structure
Board Culture
Board Development
Board Leadership Development
Governance Polices
Governance Practices
Board CEO Relationship
Staff Support
Toyoda’s 5 Whys
Toyoda’s 5 Whys is a very simple method to identify root causes. It can be used alone or in conjunction with the fishbone technique illustrated above. When a problem arises, ask why and for each response to the question ask why again until the why question has been asked at least five times.
Applying the 5 whys methodology to our problem of having a board that is a non-strategic thinking entity, the questions might look like this:
Q: Why doesn’t the Board think Strategically?
A: Because the are always digging into short-term tactics
Q: Why are they always discussing short-term tactics?
A: Because these issues are perceived to be important by the Board
Q: Why are these issues important to the Board?
A: Because they believe it is the role and responsibility of the Board to discuss and act on these issues
Q: Why does the Board believe this is their role and responsibility?
A: Because they don’t know another way
Q: Why doesn’t the Board know another way?
A: Because we don’t have a governance / Board development program
Using this example, we see the real problem is not that the Board isn’t thinking strategically, it is that we don’t have a formalized training / development program for our Board members. Of course, each group (or reader) will answer these questions differently; the point is to engage in the process to dig deeper into the actual root problem.
WHY AN INVESTMENT IN PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION MATTERS
Spending time to make sure that you have defined the problem(s) correctly is imperative to governance system redesign. On a very basic level, it ensures that you are focusing on the right problem and creates a high level of probability that the right solution(s) will be developed. Further, working on the problem identification process with a Governance Task Force builds consensus around the actual (root) problem(s). Finally, engaging in robust problem identification reveals information and knowledge that will inform the development of solutions and governance redesign.
Of course, it is also critical that you and your board have a thorough understanding of what good governance looks like as well as the appropriate roles and responsibilities of a high performing board. Likewise, it is helpful to create a vision of what a high performing board would look like for your organization so you can redesign toward that vision.
About the Author
Robert Nelson, a Certified Association Executive (CAE), brings over a quarter-century of successful executive leadership experience, working with Boards and high-powered CEOs in a not-for-profit setting. He is the founder of Nelson Strategic Consulting and brings hands-on experience guiding and facilitating the design of strategy development processes and think tanks. His focus on organizational strategies and strategic solutions to complex organizational and global grand challenges for national as well as international organizations.
Contact Robert through his website, or learn more about Nelson Strategic Consulting at www.nscstrategies.com.
What do health clubs, iTunes, Dropbox, Xbox and Netflix have in common? All require members to participate in monthly billing or auto renewal programs. And all are benefiting as a result.
Author and association consultant Seth Kahan recently hosted a summit on “Private Sector Membership Models,” a growing trend in the corporate world. He notes that for-profit companies embrace the membership model for renewable relationships and income potential, also of interest to associations. Says Kahan, “It’s hard for me to imagine there would be any resistance to auto renewal because its sounds like it makes things easier for everybody.” Indeed it does.
Here’s why your association should offer auto renewals:
Member Convenience. Auto renewals allow members to enjoy uninterrupted service and avoid the hassle of manually cutting a check or entering credit card information online. Members receive a notice in advance of renewal so account information can be updated if necessary, and they can opt-out if they choose to not renew. Otherwise, no action is needed.
Automation. Think of the flurry of activity in the membership department around dues renewal time. Then think about how this same energy could be put to better use enhancing products, services and the overall member experience instead of processing renewals. Programmed renewals allow for automation of much (if not all) of the process.
Predictable Revenue Stream. Many associations enjoy an influx of dues around the beginning of the calendar year—only to be staring at nearly-empty coffers toward the end of it. Automatic billing for dues on the member join date, rather than on a calendar year, creates a smooth revenue stream throughout the year (and is a practice worth considering even if you don’t use automatic renewal). Or, consider monthly or quarterly billing to further even out revenue.
No Decision Points. Sending a dues statement once a year provides an annual decision point for members and invites scrutiny: “Did I get my money’s worth this year?” “What am I getting for my dues dollar?”
Robbie Baxter, author of the forthcoming book, The Membership Economy, notes, “Because payment and benefits are ongoing, there is no obvious moment when the member must re-evaluate options, and potentially choose to end the relationship.”
Companies such as health clubs, iTunes, Dropbox, Xbox and Netflix don’t provide annual decision points. You want to be a member? Provide your debit or credit card number and you’re a member until you cancel. It’s a simple concept that could result in higher retention rates and millions of dollars for your organization.
About Mary Byers
Author. Speaker. Facilitator. Consultant. Provocateur. All describe Mary Byers, CAE.
Through highly interactive programs, Mary uses compelling questions and thought-provoking techniques to encourage participation. Mary helps associations and other organizations remain competitive in an increasingly competitive environment. The author of Race for Relevance: 5 Radical Changes for Associations and Road to Relevance: 5 Strategies for Competitive Associations, she’s worked with a wide variety of associations (both individual membership and trade groups) and presents a compelling and insightful message designed to help volunteer leaders and staff alike create a viable and sustainable future. Visit www.marybyers.com to learn more.
This week’s blog is re-posted with permission from Aaron D. Wolowiec, MSA, CAE, CMP, CTA. Aaron is the founder and president of Event Garde, a professional development consulting firm based in Grand Rapids, Mich. Website: www.eventgarde.com.
When’s the last time this happened to you? There’s a highly recommended, world-class speaker you’d like to feature at an upcoming program.
She’s perfect for your event in every way, except for the associated price tag. After much negotiation, you’re able to secure the “friends and family” discount; however, it’s still more than you’ve budgeted.
If your meeting comprises a qualified audience of planners or other decision-makers, you might consider an in-kind sponsorship with a local hotel or conference center. Following are 11 ideas for partnering with local venues:
Select three venues that might like to showcase their property and reach out to them directly with the understanding that this partnership will be secured on a first-come, first-served basis
Allow venue to give tours/sales kits following the program
Encourage two to three venue staff to participate in the program and to be available during registration, breaks and meal functions to engage with attendees
Recognize venue as the title sponsor in promotional materials (e.g., print, website, social media, magazine, email)
Give venue a couple of complimentary registrations to parcel out to potential clients; venue could make these VIP experiences with a complimentary overnight and breakfast before/after the program
Give venue the complete participant list before/after the program
Allow participants to register at a discounted rate if they complete a brief meetings portfolio survey that is then shared with the venue
Allow venue to set up a booth near registration
Allow venue a three-minute introduction, video or slideshow to kick-off the program
Encourage venue to host breakfast/lunch; during this time, a venue representative should be assigned to each round to meet and engage with participants
Ask venue what other deliverables they would like to receive [perhaps association-related products and services] and do your best to share whatever you can
What other ideas do you have for successful partnerships between venues and associations?
There are a lot of association management practices and general management theories focused on advancing organizations, but, when it comes down to it, if you want to propel your organization to the next level: dare to dream. This thought was crystalized for me when, going around the room at the end of a board leadership development session I conducted, a board member said the most important thing he heard all day was “dare to dream.” Dream not about what is, but about what’s possible.
In order to dream effectively, one must be willing to challenge their own assumptions, be open to letting go of long held beliefs and practices, and have the courage to challenge the status quo. Of course, to ultimately lead change, one must also be willing to challenge the assumptions of others, in an appropriate manner, and embrace calculated risk taking.
Give yourself permission to dream about the possible. Let go of your fear and imagine what could be. Once you have formulated your vision, develop a strategy to get there and articulate the vision and strategy with clarity. In the end, it is not just about daring to dream, it is about daring to do things differently.
For even bigger dreams, create a board culture wherein the board as a whole dares to dream. Engaging your board in generative dialogue will add value to the organization and the board member’s experience, as well as build trust and free members to collectively create a dream that no one member may have envisioned alone.
BELIEVE AND SO SHALL IT BE
Dreams do come true. This is especially true if you believe in them. It’s time to dream of what could be if your organization is at a transformational moment. It is also time to dream if everything is running smoothly and you’re experiencing a high level of comfort with what is. Remember, comfort with what is can be the enemy and often holds us back from achieving what could be.
So, if you want to add member value, create relevancy, transform your governance system, create growth, or strengthen the CEO – Board partnership, dream about what could be and then dare to do things differently.
About the Author
Robert Nelson, a Certified Association Executive (CAE), brings over a quarter-century of successful executive leadership experience, working with Boards and high-powered CEOs in a not-for-profit setting. He is the founder of Nelson Strategic Consulting and brings hands-on experience guiding and facilitating the design of strategy development processes and think tanks. His focus on organizational strategies and strategic solutions to complex organizational and global grand challenges for national as well as international organizations.
Contact Robert through his website, or learn more about Nelson Strategic Consulting at www.nscstrategies.com.
In today’s fast-paced world, does your board still take the time to dialogue? Yes, we engage in discussions and deliberate issues, but we rarely slow down and actual dialogue. Engaging in dialogue at board meetings can add value to an organization through the creation of new ideas, the formation of shared meaning, and the free flow of diverse perspective. Also, a practice of dialogue can contribute to strengthening trust and relationships between board members.
Dialogue is the free flow of meaning between members of a board. The goal isn’t to sell a point, idea or position; instead, it is to explore with honest curiosity and understand the meaning of what people are saying. It is exploring ideas with no endpoint in mind other than to understand. Dialogue concerns itself with truly understanding, in a non-judgmental way, what is being said. It doesn’t concern itself with what is right or wrong, or truth. In fact, it recognizes that what is said is not the whole truth, but simply part of a larger truth.
William Isaacs (1993) defines dialogue, “…as a sustained, collective inquiry, into the processes, assumptions, and certainties that compose everyday experience. Yet the experience is of a special kind–the experience of the meaning embodied in a community of people.” Dialogue is a divergent conversation where the participants suspend judgment, listen rather than react, and identify assumptions upon which they reflect for the purpose of gaining an understanding of the meaning of what is being said.
Dialogue is iterative in the sense that when something is spoken it is listened to and built on by someone else. Unlike a discussion, dialogue doesn’t seek to break down and examine the parts of what is communicated but rather seeks to understand and build upon what has been said. As those dialoguing seek to digest what others are saying and the meaning behind it and contribute to the dialogue, new thoughts and ideas surface. Shared meaning is developed as the dialogue freely floats among board members; it is a collaborative conversation where all involved come to understand the assumptions of others and recognize their own assumptions.
If your board members aren’t accustomed to engaging in dialogue, as described above, it is important that you clearly signal the beginning and end of a dialogue session. It is also imperative that the following fundamentals are reviewed with the board members at the beginning of the dialogue session.
SIX FUNDAMENTALS OF DIALOGUE:
Intentionality / conscious effort: In today’s society, we rarely dialogue; as such, it is not a natural behavior for most. As a result, it is important to frame a dialogue session, so as to ask participants to consciously engage in dialogue, with the understanding and agreement that the goal is to explore an issue without making any decisions. Dialoguing is a win-win situation where the participants are not playing against each other, but with each other.
Sensitivity: Dialogue requires sensitivity on the part of the participants. They need to be sensitive to the process, to the way they respond and to the way others respond. It is important to recognize that one’s opinions and own assumptions can sometimes block the needed sensitivity. However, simply recognizing this possibility often enables the required sensitivity.
Curiosity: A bona fide curious state of mind is required. Participants must internalize the curiosity and come to believe that their curiosity is driving them to explore ideas and seek an understanding of the meaning of what others contribute to the conversation.
Listening: Listening without prejudice may be the most critical fundamental of all. It is imperative that participants listen to what is being said and reflect on it while trying to gain an understanding of the meaning behind what has been said. It is a matter of listening and reflecting as opposed to simply reacting. Listening, of course, won’t prevent misperceptions. In fact, it is ok if one misperceives the intent of another participant, as this allows for new meaning to being created in common on the spot. This, in part, is the flow of meaning that occurs in dialogue.
Judgment Suspension: We have a tendency to judge what is said, based on our underlying assumptions or opinions. The objective is to recognize and acknowledge the judgments and then let the judgments go without acting on them. It isn’t about suppressing the judgments; it is about acknowledging that they exist and moving on in a non-judgmental manner. It is important to acknowledge and suspend one’s own judgments as well as the judgments of others.
Commitment to not Defend: Dialogue is successful when no participants attempt to defend their point of view. It is important that people enter into dialogue with an open mind, recognizing that no point of view is right or wrong, including their own. It is important to internalize the fact that all viewpoints are part of a larger truth. As such, participants must understand that no attempt should be made to have their viewpoints prevail and be willing to let go of their ideas in search of a greater truth. In short, a dialogue is not a win-lose situation and there is no need to influence each other.
If you are interested in inserting dialogue into your next board meeting, there are two ways that you could approach it. Both require that you inform your board that you are going to engage in dialogue for a period of time and that the purpose is to dialogue, not deliberate or decide. Both options require a review of the fundamentals.
First, prior to the meeting you could identify a “big” strategic issue that confronts your organization. In this scenario, the objective would be to simply explore the issue. The advantage to this approach is that no decisions regarding the issue would be taken at the meeting. If interested in this approach, you might want to read about and engage in the generative mode of governance.
A second approach would be to identify an item on the agenda that requires action at the meeting. When taking this approach, you would engage in dialogue around the options that are being presented at the meeting. Of course, it is important that you clearly delineate between the dialogue period and the subsequent deliberation period.
As a result of the dialogue void that exists in the lives of most, your board members may be uncomfortable when they first engage in the practice of dialogue. However, this will dissipate over time. When introducing the concept, you may find it helpful to discuss how dialogue can raise your governance performance to the next level.
Keep in mind that what is important is to engage in relaxed dialogue with a curiosity to understand the meaning of what is said and the assumptions that are behind the meaning. Doing so and seeing things as clearly as possible without judgment will produce shared meaning, create new ideas, and strengthen board relationships, as a result of understanding and accepting the assumptions of others as part of a larger truth.
About the Author
Robert Nelson, a Certified Association Executive (CAE), brings over a quarter-century of successful executive leadership experience, working with Boards and high-powered CEOs in a not-for-profit setting. He is the founder of Nelson Strategic Consulting and brings hands-on experience guiding and facilitating the design of strategy development processes and think tanks. His focus on organizational strategies and strategic solutions to complex organizational and global grand challenges for national as well as international organizations.
Contact Robert through his website, or learn more about Nelson Strategic Consulting at www.nscstrategies.com.
Do you struggle to get things done with a board that’s constantly looking over your shoulder? Your board might not be to blame. Robert Nelson at NSC Consulting tells us about the other side of the coin in this week’s post …
CEOs are not always innocent when it comes to boards engaging in micromanagement. In fact, CEOs are sometimes culpable in creating and sustaining such behavior and are most often in a position to refocus boards on true board level work and what really matters. If you are tired of your board’s micro management and you want create change, you must be willing to make undertaking such change a priority and be intentional about doing so.
In some cases, a dramatic change in culture is required. In other cases, it’s more a matter of changing the behavior of some individual board members. Of course, the first step is to determine why your board micro manages. In other words, the first step is defining the root problem(s) / cause(s). Once you have done this you can craft a strategy and a plan to transition your board’s culture or change the behavior of a few. Toyoda’s 5 Whys and an Ishikawa Diagram are two methods you can use to determine root causes.
As you consider root causes, also ask yourself: What am I doing, or not doing, that may be contributing to Board micro management? Be brutally honest in answering this question.
The next step it to create your change strategy. This begins with creating a vision of the future state you are seeking and identifying the barriers that will impede that change. Likewise, you will want to identify factors (driving forces) in the current environment that can be exploited to facilitate moving toward the future state. Craft your strategy in a manner that strengthens the driving forces and weakens the barriers.
Although your strategy and associated tactics will be dependent on the root causes you uncover, following are eleven tactics that are often engaged to diminish or eradicate board micro management:
Written job descriptions: Craft written job descriptions for each of the officers and for non-officer board members. In addition, make sure that you, the CEO, have a well-written job description.
Clearly defined roles and responsibilities for board and CEO: Develop a document that clearly defines board roles and responsibilities versus CEO roles and responsibilities. Have the board formally adopt the document.
Governing mission: Engage a governance task force in writing a mission specific to the board. This is different from your organization’s mission; it simply spells out the mission of the board. Have the board formally adopt the governing mission then use it as a guide post for board involvement and as something to point to when the board’s discussion or behavior gets off track.
Governance training / Leadership Development: Design a comprehensive, formal training / governance development program for your board members. Don’t assume your board members know how to govern well.
Board member orientation: Develop a comprehensive board orientation process. A comprehensive board orientation is more than a single event or session. See Board Orientation: A Development Framework.
Board self-assessment: Institutionalize a board self-assessment process. Effective board self-assessment programs act as training tools themselves, as well as provide a basis for developing a sound governance-training program tailored for your board’s needs.
Change Board Agenda. Use a strategic agenda rather than a traditional agenda. At a minimum, make sure the type of agenda items that are placed on the agenda aren’t items that invite micro-management and that the agenda contains “big issue” items.
Audit Board materials. Review the briefing and background materials that you have sent to your board over the last year or two. As you review them, ask two questions: do the materials provide the board with the type of information that allows them to engage in board level strategic discussions and does the information / detail in the materials encourage micro-management?
Key performance indicators focused on outcomes. Make sure your strategic plan and annual operating plan contain measurable key performance indicators. By including measurable success outcomes in these documents you can better keep the board discussions focused on outcomes rather than micro-managing at the tactical level.
Nominating process. Key to effective governance is having the right people on the bus. Although a non-profit CEO should not be involved in actually selecting people for the board, a CEO does have a role in the nominating process. This begins with ensuring that a sound process is in place to identify outstanding, qualified candidates. In addition, the CEO should always be on the lookout for great candidates to be introduced into the process.
CEO professional development. Ultimately, if you want to change a board’s culture to one that does not engage in micro management, it will take persuasion rather than coercion. The more a CEO can develop his or her expertise, more effective he or she will be when it comes to leading by persuasion.
If you have a board that micromanages and you are contemplating setting out on a journey to change your board’s culture or behavior, the road will be easier if you’ve cultivated a strong partnership with the Board chair. Likewise, it is always helpful to have 5 – 10 percent of your board on board as champions for change.
About the Author
Robert Nelson, a Certified Association Executive (CAE), brings over a quarter-century of successful executive leadership experience, working with Boards and high-powered CEOs in a not-for-profit setting. He is the founder of Nelson Strategic Consulting and brings hands-on experience guiding and facilitating the design of strategy development processes and think tanks. His focus on organizational strategies and strategic solutions to complex organizational and global grand challenges for national as well as international organizations.
Contact Robert through his website, or learn more about Nelson Strategic Consulting at www.nscstrategies.com.
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