Happy Friday and Welcome to the Weekly Wrap Up brought to you by the team at YourMembership.com! The weekly wrap-ups are a great resource to find industry provoking articles, blog posts, upcoming events, fun facts, and provide up-to-date news and tips found throughout the association and workforce space each week. Please feel free to leave a comment, ask a question or just enjoy the week’s top ten picks!
Top Ten Picks of the Week:
1) How to Create a Culture of Candor by Alan Murray
Adapted from “The Wall Street Journal Guide to Management” by Alan Murray, published by Harper Business.
There are no silver bullets in the field of management. But insisting on candor comes as close to being an all-purpose problem-solver as any idea yet encountered. There are many different terms for it – transparency, integrity, honesty, full-disclosure, facing reality – but whatever you call it, it appears to be at the core of all great organizations.
2) 5 Surprising People Who Are Hurting Your Career by Erin Palmer
Experience, a strong network and an excellent resume are important aspects of a strong career. But to truly propel your professional development, take stock of your personal influencers and make sure they aren’t stifling your career potential.
Even the most independent among us have people who influence our decision-making, whether consciously or not. I learned this lesson in my first job as a babysitter. One of the families I worked for was awful. The job came with low pay, a messy house and out-of-control children. I hated working for them, but I did it anyway on many occasions.
3) Will Social Media Kill Membership Associations? by Melissa Harrison
According to CNN, approximately 75% of people get their news from social media sites. This includes information about upcoming events, the pulse of business and yes, even your association.
Should associations be afraid of social media? Does this mean your membership efforts are for naught and it’s time to close the door?
Absolutely not. Social media is not the death of your association.
So, how can you protect yourself from an early demise in an age where information is freely available and your members might check their social networks before coming to your organization?
4) You Have the Power to Super Charge Your Attendees’ Brains by Jeff Hurt
What if you as a conference organzier had the magical ability to literally change your attendees’ brains for the better?
Guess what! You do have that power.
Wow, that’s an awesome responsibility and one that should not be taken lightly.
5) Social Business Demands Culture Change by Maddie Grant
Social business demands culture change.
Leveraging technology in today’s social world goes way beyond the technical requirements—success or failure seems more dependent on how flexible and effective your management practices are, rather than your specific IT competency.
Departments fighting over who owns social media? That’s a silo issue, not a social media issue.
Don’t trust younger staff to lead your technology innovation? That’s a trust issue, not a technology issue.
Internal collaboration platforms not working as they should? That’s a workflow and value prop issue, not a platform issue.
Not enough systems thinking, too many “knowledge archipelagos”? That’s a transparency and data sharing issue.
6) Fierce Membership: Telling Your Fierce Members’ Stories by KiKi L’Italien
What is “fierce membership” and how is it different than what associations have witnessed before?
A “fierce member”…:
knows their benefits and probably wants all of them plus more
wants to be involved in volunteer efforts and will leave if not given the chance to change the organization (after all, they are already educated and active in the other free ways to engage, as well)
desperately wants to change the organization for the better from the inside-out
7) Dear Associations, Here’s Why You Need to Know Social Media by Steve Drake
Ok, I borrowed this headline from Andrea Smith’s post on Mashable. And, changed “Today Show” to “associations.”
Here’s the key point of her blog about the Today Show journalists:
“It’s not OK to know nothing about social media or the Internet anymore. It’s especially not OK if you are an anchor for a major network TV news program. It was meant to be cute, but it came off as plain dumb. Here’s a wake-up call, morning crew; your audience is not that dumb.”
While this post is directed to journalists on the Today Show … it is highly relevant to association CEOs, association executives, association professionals and association leaders.
8 ) Why Is It So Hard To Treat Member Engagement As Our Core Business by Anna Caraveli
All “must reads” I suggested to the Demand-Driven CEO Network members this week were focused on understanding, providing value to and reframing relationships with customers (members, stakeholders, donors and other types of customers).
The cases for customer centricity come, as is usually the case, from the business world. From an interview with Jeff Bezos that gives us a glimpse into how he thinks, to an article about trends toward co-development with the customer, it seems clear that for the companies referenced, innovation, planning, product development, culture and strategy (in random order) are anchored in, and begin with, the customers and markets. And I don’t mean “the market” in a micro-tactical sense here, as in when members prefer to receive renewal letters; which programs they prefer; or what survey results say.
9) Social Media Strategy – Do You Have the Right One? by Elizabeth
It’s the end of January my friends and all the reality is setting in. You made a resolution to use social media to grow your business but did you write down how to do it? Do you have a plan of attack? If you are going to organize your Social Media for your business you need a plan. What do you need to post? Where do you need to post? How often? What time is the best?
10) 10 Strategies to Supercharge Conference and Meeting Keynotes by Anne Thornley-Brown
While keynote slots and general session panels are often reserved for speakers with celebrity status, some of them miss the mark. Some are one-way presentations with little or no interaction with the audience; others are not relevant to attendees.
Here are 10 tips to unleash more power and impact from your conference keynotes.
That’s this week’s weekly wrap-up! Have a great weekend everyone and Happy Groundhog Day!!!! – Holly
