Acronym

Jumping right into this week's look at notable things from the last week (or so) of blogosphere activity...

First, 7 steps to a clean RFP process from Rick Johnston over at Ironwork's Fit & Finish blog. It was written from a Technology Conference perspective, but the tips help RFPs for nontechie things too.

Tim Arnold from Beaconfire asks, "Are your mobile assumptions correct?" The post reminds us to ask the fundamental question: what is it your users would want to get out of your organization through a mobile device?

Every once in a while I have to throw a link in because it nails my own veiwpoint so well. Lynn Morton does so on the SNAP blog in describing the great utility of RSS. She stops just short of the description I'd use, which is that RSS is magic for your website.

Here's post with a link to a presentation from Jeff Hurt over on Midcourse Corrections. I like the slides, and I like the 4Cs of social engagement (Jeff, don't be mad, please, but I want to give the 4Cs: content, collaboration, community, and cumulative value.) Jeff gives us the why. The post reminds me of a post from Maddie Grant from OCtober 2009 that I still love today. She has the 5Cs of engagement, but her post tells you how.

Stepping outside of the association-specific context: as always, Seth Godin's blog remains a must read. Here's a post that will make you a better motivator of people.

And now a few that our thought projects for you, so you can decide how such ideas may or could affect your associaiton:

The creator of Delicious social bookmarking is building a new social media platform; this one is a market where people who have talent or skills hook up with those in needs.

Every day on Facebook, people watch 150 years worth of video.

And here are two about Asia -- nothing really knew, but amazing nonetheless. The first is a blog post the brings to light the amazing fact of the size of China. Hint: If you put the entire population of North America, Central America, and South America into the Continental U.S. -- you'd still be shy a few 10s of millions. I'm cheating on the second, it's a video from the TED Conference about when China and India will overtake the U.S. in economic importance.

A survey report released yesterday has good news and bad news for association advocacy and government-relations professionals.

In short, it gives evidence that in-person constituent contact is the top method for influencing legislators, well above the effectiveness of direct contact from lobbyists. But, it seems that wide-scale grassroots form-letter campaigns are not nearly so effective.

These are both techniques often used by associations in their lobbying efforts, so this info provides a mixed bag of advice. The report, Communicating with Congress: Perceptions of Citizen Advocacy on Capitol Hill, conducted by The Partnership for a More Perfect Union at the Congressional Management Foundation, presents the results of a survey of 260 congressional staff members, mostly in the House of Representatives, in fall 2010.

My initial reaction to this is that every association that hosts a legislative "fly-in" day to bring members to meet with Congress should relay this piece of data to its members. What better way to encourage participation than to say "Your presence is the most effective method possible to represent the industry's needs to our legislators"?

But on the form-letter point, I wonder if this kind of grassroots advocacy is the best use of an association's GR resources or if it needs rethought. The report says that 53 percent of congressional staffers surveyed believe that form-message campaigns are sent without constituents' knowledge or approval. Whether this is true or not, it's a clear indicator of a lack of impact among the intended targets.

I'm not a GR pro, though, so I'm curious for your reaction to these points and to the report in general. What advocacy methods has your association found most effective?

[Sidenote: you may also be interested in "5 Ways Hill Staffers Evaluate Your Association," by Bill Dalbec, from this month's issue of ASAE's Government Relations e-newsletter.]

January is one of my least favorite times of the year. The holidays are over, and it's cold and dreary outside. At least there's plenty of interesting online conversation happening in the association realm to keep me distracted.

Innovation. Jeff De Cagna and Eric Lanke, CAE, have begun a back-and-forth series of blog posts on innovation in associations. Jeff kicked it off last week, and Eric followed up this week. These two have likely devoted more personal mindpower to the broad topic of association innovation than anyone else you'll find. This is a conversation to follow.

AMS ROI. Wes Trochlil explains that an association management system should benefit an association in ways beyond just enhanced data management.

Open GR. Stefanie Reeves, CAE, interviews Maddie Grant, co-author of Open Community, about how the concepts it the book apply to association government relations professionals.

Facebook. Maggie McGary explains why the thought of Facebook fully replacing websites sounds like "the worst idea ever."

New products. Seth Godin asks, Why the need for a big splash? Perhaps a quiet, obscure launch for a company or product is best. That's how Google and most major web companies started, after all.

Online groups. Maddie Grant points to a new Pew Internet Research study about the effects of the web on how people form groups. Obvious implications for associations.

Microvolunteering. Robert Rosenthal at the Engaging Volunteers blog explores the varying definitions of microvolunteering and asks whether the definition really matters, as long as organizations are experimenting with it.

The over-50 crowd. Dan Pallotta at HBR writes on the value of age and experience, which often goes overlooked in the fuss over young "potential."

Website landing pages. Copyblogger offers five common mistakes made by organizations that build website landing pages, whether it be a "sales page, an email opt-in page, a video landing page, or even a content landing page designed to rank well in search engines."

Okay, so a long time ago I wrote several blog posts related to Goplow.com, our associations new content+community website, and I promised more...and then I didn't get you anything else because nothing great happened for a while. But I am here with an update as our small association pushes itself hard to build this resource we've created. And I must say that creating and growing an online community is the wild west of the association world; one must stay true to the association's goals and fight through the cacophony of noise that is out there relating to creating and fostering a digital community.

Thanks to great resources at ASAE and some solid colleagues met through the annual meeting, I was emotionally prepared for the initial LAL (lull after launch, just made that up). Since then, we've made some good headway, here are some things we have done:

A Great Story: We launched a video contest for our publication in the fall. Each issue we feature a snow professional on the cover, and it's a great honor, so we created a contest where folks could submit videos explaining why their story should be told. We got a whopping 8 entries, 2 of which didn't qualify, so sounds like a drag, right? I disagree; we got 6 great companies to share their stories with us, and the winner especially had a powerful story that I think will resonate with our magazine readership, and we probably would have never known of it...and we doubled our traffic to the site BTW and people really watched the videos.

Partnering: We forged a new publishing partnership, believe it or not with our main competitor online in our market. We strategically built our site to differentiate it from this site from the start, so together we complement each other and offer better choice for our advertisers and end-users. This allows us to spread our message via email and in print to new audiences, at much higher numbers then previously; we provide quality content links, they feature their diverse community, and both sites drive traffic.

Synergy: In the past year we launched an online marketplace with another partner, linked to our site homepage. In 2011 we hope to take this a step further, pulling the sites closer by creating a sub-domain on our site for the marketplace, which will allow us to leverage the high-SEO potential of a site like the marketplace (tons of links to other sites!), and make it easier to market the sites (instead of separate URL's) to drive traffic, and make it more intuitive for site users.

Constant Review: We just finished a user's survey, and thanks to a very strong financial start for the site in terms of ad sales, we are able to re-invest a portion of that revenue into the site in 2011. Concept is: launch, implement, review, rework, and the process starts all over again.

Would love to hear how others are building their online communities in any function, or if anyone has advice for us as we grow our fledgling community!

A great article came through my feed recently (thank you, Maddie Grant, for sharing) -
"Experimental Marketing: 1 out of 20 Ain't Bad" outlining the failures of the infamous Office Max "Elf-Yourself" campaign. Yes, the failures.

I couldn't help but think about my experience to date as an association professional. How many of our organizations work from a mind set and culture that would see 19 campaign or pilot program failures as a success?

Obviously, most of us don't have budgets that come close to the scale referenced in this article, and it may be a bit extreme to try and compare this Office Max case study to any organization in the association landscape. However, the mind set of association work seems to be what holds many organizations back.

• Are we conditioned to fear failure, rather than embrace it in the assocation landscape?

• Even if we operate with an acceptable amount of risk, do we truly have the ability to respond with agility, given the approval process and volunteer oversight?

What do you think?

The first Haiti earthquake anniversary this week has prompted myriad progress reports from the many associations and nonprofits who responded with volunteers, professional guidance, money, and resources. With almost 500 projects and 80 major NGOs doing on-the-ground work in the devastated region, it's easy to get confused about who's doing what as our community continues to respond to the crisis.

Luckily, this week also marks the release of a helpful free tool that aims to foster partnerships among nonprofits and associations, "strengthen corporate and NGO relationships, and increase transparency and accountability." It's called the Haiti Aid Map, and it's a who's-doing-what-where map with snapshots of projects and their coordinating groups. Created by InterAction in partnership with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Business Civic Leadership Center, it was funded by FedEx, a master of organization and mapping.

I encourage you to refer to it, whether you have ongoing projects there or not, because so many of your peers are making a difference in that challenging zone, and you may find something that would inspire your organization to get involved as well.

Meanwhile, here are a couple of things that associations are doing right here in the U.S. that are improving life in Haiti. If you're mostly interested in philanthropic giving, perhaps some of their projects will prompt you to write a supportive check.

The American Library Association (ALA), for instance, has distributed $25,000 to clear and prepare land and complete designs for one of three libraries it plans to rebuild and equip through its Haiti Library Relief Fund . Its needs a lot more money, though--just one library will cost an estimated $325,000-$350,000 to rebuild and equip.

The Haiti-inspired partnership between the American Dental Association's Division of Global Affairs and Health Volunteers Overseas has focused on raising $300,000 through an innovative Adopt-a-Practice program to rebuild 30 dental practices, almost one-third of all dental health facilities in the region. ADA also has developed an International Disaster Assistance Volunteer Inventory based on a survey for members interested in volunteering in the aftermath of an international natural disaster.

The American Bar Association Center on Children and the Law, in collaboration with the ABA Family Law Section and Section of Litigation, and the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys, hosted a free webinar on "How Attorneys and State Court Judges Can Aid in Finalizing Adoptions for Haitian Children Now in the U.S" and is offering its materials for free downloads to anyone interested.

Also, for the record, as a result of such outreach work, many organizations also have found that they've galvanized members, boosted innovation, and added meaningful value to their brand and membership offerings. Please accept my personal congratulations for your efforts and commitment. I've heard astonishing stories of what your members and staffers are doing even a year after the earthquake.

Let's face it: none of us have really been here before. Yes, we've all navigated tough times, but not like this. The foundations of our economy have fundamentally changed, and things may never be exactly as they were.

A while back, Paul Pomerantz, worldwide executive director of the Drug Information Association, shared with me a Business Week article titled "Is your CEO recession capable?" It suggested that many for-profit executives weren't equipped to lead in these times and that a rethink of competencies and behaviors is essential. While the U.S. economy is now growing, it's clear that things are very different—and difficult.

It struck me—and a number of my CEO colleagues—that we need to start a new conversation about what's really different and how we may need to grow and develop to ensure that we're able to help our organizations fulfill missions and goals and realize personal fulfillment.

After initiating the conversation with the ASAE Fellows group, Paul, Henry Chamberlain (president and CEO of BOMA International), Pamela Kaul (president and founder of Association Strategies) and I joined about 50 CEOs at the 2010 ASAE Annual Meeting & Expo in Los Angeles for a conversation on what it takes to lead in these crazy times. It was a beginning. First, a couple of assumptions that framed our conversation:

• This isn't like any other downturn we've ever seen, and reprising past practices won't be enough.
• Nobody is perfectly equipped to lead now based purely on experience in tough times.
• A new mix of competencies and behaviors will be necessary to lead effectively.
• It's time for CEOs to grow.

Rather than list all the takeaway points from our conversation, I'd like to share three key themes that emerged. Your thoughts are welcomed.

• We need to rethink our teams and how we function. We must become effective at getting more minds with diverse skill sets into the game and encourage them (and ourselves) to "challenge authority" in a constructive and effective way. The consensus was that we need to encourage and support our teams by promoting development and sharing authority and visibility.

• We need to rethink how we develop ourselves and spend our time. According the Business Week article I referenced above, the optimal "recession CEO" time allocation may be 20 percent CEO, 40 percent COO, and 40 percent CFO. Given that many of our groups have enjoyed the fruits of long, continuous growth, I wonder if many of us have grown to become strategic thinkers and visionaries who are less connected to operational realities. Is it time to get back to basics and all the development or choices that come with it?

• We need to exert even more future-focused leadership while not being perceived as controlling or overly directive. Now that boards are expecting more than ever before—while sometimes, paradoxically, being more risk averse—successful CEOs will need to deliver more creative and practical approaches to vexing problems than ever before. Many of us have done as much as possible on the expense side, and the expectation is that we will need to grow our way out. One participant suggested that, in order to succeed, we need to demonstrate "vulnerability to our boards and staff while at the same time exuding confidence." Like I said, we need to grow.

In a future post, I'd like to share some thoughts that emerged about the concept of "fail fast, fail small, learn, and adapt."

Please welcome new guest blogger Joel Albizo, CAE, executive director of the Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Boards in Fairfax, Virginia. Joel led a Learning Lab at the 2010 ASAE Annual Meeting & Expo titled "Do You Have What It Takes To Be a 'Recession CEO?'" with colleagues Henry Chamberlain, CAE, Pamela Kaul, and Paul Pomerantz, CAE, and will offer some insights over the next few weeks on that very topic. Welcome Joel!

I wrote the bulk of this post in December but sat on it until after the holidays. In light of the discussion spurred by Joe Flowers' post about not renewing with ASAE and Scott's follow-up post about social media changing the future for associations, I'm glad I waited.

Anyway, some other online discussions that actually preceded Joe's post already had me wondering what the world would look like without associations. Frankly, I have a hard time picturing it, but that might just be because I'm not very imaginative. In addition to the posts ensuing from Joe Flowers' post (which Scott is compiling as they arise), also see:

• On ASAE's Executive Management listserver, in response to a request for guidance about starting a membership organization, Steve Townsend posted a lengthy message about the challenges that the membership model faces today. "If we all had the option of starting from scratch ... we might explore other alternatives to that model," he says.
• Eric Lanke, CAE, wrote last month that members of associations greatly underestimate the true costs of the services associations provide.
• Back in October, Diane James, CAE, wrote an excellent post here on Acronym asking why associations haven't adopted new business models, despite an apparent consensus that the traditional association model is doomed.
• Also last month, Jeff Hurt asked how associations will transition from push economies to pull economies.

The question we all seem to be struggling with is, more or less, "It's getting so easy for people to self-organize and to find what they want for free, why would people need associations in the future?" But Eric Lanke's post struck a particular chord with me, on which I'd like to expand here.

I'm not convinced that free stuff and self-organized groups (the internet's two-pronged menace) would fill the void that associations would leave if they disappeared tomorrow. (Poof!) The question that's always stuck in my mind is, "Where's the business model?"

Here's what I mean by that: if self-organized groups were to inherit the Earth, how will they (or who else will) pull off the most resource-intensive services that associations currently provide? Things like conferences, advocacy, and certification. Despite the forward march of technology, the value of all of these is still quite high. I've just never been able to make the leap in my mind from self-formed groups to large-scale products and services. When a group of like-minded people finds it can no longer bear the burden of serving itself through the goodwill of volunteers, it hires a staff to manage these things, and it turns to bundled or unbundled fees to support that overhead. At its very basic, isn't that how every association gets its start?

Don't mistake this for an argument against the need for change, though. I'm with you. We all need to evolve. But rather I put this forth as a challenge: Paint the scenario in which what associations do today is fully replaced by emerging social dynamics and new business models tomorrow.

We've fidgeted over business-model innovation for associations for a while; let's red-team it and create the anti-association business model. Then maybe we can learn from it. So, please, tell me: what does association doomsday look like?

[Sidenote: Lisa Junker, CAE, got this started in her "A World Without Associations" vignette in the "Visions for the Future of Associations" feature from the January 2010 issue of Associations Now. The only reason she wrote that essay herself, though, is because she couldn't find anyone else to write it. Here's a new chance to step up, people.]

Photo credit: www.coach2accomplish.com