Association Transformation

Send us Fan Mail At this year's ASAE Annual Meeting, keynote speaker Marcus Whitney encouraged association professionals to reexamine their perception of innovation and offered practical lessons on how organizations could be creative and goal-oriented. But what else did we learn from #ASAE22? Elisa and Andrew are joined by association community specialist, blogger, and fellow podcaster, Kiki...

Send us Fan Mail After two years of unprecedented change for individuals and organizations both societally and globally, with their 2022 State of Membership Survey Fonteva wanted to learn not just about where associations have been, but where they are going. Many associations have adapted and evolved as the needs and expectations of their members have changed and many have stepped into numerous ro...

Send us Fan Mail The Entomological Society of America (ESA) is a non-partisan scientific organization which represents a broad spectrum of opinions united under one principle: the promotion and advancement of scientific inquiry, discovery, and communication. Within the context of its diverse membership, the ESA has devised a successful approach to engaging in topics of broad  social interest, incl...

Send us Fan Mail Maintaining diverse income streams is (or should be) a ubiquitous priority for association leaders. While the pandemic focused our attention on new approaches to securing non-dues revenue, post-pandemic it is incumbent on us to to sustain partnerships and innovations that underpin financial strength, promote business resilience, and support the development of an equally diverse va...

Send us Fan Mail This week's episode is sponsored by our friends at Cambridge Publishing Ltd (www.cpl.co.uk). Elisa and Andrew are joined by Martin Bewick, Senior Content Strategist at CPL to explore the value of devising an association's content strategy and the impact of cultivating a content culture.  There is no single 'right' model and Martin helps us understand the proces...

Send us Fan Mail How's life in Association World? What are the priorities? What are we talking about and what should we be talking about? This week Elisa and Andrew spend time exploring the subjects that pique their interest as they reflect on the ongoing development and focus of membership organisations since launching Association Transformation nearly two years ago. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Salesforce recently published its 7th annual report on marketing within the global nonprofit environment. Over 8,200 marketing professional from more than 30 countries were surveyed on the shifts which have occurred in marketing strategies, priorities, and challenges during 2021. It makes insightful reading and this week Elisa and Andrew are joined by marketing specialists Lorrain...

Send us Fan Mail Ahead of their session at the this year's ASAE's annual meeting in Nashville, Jessica Irizarry, Michelle Runge, and Elisa share their views with Andrew on the imperative to elevate awareness of and appreciation for the centrality of component relations amongst associations.  Register for the 2022 ASAE Annual Meeting at https://annual.asaecenter.org/index.cfm.  Support th...

Send us Fan Mail Organizations that employ the strategy of Continuous Disruptive Innovation (CDI) are a rare breed. They require disruptive leadership teams who create tremendous long-term value by nurturing periods of sustained ideation and value creation. They build platforms or networks that give rise to the development of a series of offerings, each of which creates further disruption within a...

Send us Fan Mail The last two years have seen unprecedented disruption across the world and businesses have had to adapt to survive. In 2017, McKinsey wrote a report called the Five Trademarks of Agile Organisation. Today's guests, Marcia Philpin explains how she adapted the five trademarks and developed the FPM's House of Agile to nurture, sustain, and grow the FPM during the pandemic....

Send us Fan Mail When he defined the concept of "attention economics" in 1971, Nobel Laureate Herbert A. Simon wrote that "...a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention...".  50 years later, and in a data-rich world, the overwhelming wealth of information available to us means a dearth of something else, i.e. the scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes...

Send us Fan Mail Exposure to fresh perspectives, new ways of doing things, alternative solutions, peer networks, and creative ideas is fundamentally every association's core purpose; and building and capitalising on an international network is an effective way of delivering against an association's mission. But many association leaders grapple with international business development, not...

Send us Fan Mail Storytelling is humanity’s oldest technology for connection, identity, and sense making. And today it’s the mission-critical competency for knowledge-era leaders. The world's most influential leaders are telling stories, including association leaders and Elisa and Andrew are joined by the Storyteller Leader, David Hutchens and discuss how to bring the power of authentic human...

Send us Fan Mail 2021 was a tough one. Tougher than many of us expected. But there were still plenty of highlights and successes, and there's a lot to look forward to in 2022. In the Season 3 opener, Elisa and Andrew reflect on the big takeaways from 2021 and explore what's exciting them in the membership world for the year ahead. Welcome back to Association Transformation! Support the s...

Send us Fan Mail They call it the "great resignation" but is it really going to turn out to be that? Certainly, as with so many professions, post-pandemic, association executives are reassessing their priorities, reexamining their career paths, and rethinking what it is that they want from work. Bob Corlett, Founder & President of Staffing Advisors joins Elisa and Andrew to explore t...

Send us Fan Mail Neuro-Linguistic Programming is the practice of understanding how people organise their thinking, feeling, language and behaviour to produce the results they do. It's been defined as the “users manual for your mind” because studying NLP gives us insights into how our thinking patterns can affect every aspect of our lives, including in our roles as association leaders. We mark...

Send us Fan Mail Since last year's Associations Week, it's fair to say that the membership sector has more than proven itself adept at managing change. There's no doubt that associations have demonstrated their worth as creative, adaptive, flexible, innovative, ambitious, and responsive focal points of many professional communities. But at what cost? Heightened member expectations,...

Send us Fan Mail It is fundamental to the principles of ESG that governance can and should be used to leverage positive, sustainable change; and as focal points of civic society, through their governance action, professional membership bodies can work to realise significant cultural change. Elisa and Andrew are joined by first-time Board member, Leanne Antoine, who as a newly appointed member of t...

Send us Fan Mail Have you ever been in a meeting with someone who is clearly giving you the same presentation they've given before to other audiences? There are some telltale signs: a generic set of benefits, little anticipation of objections, a lack of details that speak to your specific situation. Chances are that you tuned out somewhere along the way because you didn’t feel connected to wh...

Send us Fan Mail UNESCO describes 'futures literacy' as "...a universally accessible skill that builds on the innate human capacity to imagine the future, offers a clear, field tested solution to poverty-of-the-imagination." FL is a capability  that allows people to better understand the role of the future in what they see and do. Being futures literate empowers the imagination...

Send us Fan Mail Every four years the best are brought together to compete. What makes the best of the best in association leadership? Andrew and Elisa undertake an Olympic discussion of gold, silver and bronze competencies. In advance of the IAL releasing its leadership systems map, this week we explore the changing and emerging skills required of gold medal CEOs and how to employ and frame compe...

Send us Fan Mail Video is such a powerful medium! To educate, to engage, to bring together. You add some special effects, the written word, and some music, and you’re able to influence people in ways you just can’t do with a still graphic or an email.” While the cat’s away ( no Andrew this episode )… we chat video and the power of visual storytelling to advance mission-driven organizations. Elisa...

Send us Fan Mail How would you score in a communications audit? Shannon Powell Rodocker joins Elisa and Andrew in exploring the impact of good (and bad!) communications and introduces us to the process and value of routinely auditing, investing, reviewing, and refreshing association communications. Visit www.remembermkt.com for more details on the audit toolkit. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail With a guest list that reads like a who's-who of global association specialists, we've enjoyed an incredible first year of insights, debate, and banter. Join Elisa and Andrew as they reflect on their first 12 months of transatlantic conversation and look forward to what the next 12 months has in store. Happy Birthday, Association Transformation! Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Disagreement, misunderstandings and tensions amongst team members are not uncommon. Indeed, conflict amongst people is a natural part of everyday life but in the context of our professional lives, conflict does not need to be destructive. Instead, it can and should be used as a tool that allows teams to take action to accomplish a particular goal. Getting issues out in the open an...