Acronym

All associations have policies and procedures as well as volunteers. In the ideal world, these two would work in tandem and complement each other. For example, policies and procedures would increase the volunteer’s enthusiasm because it helps them make their idea a reality. Unfortunately, this seldom is the case. Policies and procedures bog down the creative process, frustrate volunteers who only have a limited amount of time to devote to these details and cause tension between staff and volunteers.

What can be done? (A quick disclaimer – I have not implemented policy light, but this seems like a plausible approach.)

First, volunteers in their first 1-2 years should have little interaction with the policies and procedures, if possible. This approach provides them time to learn the organization and volunteer structure. If they begin a project that necessitates policy involvement, pair them with a higher-level volunteer. Second, once volunteers are more mature and ready for additional responsibility, they should be introduced to ‘policy light (pl).’ PL would include a high level summary of the policy as well as high-level bullets of action items. These easy-to-read documents would help the volunteers to turn to staff for full details and in turn, develop a positive working relationship with staff. Lastly, if the volunteer is ready for a higher level of commitment, send them the full policy and procedure manual, ask them to serve on the board of directors or hire them!

How does your association foster volunteer enthusiasm while enforcing policy?

Nick Senzee in his posting “Is there a volunteer problem?” intends to take the private, internal conversations we’re having in our individual association to a public conversation on how to change the volunteer model we in associations are saddled with at this time.

We know from the Decision To Volunteer (and if we’re honest from our own trends in volunteerism) that the model is indeed changing. It’s not that members don’t want to volunteer. The research underscored that volunteers are motivated to help associations accomplish change for the greater good and in doing so feed their own professional development. What is changing is how they volunteer and what they need to volunteer. That’s what’s behind the struggle for associations. We’re expecting volunteers to do the same jobs and carry the same loads with the same support and training that we’ve given them for the past 30 years. I think Decision to Volunteer is our version of the story of Emperor’s New Clothes.

You see, I would argue that the emperor (association) isn’t wearing any clothes in that the vast majority of associations don’t have established, formal volunteer management programs. We haven’t spent the time or focus as have our c3 cousins (charitable, service organizations) on assembling volunteer management programs that have robust recruitment, activation, training, evaluation and recognition programs. It may be because our c3 cousins recruit volunteers that become members while we’re focused on selling memberships and then suggesting members can get more from their membership by volunteering.

Also, did you notice that associations focus on just one small group of our volunteers: the leaders? These are the volunteers who form our committees and governance boards. For them we hold leadership conferences, listservs, webinars, conference calls and the like. But, they only represent about 18% of our national leaders and 23% of our local leaders according to Decision To Volunteer. Meanwhile, 60% of our volunteers are episodic and fall below the radar in many ways.

Before we complain about our volunteers, shouldn’t we first dress up the emperor? How can we reach out to all of our volunteers, not just volunteer leaders? What would a volunteer management system for episodic volunteers involve? How would it be different than what most associations do today? Who’s been to the tailor?

I have been doing a lot of thinking lately about the challenging times that may be hitting many associations and how it will impact our membership strategies. In addition to changing our messaging to even more directly point out to our members why the hard times are the worst time for them to let their membership lapse, I have been wondering whether it would make sense for us to provide some free benefits for a period of time to certain segments of members who have not renewed.

My thinking is that if there are certain segments of your membership that you know have a high likelihood of coming back once the economy improves doesn’t it make sense to tell them, and show them, how much you value them as members by providing them a limited amount of their benefits for free for a limited period of time.

I think it is critical that you figure out what benefits you can afford to continue to provide for free (e-newsletters, access to members-only portion of the website, member pricing at conferences or webinars, etc.) and make sure that as you deliver them you remind recently lapsed members that you are doing this for free for a period of time in the hopes that they will eventually return to the organization. You can put subtle, or not so subtle, win-back offers in everything you give them in case they decide they want to renew before the end of the free period. Of course, once the free period is over, you will want to reach out to them and remind them it is over and that you want them to re-join.

I also think it is critical to determine what segments will receive this offer and how you will promote it. Will you offer it to long-term members who you noticed have dropped after extended tenure with the association? New members who you really want to help get through those first few years so you have them hooked long term? Will you promote it widely? Will you do it on a one to one basis? Personally I feel it really needs to be done on a one to one basis based on likelihood to renew which could be determined by past participation, volunteer status, etc. Otherwise you may end up extending the offer to many folks who never really intend to come back but really want the free benefits.

What do you think about this strategy? I think that if it is done right, the staff effort and minimal cost involved in doing it could position an association way ahead of its competition once things turn around.

I get to go to a lot of board meetings of different chapters around the country. Some are great, some are a little frustrating, and some are out of control (you know, in a good way). But in all of them, I have to think there’s a better way for us, as headquarters staff, to support them and make the whole experience more usable for everyone.

So many issues we have in small organizations stem from lack of time. Sometimes I wonder if we’re seeing a sea-change among our chapter leaders. Life has gotten super busy. Headquarters organizations can’t afford to saddle volunteers with our own sloppy, "just-because" processes or workflow. I’m telling you, these people (just like me and probably most of you reading this) do not suffer busywork gladly. And why should they?

So many basic principles of volunteer management are ignored or just plain violated that folks can be forgiven for not filling out our forms on time. As with just about any professional society, our folks are likely to volunteer to improve their career options, because their friends are involved, to explore their strengths and to use their skills and experience in a different context.

We should really feed these needs a lot more than we do. But the issue gets really weird when you consider you have volunteers managing other volunteers. So then you get to teach the volunteer to manage other volunteers, who have to manage other volunteers. And it’s pretty common for people to volunteer for the wrong reasons. So you can see where the whole thing can be a bit unwieldy.

Back at the ranch, I’ve been working with ASAE’s component relations section council and we've been taking a serious look what makes chapters tick. We've gotten behind "the decision to volunteer." The curiosity stems in part from the proliferation of communities just about everywhere you look. (And the fact that mainstream folks in lots of fields explicitly talk about the benefits of community can take one aback.) But why oh why does it seem to take more and more work to get the same level of participation back at the ranch? How can we harness the power of community that Facebook and Twitter and so forth seem to have captured so effortlessly? Is that possible or have we missed the boat?

Anyway, we've decided that looking at the volunteer issue could clarify some of this. Is the definition of volunteering changing, do we need to adapt our model to the hectic, bottom-line-focused society we live in? Do we need to just build online communities and never have a conference? Or do we just need to focus on building nice, cozy in-person relationships and let the chips fall where they may?

We tried to make a start in our associapedia entry but we’d like to have a broader conversation and listen to what you folks have to say. Any thoughts?

I'd like to introduce two new Acronym bloggers to you today--Peggy Hoffman and Nick Senzee. Peggy is president of Mariner Management and Marketing; Nick is assistant director of constituent organization resources at the American Academy of Physician Assistants. (They're both bloggers, too.)

Together, they're going to be sharing some of their thoughts on volunteer management with Acronym readers. What are some of the current trends in volunteerism associations and components are facing? What do they mean for the future of our organizations? Peggy and Nick have some ideas, but they're interested in yours too--and I'm looking forward to seeing what comes out of the discussion.

Thanks to Peggy and Nick for joining us on Acronym.

I like to believe everyone always acts to the best of their ability. However, upon reflection of past board of directors, local and state governments, I realized this may not be the case. Individuals may compromise their best in order to garner a favor for later. This ‘values stock market’ hinders healthy discussion; to truly represent members and the best of an association, board members need to each share their individual views and concerns, not those views fed to them.

Not to say organizations can, or should, exist without politics. Any organization has politics and its employees and volunteers should work to persuade others. It keeps the organization viable. Oppositely, politicking, or the practice of collecting favors for future use, understanding of the membership and of issues.

How does your organization work to discourage politicking?

I am often surprised by what generates reaction on the part of readers. There are some things you just know are going to get the words flying—most thoughtful arguments against social media on this or any of the other association blogs, for example.

And I admit to deliberate attempts (which sometimes work and sometimes don't) to fan the flames.

But I was surprised at the vehement reaction that "The Perils of Strategic Planning," an August Associations Now article, generated. It was so strong, we had to create a blog post about it to let people vent/converse. I was surprised by the reaction because, frankly, I didn't think what Jim Hollan wrote was particularly controversial. I thought the idea of strategic planning having lost its vitality and usefulness in favor of a more nimble, open planning process was pretty well set.

This is a long way of getting to the point of this post. I may not have given this a second thought, but when I ran across a video of the authors of Fast Strategy: How strategic agility will help you stay ahead of the game, it reminded me of that big debate. I have not read the book yet, so I can't give my thoughts on it, but their basic message seems to reinforce Hollan's point. This is from an article about the book in the Insead Knowledge newsletter:

Kosonen says he faced the challenges of strategic agility for years in his roles with the Finnish telecoms firm as head of strategy and chief information officer. At Nokia he became familiar with two dimensions of strategic agility, he says, namely strategic sensitivity – that is, the way in which an organisation views the world and whether it is ‘open-minded’ and attentive enough to sense new opportunities and discontinuities– and secondly, ‘resource fluidity’ which relates to whether companies can redeploy resources rapidly enough to quickly exploit emerging opportunities in a complex and fast-changing environment.

This says to me that a planning process that takes 9 months or a year or (gulp) spans multiple years to develop a plan is useless. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be thinking about what the world will look like in 6 months or 12 months or even 36 months. But I do think that the further forward you look, the more you have to realize that it is highly unlikely that the world will actually turn out that way.

For associations, plans in the next 2 to 4 months can be pretty well set, with only major, unforeseeable events causing major changes. To me, that's really execution.

Plans for things 6 to 12 months away are where association leaders (and for large organizations at least, I mean staff and task force level volunteer levels) should be doing the bulk of their planning, and making changes to plans as the environment calls for.

More than 12 months should just be future plans, more ideas or outlines than plans really. And I think all leaders—board, task force, staff, other interested constituents—should be engaged in the development of those outlines.

And finally, more than 24 months — this is the realm of the big picture. It's where, for example, the Realtor organizations might contemplate the future of their profession given how online sources may change how people buy and sell homes. I think it's important to have these conversations, but I don't think they result in anything resembling a plan. Too much is going to change before any actions would matter—some changes will come faster than expected, other things may not change at all, and, no matter what, the change that does in fact come will have significant unpredictable components. But having the conversation can and should affect things in all the other planning time horizons.

This is how it read on The Washington Post website:

"Online social networking sites, or socnets, are changing how people get their political news."

First, and most importantly, I think everyone will agree that the term "socnet" should be banned with perpetrators subject to slow torture.

With that out of the way, the article is interesting in its underscoring of the changes in the ways people get and provide information. It's not really a new idea, and the fact that it is especially true for political information will surprise no one reading this blog. What the article made me think about was that it's one thing to believe that change is occurring, it's quite another to be doing something about it — what are associations doing about it?

If political advocacy is a major part of your mission, do you know the quantity and quality of the involvement of people affiliated with your organization in social media? Are they pushing forward ideas that synch with your organization? How are you training members to get involved in these areas?

If you think social media is just a bunch of navel-gazers — a group of people all blowing hot air at each other — I tend to agree with you to a point. I think it's probably ok if you can't answer the above questions right now. However, I do think the time for ignoring it is past. The circle of people who are engaging in these online communities has grown too large, and the circle who read without engaging is also larger still. The 2000 presidential election was dominated online by The Drudge Report. In 2004, Dean's fundraising and major media (perhaps most notably ABC's The Note) were the major signs that political news and ideas were traveling differently than before. In 2008, it's too numerous to count in both large and small ways. The next page is already beginning to turn; you need to make sure your organization has something to say about what is written on it.

Despite economic woes nationwide, more workers than ever appear primed to spend their holiday dollars on many of the latest consumer electronics, in large part as a tool to do their jobs better. That means loads of folks (I see you nodding) will be upgrading their old phones, computers, MP3s, game consoles and more.

If you or your organization are concerned about the potential for a season full of polluting e-waste, visit the Consumer Electronics Association’s handy site at www.myGreenElectronics.org for locations and news about the latest corporate take-back and recycling programs (Samsung announced its newest program this month). Consumer recycling of electronics is up by almost 30% since 2005, and manufacturers expect that number to grow quickly, especially as new corporate greening and recycling programs continue evolving to strive to meet consumer demands for greater eco-friendliness in the industry.

And before you buy your next beloved gizmo, you might want to turn to the online calculator on the site, which lets you determine how much energy your electronics equipment uses and how you can reduce it.

With the downturn in the economy, we have encouraged our volunteers to trim budgets and decrease spending. Our staff researched several free, high-quality tools for their use - this way, the members do not see a decrease in benefits. This being said, frequent use of free services may decrease the association's credibility, so we encourage volunteers to use better options in better financial times.

Some examples we shared include:

www.weebly.com - create customizable, attractive Web sites for free
Yahoo Groups - create bug-free listservs for members
freeconferencecall.com - hold conference calls at no expense to the organizer

If you have additional recommendations, please share.

At the recommendation of a friend I'm reading Fat Man in a Middle Seat: Forty Years of Covering Politics, the autobiography of Jack W. Germond, best know for his seat on the McLaughlin Group.

Early in his reporting career, he relates this story of one of his small daily newspaper editors:

JS Gray...was totally professional and so was his newspaper, not in the sense that it was a polished and sophisticated product but in the sense that it understood its place in the community. It was there to print the news, no more no less. ...JS backed his reporters to the hilt. When a city commissioner who owned a department store threatened to withhold his advertising because of a story I was writing, JS told him the advertising would not be accepted until he had apologized for the threat. ...The sky, it turned out, did not fall. It never does."

It's not surprising that this passage appeals to my editorial nature, but I think it reaches much further than that. As a manager, that's what you want your employees to think about you. As a leader, that's the type of integrity you need to inspire those around you.

Obviously it applies to the business partner communities that are interested in being in front of your membership—don't compromise your organization. Your organization will be stronger and the companies you do partner with will be better served as a result.

But could it also apply to members? Or certain members? You know the ones I'm talking about. For many it's a mantra to not speak ill of a member, any member, and I respect that. But I think truth be told, there are some people that are just pains in the, um, backside. It's time not to jump when those wheels squeak. Rather, tell them that kind of input is not helpful and that you'll be glad to listen to future input from them only after they've apologized.

For a nice example of a nonprofit’s Web site for educators, visit Heifer International's latest rollout. Increasingly, nonprofits are setting up entire multimedia Web sites for the nation’s cash-strapped teachers in search of new resources, tools, lesson plans and classroom projects.

While some of the sites seem pretty shallow in terms of what they offer, others are creative, fun and useful. Trends I’m seeing include the following:

- More short, downloadable videos (thanks mostly to YouTube)

- More hands-on projects rather just straight reading

- More diversity in which grades or ages are targeted

- More diversity in languages—(Spanish is the most obvious, but also Vietnamese, Chinese, French and Arabic.)

- More effort to integrate multimedia elements into the tool or resource, such as downloadable podcasts and mini-dramas

- More effort to obtain feedback from educators about the quality of the materials and whether they will use them (I’m starting see ratings systems on educational materials, for instance.)

- More effort to depict a multicultural society—through photos, slang, and careful word choice

To learn more about how to get your nonprofit’s materials into America’s locally run schools, read “Becoming Teacher’s Pet”.

Although I recently posted about the increased popularity of personal giving through text messaging, I’d like to add a short update about Twitter, the hot microblogging social media tool that has captured the imaginations and texting fingers of primarily young professionals.

The New York Times has an article today about the Salvation Army’s efforts to expand its trademark “red kettle campaign” online, a move it started making three years ago with early texting donation drives and easy, click-on-the-bucket online giving at its Web site.

This year, the nonprofit is making an even greater virtual push, increasing its Facebook exposure, offering personal Web fundraising pages, and other interactive self-fundraising features, the article explains. Of particular interest, though, is the Salvation Army’s piloting of a Twitter-based campaign that provides brief, real-time updates on the progress of the red kettle campaign, again inviting folks to give on the spot via their cell phones.

I don’t know of any other associations using Twitter specifically for a fundraising campaign, but I’d like to hear from any who are experimenting with this vehicle. Please post here or email me at kclarke@asaecenter.org.

I've been collecting a bunch of links to share with you:

- Did you see the very interesting article in the Wall Street Journal on why you should get rid of performance reviews? I don't know if I agree (although Scott might), but it's definitely a thought-provoking read.

- Elizabeth Weaver Engel started a good discussion about flexible schedules.

- Kristin Clarke's post on associations and the financial crisis sparked some good posts by other bloggers: Bruce Hammond lists some questions we should be asking right now, Caron Mason suggests ways associations can help members impacted by the economy, and Tony Rossell points out that association membership can be a form of unemployment insurance. In addition, Kerry Stackpole writes on leadership in uncertain times

- Kevin Holland and David Patt respond to Scott Oser's post on whether or not attendees at association meetings are really ready for new meeting formats. Both of them raise important points about the negatives of some more interactive education sessions.

- David Patt also points to an interesting blog post, where the blogger in question and her commenters discuss the pros and cons of joining a professional association. It's an interesting glimpse at a potential member's thought process.

- Wes Trochlil is gathering information on associations that use their AMS successfully.

- Lindy Dreyer suggests that both age and generation are less important than we often think.

Is your organization involved in a voter registration campaign focused on 18- to 24-year-olds? Another tool has just emerged to help. Justice Through Music Project, a DC-based nonprofit working toward greater youth registration and political involvement, is offering thousands of copies of an ultra-cool "Rock Your Rights" DVD to associations and nonprofits to help inspire youth to get-out-and-vote in November. The DVD features more than 25 famous bands and musicians who urge young people to register, vote, talk about issues, and get involved.

For three years, JTMP has been interviewing bands and musicians—from The Indigo Girls to O.A.R. to Dar Williams--to get their opinion on issues such as voting, war, civil rights, equal rights, and free speech. “The responses are unscripted and many times surprising and provocative,” says a spokesperson. “Young people listen to bands and musicians more than authority figures, and musicians inspire youth to take part in the election process.”

The DVD also combines those celebrity interviews with Q&As with college students on their home campuses.

JTMP especially wants voter outreach organizations, especially in "swing states" and "battleground states," to contact them for free DVDs, so they will have another resource to accelerate efforts to get young people into the voting booth.

Over the last two weeks I have attended the following presentations:

1. Lindy Dreyer of SocialFish on Social Media at an ANEX brown bag lunch in Columbia

2. Ben Martin on Marketing of a Conference vs. an Unconference at DMAW Association Day (I could have chosen to hear Andy Steggles talk about Social Media during his session, but the times conflicted and I have heard Andy speak a number of times already).

3. An ASAE Marketing Idea Swap on Viral Marketing and Social Networking facilitated by Shelly Good-Cook of CTAM.

Today I went to a lunch at The Center for Association Leadership put on by Avectra. Maddie Grant spoke and the topic is … you guessed it, social media. The good news is that if I haven’t got my fill of social media by the end of the lunch on Thursday in November I can sign up to attend the following events:

1. ASAE Technology Idea Swap on Integrating Web 2.0 Tools to Your Association’s Web Site
2. ASAE Membership Idea Swap on Building Your Membership Community Using Web 2.0

And these are just the social media focused events that I remember. Am I the only one who is kind of frightened that social media is one of the only things that association marketers want to learn about right now in a time when direct recruitment and retention could be critical because of the downturn in the economy? I am not trying to say that social media is bad in any way, just that it is just a piece of a marketing puzzle. It is one that is growing more and more important, but in times like today we have to also really understand the more traditional methods as well. I would love to hear opinions.

I’ve been reading a lot about how social movements start, stall, or succeed. Apparently, it’s an inexact art, making success a challenge to duplicate. An effort that caught my eye recently, though, made television history last month.

Many of you may have seen or even participated in the September 5 Stand Up to Cancer (SU2C; www.standup2cancer.org) telethon on all three television networks, XM radio, and elsewhere. While the cause is certainly laudable, and the amount raised ($100 MILLION) in the mere three months since the organization’s launch in June 2008 and its telethon is breathtaking, I was especially interested in how this young organization planned to tackle a massive social problem on which hundreds of nonprofits already focus. And how would it convince people that what its leaders had in mind differentiated them dramatically from all other cancer-focused nonprofits?

First, SU2C is a radical bid to suppress barriers among multiple health, science, and technology sectors and build an entirely new space in which leading professionals collaborate and take risks. This aims to blow up the “let’s all get along and just work better together” niceties in favor of “Dream Teams” rallied around a kick-butt attitude of “We’re not leaving this war room until we solve this sucker!”

Second, it has a heavy-hitting leadership team. SU2C's leadership team ranges from a cancer surviver who also is a seasoned TV executive producer; the ever-popular Katie Couric; and reps from numerous powerful foundations, nonprofits, and research institutions. Cancer has touched each of them personally in some manner, making them incredibly determined, knowledgeable, and impatient for progress (hence, the sparks for innovation).

Third, they’re smart enough to know they’re still not smart enough to get to their goal: a cure for cancer as fast as possible. As a result, they allied themselves with the American Association for Cancer Research, which will rely on advice from a scientific advisory committee to vet proposed research projects and allocate the $100 mil to accelerate almost-there breakthroughs and speed new therapies to patients.

Fourth, the leadership team leveraged their considerable social networks in a big way, bringing in the kind of major donors that cause envy among us all--AARP, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Alliance for Global Good, and the Milken Family Foundation, for instance—and then convinced an unprecedented number of media partners—from online powerhouses like WebMD, Facebook, and AOL to ye ole traditional Hearst Corporation and The New York Times Company—to help jumpstart “a new movement.” It didn’t hurt that more than 100 celebrities also leapt on board.

We’ll have to see how and whether this “movement” does thrive to the grand-scale level of other well-recognized movements and whether it does indeed mark a tidal shift in cancer research and treatment, but the dramatic early days show great promise that may inspire others working to build a movement of our own. Maybe a wildly new bring-it-on attitude and fearlessness truly are the secret ingredients.

The content might make some readers a little squeamish/angry/indignant, but the methods described in this article are, I think, worthy of note.

The article by Kevin Sullivan in today's Washington Post describes a plan hatched by writer Ariane Sherine, and later endorsed by the British Humanist Society, to respond to Christian-themed advertisements on London buses that talked about the fiery fate of nonChristians with an ad campaign featuring slogans such as "There is probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."

Before the angry emails and comments start flying, I'm not writing this post about the merits or demerits of Christianity, humanism, atheism, or any other set of beliefs. I admit, the audacity of the slogan caught my eye and made me read the story, but if it was just the work of an organization, I wouldn't consider it particularly noteworthy.

What is interesting is that it is a campaign that was planned and then grass roots funded. They came up with the idea, the slogan, the look, and the placement plan, and said: "Here it is, if this is something you would want to support, send us a donation and we'll make it happen."

I think the traditional model is (1) conceive of the need or write the case, (2) solicit donations, (3) create campaign based on donations received. By creating the campaign first, it's a more powerful ask.

Sick leave. Child care. Eldercare. Health care. You can now tap into notes from several conference calls about work-life issues with policy leaders from the presidential campaigns of Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain. Hosted in September by the nonprofit Families and Work Institute (FWI), the calls incorporated questions posed by business leaders in the work-life field and enabled business and community leaders nationwide to listen in.

"We consider it very significant that both campaigns have taken work-life issues seriously," says Ellen Galinsky. "This is the first ever Presidential campaign in which both nominees have formally articulated their positions in this arena.”

Among the questions addressed were the following:

- What are the work and family life issues the candidate feels are most important to address?

- What is the candidate's position on workplace flexibility? What are the roles of the government, employers and employees in providing workplace flexibility?

- Should the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) be changed and, if so, in what ways? Should it be paid? By whom? Should sick leave be established and paid? By whom and for whom?

- How would the candidate address issues of the time famine that so many employees experience?

- How does each candidate plan to address the impact of the gas crisis on commuting employees?

- How can work life issues help address the spiraling cost of health care?

- What if anything, does either party plan to do to support the 45% of employees taking care of our growing elderly population?

While just about every association or nonprofit in America is concerned about the expected impact of the U.S. economic meltdown and federal bailout efforts, some organizations are doing much more than worry. As they have historically whenever a national crisis has arisen, associations are creatively drawing on their expertise and resources to help others weather the financial storm. Here are a few examples:

Staffing company executives from across the U.S. will provide résumé and interviewing advice to help strengthen the job-searching skills of residents in San Diego, California, October 22 during Staffing World 2008, the American Staffing Association annual convention and expo. The day of giving back to the conference's host city marks the first large-scale corporate social responsibility project in the organization’s history. Attendees expect to serve hundreds of local professionals seeking help in finding new jobs and careers.

The Financial Planning Association hosted two special conference calls for members last week to “address the financial crisis and how to best serve clients during this turbulent time.” It also developed an online resource center for them, archived the conference calls for 24/7 online access, urged members to reach out to each other in the association’s discussion areas, pulled together online education sessions about “managing client emotions” and holding difficult conversations, and analyzed details of the bailout legislation. It also released results of a new consumer survey that shows “how critical the pairing of a professional financial planner and the creation of a comprehensive financial plan can be to an individual’s long-term financial success” and urged members to use it to help frightened investors find guidance.

The American Bankers Association and thousands of volunteer bankers joined with students nationwide to celebrate its sixth “Get Smart About Credit Day” October 16 to provide “a credit reality check” and explain how to use credit responsibly. According to Laura Fisher, ABA Education Foundation director, “We are in the midst of a national teachable moment on credit use, and bankers are seizing this opportunity to educate future generations…. This is a tough time for everyone, but it’s not the time to let up on financial education.” Volunteers also encouraged parents to use the opportunity to talk to their children about smart use of credit and money management, and to download a free A.C.T. Credit Pledge (A=Assess your debt. C=Check your credit report for errors.T=Take the information and create a plan.)