Acronym

A couple weeks ago, I volunteered as a judge for an awards program. When I originally signed up for this duty and when I filled out an online evaluation survey about my volunteer experience, I was asked "Why do/did you want to serve as a judge for this program?"

I like that I was asked that question. It had an open-text answer field, so I explained in my own words why I volunteered, and I hope the association is able to use that info to its advantage. It was a good reminder to me that the answers to "why" questions are extremely valuable in a way that the answers to "what" questions can't quite reach.

Consider these two "what" questions that could appear on any member or volunteer application or survey:

• What types of resources or educational programs are you most interested in receiving or attending?
• What types of volunteer opportunities would you be most interested in?

And now consider these two "why" questions:

• Why did you join this association?
• Why did you sign up to volunteer?

In either case, you'll get some pretty good info about your members (quantifiable data, even, if you do it right), which you can use to match your offers with the appropriate segments of your members. The difference between the two, however, is the difference between interests and motivations.

It's great to know that a member is interested in writing for your journal. It's even better to know that she's interested in writing for your journal because:

• She sees it as a prestigious publication in which to appear.
• Or, her company wants to gain exposure for a new product it has developed.
• Or, she is writer by training and she wants to exercise her writing muscles in a way that she isn't able to in her normal job.

These are three very different motivations, and knowing which one applies gives you the ability to directly appeal to that intrinsic, personal benefit when informing that member of future events, products, and volunteer opportunities.

But you can't get that info about motivations if you don't ask "why."

I told the association for which I volunteered that I wanted to serve as a judge to see and learn from the best examples of work in our industry. The networking was nice, sure, and so was the sense of contribution to industry, but learning from the best definitely topped my list.

If that association leads with "learning from the best" the next time it tells me about an event or a chance to volunteer, I'll be more likely to sign up.