A Request For Input

Bud Crouch, Summit Leader of the 2009 Governance Summit would like the opinion of Canadian association executives, whether attending the Summit or not.  He values the opinions of association professionals such as yourself.

 

There are a lot people trying to prognosticate what the future of associations will look like 60 – 72 months out.  What will be the major challenges and what will successful association look like?

 

Below is the link to ‘The Association Future Scape’.  Please share your views on the subject.  Bud would like to compile the results and use them at the Governance Summit in November and when working with other organizations in the future.  You can post your comments here, on this CSAE conference blog or if you prefer through Twitter.  If you post on Twitter please use the hashtag - #csae09 so we may track the replies. Thank you for feedback and your help to put out a finger on the pulse of what is ahead for associations.

 

Article - http://www.csae.com/public.asp?WCE=C=56|K=228377|CAL=220579

Comments

[Don Butcher, CAE]

I have a mixed response to this: some of it is way out of date, some of it is spot-on.

Value Proposition -- there's nothing new in this paragraph ... the challenge of ROI has been with us since I entered the field 23 years ago.

Competition -- Right on the mark. The number of for-profits that are getting into the meetings and information businesses that have been the purview of associations is truly scary. Fortunately, they charge a higher price, so this is an opportunity to raise our prices to market levels and continue to offer a superior product, generating a higher margin.

Financial Resources -- As noted above, an increasing challenge as for-profits suck up discretionary dollars. And increasing the diversity of the revenue streams is a double-edged sword: might (and I mean "might") generate discretionary revenue to be reinvested in the core business, but might also distract from the efforts to achieve the mission, destroying the reason members are members. By the way, membership growth is not be a goal: it's an outcome measure. For more on the fallacy of membership growth, see the Sept. 2009 issue of ASAE's "Associations Now" magazine

Human Resources -- I agree. Volunteerism is being totally restructed (the reasons are too many to go into here), and somehow we have to convince our owners that the best thing they can do is invest in paid staff. It's the only way the activities in support of the mission are going to be accomplished. "Yes" to shorter, more focused volunteer efforts, and "yes" to greater use of technology, but if an association truly wants to move forward, financial investments will be needed in technology, systems and staff.

Overall, we as a sector have a handle on governance. The next macro-direction will be on operations: actually getting the work done.

- Don