Review
Thanks to Eric at the “That Inscrutable Thing” blog for reviewing our book! Read what he wrote here. And thanks to everyone who keeps buying the book. We’re over 1,300 sold.
Entries Tagged as 'We've Always Done It That Way'
More on Not Pleasing Everyone
Kevin Holland has a nice post about finding your association’s “sweet spot” that expands on the post I did here about not trying to please everyone.
Don’t Be A Bad Toaster
Seth Godin just wrote a blog post about buying the worst toaster ever, and his message is basically another version of David’s “Get Out of Their Way” post from the book.
Just Ask Them!
Blogger Maddie Grant (who, for all you trivia buffs out there, was the first person to get all five authors to sign a copy of the book) wrote a nice post today about how grateful some of her members were to be even ASKED their opinion. It reminded me of Amy’s post about Generational Education. And Maddie points out that sometimes you need more than just the epiphany that asking people what they think is a good idea:
But my biggest “Doh!” moment was this: at the end of the discussion, I was thanking everyone for giving up their break time and talking to me about it, and someone said, “No, we want to thank you for coming here - nobody has ever asked us what we thought about it before.”
I mean, I knew this was true, because I have made it my number one priority for us staff to have a real presence at all of our events and for all of our members to know who we are and be free to talk to us about anything. But to have someone actually say it, point blank, made me realize that there is a HUGE cultural shift that I need to make happen, where all members and students are made to feel part of our community, not just the core few who are involved the most. And all it takes to make that shift start to happen, is to be able to show that I care what each of them has to say. Which I do! So I will keep asking.
2008: Three commitments for our community
2008 is fast approaching, and it is going to be a very significant, and quite possibly, historic year for both our country and our world. Not only will America elect its 44th president next fall, but all eyes will be on Beijing during the month of August as China plays host to the Games of the XXIX Olympiad. On a very personal level, I’m looking forward to celebrating my 40th birthday in March 2008. Well, that’s not exactly true. I’m neither “looking forward to” nor “celebrating” the conclusion of my 40th year of life, but I am paying close attention to what I can learn from the inevitability of this important milestone, as well as what new inspiration and imagination its arrival will bring.
This spirit of discovery and possibility in the face of inexorable reality fills me with a genuine hope that 2008 will be a momentous year for our association community as well, a time in which our commitment to meaningful innovation is dominant, and our “we have always done it that way” reflex is in decline. To help nurture this hope in others, I want to propose three “commitments” of learning and action for the association community to pursue in the coming year. Individually, each of these commitments is about building stronger organizations and, by design, a stronger and more authentic community of associations. When taken together, progress on these commitments could be a wellspring of innovation, with broader positive implications for society.
+Commit to build new capacity for association stewardship—Far too many associations, especially small organizations, continue to struggle with the profound challenges of making a complete transition into the 21st Century. The ambiguity and uncertainty unleashed by rapid and on-going paradigm shift creates unprecedented difficulties for all associations. Our traditional business models are decaying, and our standard practices are not delivering their usual impact, if they still work at all. To flourish in the years ahead, our community needs boards, CEOs and other senior leaders who are willing to be inventive, decisive and bold in the pursuit of new forms of success.
+Commit to tear down our irrelevant, self-imposed boundaries—One of the major business imperatives for all associations is the full embrace of inclusion in every conceivable dimension. Diversity is not (and has never been) a human resources buzzword, but a true reflection of our enormous national promise. It is now time for our community to demonstrate that it can fully realize this reservoir of untapped potential. At the same time, we should acknowledge that inclusion isn’t merely a domestic issue. Associations must stretch beyond the limitations of geographic borders, shake off the fear of what we do not understand and reach out to a global, dynamic and diverse network of colleagues to connect, collaborate and create value on behalf of our members and customers.
+Commit to take action on strategic social responsibility—In 2008, all associations will have the opportunity to make a meaningful contribution to a critical dialogue on the importance of strategic social responsibility to our community, our country and our planet. The Global Summit on Social Responsibility, which ASAE & The Center for Association Leadership will convene in the spring of 2008, will be the platform for a robust exchange of ideas around how associations can capitalize on the exciting new business opportunities created when we collaborate to develop solutions to the world’s most pressing environmental and social problems. Strategic social responsibility isn’t about community service or doing good works. It’s about protecting and investing in what was entrusted to us to ensure that it is sustainable for those who will inherit it. It’s not about self-interest. It’s about shared interest.
If we are able to act on these three commitments, we can be catalysts for the kind of deep-seated change and innovation that originally inspired the creation of this book. So will you accept the challenge?
Why We Don’t Do Anything New
Thanks to Scott Briscoe for plugging the book in his recent Acronym post. He provides three reasons why associations don’t do new things: budget, no time, and culture. It’s a very interesting post, so check it out. I was disappointed to find no comments to the post (other than mine). What’s up with that?
Roundtable Ruse
I’ve noticed lately that many associations are discouraging speakers from lecturing (you know – be the “guide on the side” versus the “sage on the stage”). Roundtable discussions seem to be the “in” solution.
But there is a problem. Being an effective guide on the side isn’t easy. I once attended a workshop in which the speakers utilized great in-depth case studies to generate roundtable discussions. They had the groups discuss the cases, report out…and then they moved to the next case. Here were two individuals with combined 30+ years experience and they offered no opinion on how the cases could or should have been handled. They didn’t even identify if they agreed or disagreed with the solutions identified in the report-outs. We all had interesting discussions, but left feeling we still didn’t know how to handle the situations if presented to us. Anyone off the street could have “facilitated” that session. It was easy, but not effective.
If you have experts available, use them – I mean really use them. Don’t let them just organize table discussions; have them use their experience and expertise to facilitate meaningful discussions and learning. As one model, consider how the workshop I attended could be reworked:
- Experts shares enough information and context about the cases to enable a rich discussion
- In small groups, learners discuss case studies and generate ideas for how they would handle the situations
- Each group reports back ideas generated
- Experts debate, clarify and/or build upon the ideas/actions suggested (providing the rationale and/or evidence for their advice)
- Experts close the session by highlighting the key lessons to be taken from the each of the case studies
- Learners depart with knowledge they can use
Now, building a session like this is harder than assigning table topics and letting the session go where it may. Roundtables need a purpose and structure. So, choose your experts carefully and provide them guidance. Your learners will thank you.
Powerpointless
There seems to be a growing trend of associations providing Powerpoint templates for conference speakers. Really, what is the purpose here? Isn’t it kind of boring for each session to have the exact same slide graphics and color scheme? And why do they always seem to be orange? Plus, those header, footer, and sidebar images really compete with the content. Is your association logo more important than my content? (Don’t answer that.)
I understand the benefit of having the same look/message displayed at the beginning and end of each presentation – and I even understand the value of having the last slide serve as a promotion for association services/events. However, I do not see the benefit of mandated template slides for the core presentation.
Another problem is that requiring the use of template slides also implies speakers should use slides! And that’s a dangerous implication given the widespread abysmal use of Powerpoint slides. Of course slides have the potential to enhance a presentation, but when is the last time you were moved by a slide deck?
If you really want to make an impact to your conference sessions, nix the slide template and instead provide guidance and tools to your speakers to help them deliver more effective presentations, with or without visuals. A few ideas:
- Be flexible in room set-up and AV requests; requiring classroom set-up and a podium mike is begging for a traditional lecture.
- Provide speakers with as much information about the audience and their needs as possible; don’t assume they’ll do the research on their own.
- Ask speakers to identify and provide to you their key points (you’d be surprised how many speakers can and will present without ever identifying key points!).
- Provide a guidance document that outlines principles of effective presentations (you can find several model documents online).
- Provide speaker training sessions virtually and at your events - these could be by invitation only or for all potential speakers.
- Hire a presentation coach to work with your speakers one-on-one.
- Establish an arrangement with a presentation coach to offer discounted coaching sessions to your speakers in exchange for your promoting his or her services to that target.
Dump the Happy Sheets
I am going out on a limb here, because I am not an expert in research methods, but I think it is time that we stopped using the standard evaluation forms at conferences. I started my career in the conflict resolution training business, and at the end of each of our training events, we gave our participants an evaluation form. It asked five or ten questions about the quality of the event, the instructors, etc., using a five-point Likert scale. We compiled the scores and included the data in our report to the funders.
Can anyone guess what the scores were? Around 4. There was slight variation (down to maybe 3.5), as some groups were more or less impressed with the venue or the instructors or the content. I learned early on that the instructors derogatorily referred to these evaluation forms as “happy sheets.”
Flash forward fifteen years, and here I am speaking for the association community, anxiously waiting to get back my evaluations to see if I am staying above the magic 4.0 line.
Stop. Throw these forms away. Never use them again. Go back to the drawing board and ask again (or maybe for the first time?), WHY are you using these sheets? I am guessing that the standard answers are things like, we need to compare the quality of different speakers (or the same speaker over time), or we want to know if participants are satisfied with their experience.
Those are laudable goals, but are the happy sheets really getting you there?
Quality of speakers should be based on the impact they have on participants, which is not always measurable at the end of the session (or even a few days later). Some speakers (dare I say, some of my fellow authors!) design sessions specifically to provoke new thinking in the audience. This can be uncomfortable for the participant in the moment, but immensely valuable over the long term. Other speakers need to deliver specific content to help people accomplish a specific task. One person can get tremendous benefit from both sessions, but in the moment rate the provocative session lower than the “just what I needed” session, whose impact is more immediately apparent. Happy sheets don’t tell you who your good speakers are.
Happy sheets don’t tell you much about the participants’ real experience either. As Amy Smith wrote in the first edition of the book, there are critical questions you need to ask when designing your learning experience in the first place, like what are the business problems of your participants that you can help to solve. With those in place, you should design some research to see whether or not your event made progress against those goals. You may find that more qualitative tools will be more effective than happy sheets. Do interviews with participants. Sit in and observe the speakers. Have a session at the conference where a facilitator can have a back-and-forth conversation with participants about what is working or not working at the conference (entice them with some good break food!). Gather data six months later in addition to right after the meeting. If nothing else, you should at least experiment with some of these methods.
The happy sheets provide relatively instant feedback, so I know they are “satisfying” to an organizer. But that is about you. Your event evaluation should be about the event and the customer, and it should be focused on learning, not earning a score. Approach this as a research issue, and design your evaluation research so it will generate learning, which then leads to experimenting and changing the way you do things.
Six principles for designing an architecture of participation
To reinvent eroding membership-centric business models, association leaders will need to answer a fundamental question:
What is the strategic relationship between membership and participation?
In answering this question, leaders also will need to confront the even more fundamental truth that dues payments do not create members. Instead, going forward, association membership must be based on a personal commitment to participate, irrespective of dues payments. The approach associations adopt in this area must be open and flexible enough to accommodate both the absolute need to fully engage the payers of dues and the non-dues paying participant’s choice to be active in the association. While the former will pay for membership in order to participate, the latter will use participation as a form of currency to “pay” for membership.
This type of business model innovation is made necessary by what is happening online. The ease and simplicity with which anyone can make immediate and passionate contributions using free and inexpensive Web 2.0 technologies highlights the lack of an equally clear and accessible “architecture of participation” in most associations. A phrase that originated with the Web 2.0 revolution itself, a useful definition of an architecture of participation as it pertains to organizations in our community is “the collaborative design of pathways for meaningful engagement in and substantive contribution to the association’s work.” Designing an architecture of participation is about much more than simply offering opportunities for involvement. It is about innovating our associations for the future.
Association professionals must begin experimenting right away with developing new architectures of participation. Some of those experiments will fail, while others will evolve to become integral elements of new business models built for sustainable growth. To facilitate these processes of experimentation, staff and volunteer leaders can use the following six design principles:
+Keep it simple—In developing wiki technology, creator Ward Cunningham kept asking an important question: what is the simplest thing that could possibly work? In designing a new architecture of participation that will attract your next contributors, you should be asking yourself the same question over and over again. Try to create the simplest possible participation experience for everyone who wants to contribute by looking carefully at the factors that make your current architecture of participation complicated and less satisfying for your stakeholders.
+Tear down the garden walls—It is impossible for any association today to possess all of the ideas, knowledge and talent it needs to succeed. Fortunately, those resources are quite abundant, connected and mobile in the current marketplace, but they will not be attracted to our organizations if we continue to put up obstacles to keep them out. Just like the Web itself, your new architecture of participation must fully embrace open networks as a tenet of a new business model, and sunset the idea of the association as a walled garden.
+Take down the ladder—The ladder is the most enduring symbol of association participation. Contributors spend years, and usually decades, climbing these ladders in pursuit of leadership opportunities with increasing responsibility and authority. But what if your next contributors aren’t interested in climbing your ladder? What if they are comfortable leading horizontally and don’t necessarily want or need vertical authority to accomplish their goals? To address these questions, your new architecture of participation must reconsider traditional structures and roles, and fully engage the self-organizing leadership talents and coordination capabilities your next contributors bring to the table.
+Be modular—If the ladder is no longer the appropriate metaphor for association involvement, what should replace it? Think Legos. To fully engage your next contributors, your association’s new architecture of participation needs to be as modular as Lego bricks, allowing individuals and groups to quickly assemble, disassemble and rebuild “pieces” of different shapes and sizes to create new experiences that easily connect and enable meaningful collaboration with globally-distributed peer networks on a near real time basis.
+Trust first—Associations use a combination of policies, guidelines, requirements and similar mechanisms to enforce “synthetic trust” within their contributor communities. But community on the Web, as well as the trust that bonds the members of those communities, is considerably more organic, and it is this more authentic way of being that associations must embrace going forward. Your new architecture of participation can energize its next contributors by first demonstrating real trust in them, without requiring prior proof of their fidelity to the association.
+Make success a shared responsibility—Associations are still more comfortable with concentrating responsibility for success in the organizational core at a time when most of the energy for future progress lives at or near the “edge” of our organizations. By distributing real responsibility away from the core, associations can challenge their next contributors to direct their efforts toward executing strategy, advancing mission and realizing vision. Your new
architecture of participation can energize contributors by offering them the opportunity to connect their passionate interests and commitments to the long-term growth and success of the association.
The continuing decline of the membership-centric association business model means the end of association membership as we’ve always known it. To flourish in the years ahead, associations will need to shift their focus away from the inertia of transactional relationships and toward dynamic approaches that can unleash the full potential of passionate engagement.
When Data Crunches You
Ever since Good to Great hit the scene, the association community has gotten data religion. Count this, measure that, does this metric make my balanced score card look fat? The problem with too much data collection is that you can be paralyzed by an undifferentiated mass of input. You become the crunchee rather than the cruncher.
Repeat after me: If a piece of data can’t enable a decision to be made, it isn’t worth measuring. Using this simple rule will dramatically reduce your measurement efforts while simultaneously enabling you to take more action. What’s not to like?
This same approach can be invaluable for your Board of Directors and other leadership bodies. When you are pressed for more and more data, push back. Ask what decisions the requested data will support. If it doesn’t support any, it is in everyone’s best interest to not go through the labor of producing it nor the time of assessing and discussing it. You can move on to those metrics that really matter to your leaders making decisions about the future of the organization.
Do not allow your measurement efforts to crunch you and your leadership.
Spend Less on Promotions, More on Concept
Marketing is the full process of conceptualization, pricing, promotion, and distribution of a program, product or service. Intellectually you probably knew this, but do you live it? In reality, too often the focus of association “marketing” is a slick brochure or an e-mail blast. This, of course, isn’t very effective.
Try something different. For those products that aren’t selling well, cut your promotions budget in half. Then apply those resources to product concept (or re-concept). Why? It may be your product that is the problem, rather than the promotions. You can promote the heck out of a mediocre product but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s a mediocre product. So, most of those promotional dollars are wasted. Even if you’ve created a gem of a promotional campaign and gotten buyers for that mediocre product, will they be satisfied buyers? Repeat buyers?
Consider this real case. An association has been offering a certificate of training program for the past six years. It spends very little on promotion - a listing on its website, occasional e-blasts, and a simple printed flier included in select mailings. Yet, almost all programs have sold out - many with a long waiting list. How? They spent their time wisely and generously on program concept and design. The program meets a real need, and exceeds participant expectations. Now, they don’t have to promote the program; it sells itself. Well, actually, graduates of the program sell it for them. Evaluations data show that over 95% of participants would recommend it to a colleague…and they do. Word-of-mouth marketing at its best.
Consider which of your products, services or programs aren’t selling well regardless of how much you promote them. Then, delve into the product’s concept. Who is the target? What are their needs? Is this product meeting a need? If not, can it be redesigned to meet a need? Is it a mediocre product or a remarkable one? Is it so remarkable that your buyers will “sell” it for you through word-of-mouth? Can you make it so? (Of course, remember that not all products are worthy of a redesign; some may need to be retired.)
A place to start: the product of membership. Do you really need to promote membership more…or do you need to work on making it worth buying?
Avoiding the Real Work of Strategy
In the first edition of this book, I advocated separating “strategy” and “plan.” The primary reason is that when we do “strategic planning,” we end up bolting the weight of our strategy to the details of our plan, making it hard to change, to take in new information, and, in many cases, even to implement. Planning and strategy are simply two different things. They should be “tethered” together, not “bolted.”
But the standard response to my argument since that first edition has been: “Okay, but if we don’t do strategic planning, what do we do instead?” The answer is, you do the real work of strategy. Unfortunately, too many associations find the real work of strategy unfamiliar, and even uncomfortable.
The real work of strategy focuses first on strategic direction—clarifying precisely what drives the association’s success and orienting all decision-making, implementation, and learning in that direction. Honestly, most associations do not do this. They are good at identifying their mission, and they know what programs and services they have, but they rarely can articulate “middle level” strategic thinking that helps everyone from the Board down to the staff understand not only where they are headed, but how they can best get there given the current operating environment. Strategy becomes a guide that everyone uses to evaluate decisions and understand changes in the environment, rather than a thirty-nine-page instruction manual that tells people what they should do.
The second focus of the real work of strategy is learning. What if the world weren’t linear? What if you had to articulate a strategic direction, knowing that you would need to change it on an ongoing basis, but at irregular intervals, based on how the real world unfolds, rather than on the availability of your executive committee? If the world did work that way (and, of course, it does), then you would need to build your organization (structure, process, culture) around learning. Suddenly the work of strategy becomes integrated at all levels, as everyone learns from what they are doing and feeds that learning back into strategic decisions.
Strategy may not be a new concept in your association, but what about the real work of strategy? If you want to go down this road, then prepare yourselves to do things differently. For example:
• Demand creativity. Thriving without creativity only happens in that non-existent linear world.
• Bring more voices into your strategy process. It’s not just beneficial; it is required.
• Describe your association’s entire strategy on the back and front of one page. If you can’t tell a simple story, the system won’t be able to make it happen.
• Re-evaluate your meetings. To learn from what you are doing, you need better conversations.
What is Your Organization’s Capacity for Change?
In a survey of full-time employees in the U.S., Katzenbach partners found that the group was split 50/50 in their assessment of their own organization’s ability to “change the way things are done.” In the group that said it was easy to change things, 51% described their work environment as positive (and 67% of them enjoy their work). In the group where it was hard to change things, only 21% described it as positive (and only 48% enjoy their work).
Hmmmm. Which side are you on?
Resilience and responsibility
One of the most common arguments made in defense of the “we have always done it that way” approach to leadership in our organizations is that associations have existed for many years, indeed for many decades, and thus have a demonstrated ability to survive and thrive in the face of profound change. So, the argument goes, why should association leaders dramatically change their beliefs and practices to accommodate what’s happening today? Isn’t today’s brand of change simply an extension of what we’ve always known?
Let’s unpack this argument. First, there is no question that associations are resilient organizations. It’s absolutely true that many associations have managed to stick around for a long time, and the leaders of those enterprises deserve most of the credit for keeping them going during periods of considerable difficulty, including depressive economic conditions, social and technological disruption and world war. Whether these leaders made all of the right decisions in their time is immaterial as far as I am concerned. They accepted the responsibility of leadership, and they’ve earned both our gratitude and our respect for everything they achieved.
Going forward, however, the question is not where we’ve been, but where are going and how we will sustain what our predecessors entrusted to us. In our time, we face a fundamental question that those who came before never had to confront seriously: what role, if any, should associations play in our society? We are neck deep in a period of accelerated political, economic, social and technological shift that is unlikely to abate anytime soon. Precisely what it will take for our organizations to be successful in this environment remains somewhat unclear, making our historic resilience useful. What is increasingly clear is that our standard set of responses to new realities is no longer getting it done. We need new approaches, which diminishes the value of being resilient because it may prevent the deep and sober reconsideration of the conventional wisdom that is the basis for doing what we’ve always done.
So associations must continue to be resilient, of course, but not in a way that ignores the solemn responsibility to create a more vibrant future. We cannot defer the hard strategic choices that we certainly will need to make in the next few years. To do so, would be absolutely irresponsible. Rather, we must embrace the challenges and opportunities of a new era, and act decisively, confidently and responsibly. Our ancestors would expect nothing less from us, and we should accept nothing less for ourselves and our successors.
Language Matters
On an association listerver discussion recently, several members debated the pros and cons of what to call their volunteer leadership group: board of directors or board of trustees. The consensus conclusion was that it really doesn’t matter. What matters is the way the Board does its work, not what we call it. We have heard this argument before. For example, since the first release of the book, we have engaged people in the association community in conversations about different approaches to strategic planning. When we propose a new way of doing strategy work, people often respond with, “Well, that’s what we do, but we call it strategic planning; this is an issue of semantics.”
While I agree wholeheartedly that action is critical, I think the association community is underestimating the power of language. Dee Hock, the founder of VISA International, has said, “Language is only secondarily the means by which we communicate. It is primarily the means by which we think.” The words we choose can actively change the way we see the world, and this can then change the way we behave. We are frequently not aware of the impact it has, so it is important that the association community pay more attention to the language it uses. Better execution is fundamentally about different action, and this requires careful attention to the words we use.
Michael Roberto is an expert in decision making, and he has done research that demonstrates the power of simple word choice. For example, at a hospital in Minnesota, a manager was trying to address the issue of medical accidents. She noticed that the language that was used in the official reporting of these incidents was focused on “accusing, blaming, and criticizing” individuals. The leader changed the language that was used in reporting so that it emphasized both the systemic causes and the importance of learning from mistakes that were made. When they changed the language, the hospital actually started reporting MORE accidents, but was also able to learn from them and make improvements.
It is rarely a case of changing a single word, like director to trustee. But if you wanted to change the behavior of your board away from individuals who seek to control and direct the operations, towards a group that worked to protect the interests of the enterprise, changing that word (and a host of other words) could be critical. You would also have to change some processes and have some important conversation with the Board members, but attempting to make the change without addressing issues of language can slow you down. The same is true if you want your staff to think more strategically on a regular basis, and the same is true if you want your people to place more attention to quality control.
Language matters.
Five ways “ungovernance” thinking enables innovation
The success of associations in the 21st century will depend, in large measure, on whether the leaders of our organizations choose to set aside their self-aggrandizing agendas, petty personality conflicts and micro-managing tendencies to embrace the real responsibilities of stewardship that come with the staff and volunteer roles they occupy. It’s clear to just about everybody in our community that current governance approaches aren’t working for many organizations. So, if we’re really ever going to extract the “we have always done it that way” DNA from associations, those legacy systems must be among the first challenges we tackle.
To make it simpler and more attractive for boards, CEOs and other stakeholders to adopt a new mindset, I have articulated a set of ideas around what I call “innovation ungovernance.” Ungovernance offers an alternative perspective on what association stewardship can be and what it can achieve if we’re willing to let go of old ways of thinking, acting and being, and embrace the necessity of innovation. It is a framework for driving organizational success that is more consonant with the world in which associations operate today, and it certainly can be a catalyst for a renewal in the critical role associations have always played in the fabric of our democratic society.
Below are five ways that ungovernance thinking enables innovation in our organizations. I hope you will share your reactions, thoughts and ideas as comments. Also, I invite you to join a virtual dialogue on innovation governance where you can help shape this conversation for our community.
1. Ungovernance questions existing assumptions and beliefs—Associations face daunting challenges in the years ahead, and chief among them is the need to complete the transition of our organizations from the last century into this one. Unfortunately, the outdated core beliefs that guide association governance practices interfere with this process. Ungovernance seeks to challenge such orthodoxies by asking different questions, posing fresh and perhaps unpopular perspectives and demanding more original responses from leaders. Associations are long overdue to eradicate the toxic influence of denial and nostalgia in their organizations, and it must begin with a radical shift in the way we think about association stewardship going forward.
2. Ungovernance focuses on the association’s business model—Associations don’t exist to be governed, but to create value for stakeholders. Indeed, the future growth and advancement of associations depends on their ability to create distinctive new value in a time when the traditional economic framework for such value creation is rapidly eroding. Organizations in our community—not to mention the community as a whole—face a competitive landscape that has changed dramatically in the last decade, and will continue to morph in the next one. In this new context, association leaders must cultivate both the freedom to discover and develop inventive new strategies and the discipline necessary to execute them intelligently. As the Ungovernance Doctrine states, the definitive responsibility of association boards and CEOs is the capable stewardship of sustainable business models powered by innovation.
3. Ungovernance distributes responsibility—Current approaches to association governance embody the concept of centralized control. The future of associations, however, lives at or very near the edge, with contributors who are already deeply involved with—or are actually creating—what’s next. Ungovernance recognizes that sharing real responsibility for long-term success with all stakeholders supports the kind of robust and energetic collaboration necessary to achieve it. Contributors must be invited to engage with the association on their terms, but within a coherent and sustainable strategic framework that capitalizes on everyone’s unique talents and capabilities and inspires them to innovate consistently. In short, ungovernance is about creating an ecology of stewardship.
4. Ungovernance builds trust—At best, legacy governance practices create a kind of “synthetic trust” that must be enforced through bureaucratic structures, burdensome management mechanisms and restrictive policies. At worst, association governance actively undermines trust by creating a culture of risk aversion and fear. In contrast, authentic trust is organic, and emerges only through an unswerving commitment to build it everyday. Ungovernance enables innovation by inviting leaders to adopt the notion of “trust first” as their new default position, while working hard to earn the trust of those they serve by “walking the walk” of innovation in their own work.
5. Ungovernance inspires creativity and unleashes passion—Associations desperately need creative, passionate contributors who are willing to advance the work of innovation by experimenting with powerful ideas. Ungovernance is all about removing onerous constraints that impede the freedom to think expansively and act with confidence, while applying “generative constraints” that help ignite new thinking around difficult problems. Ungovernance embraces possibilities that fuel the passion of contributors who will drive the association’s long-term success. At the same time, ungovernance requires clarity around which possibilities have the greatest potential to become worthwhile strategic opportunities.
Stifling Ideas, Stifling People
While finalizing an online learning program for preceptors (clinical setting teachers), I saw a table with the phrases preceptors should never use with students. I couldn’t help but share them here. I think the reason is obvious.
Phrases Preceptors Shouldn’t Use
That’s not the way we do things here.
I don’t think that will work.
We don’t have the resources to do that.
Don’t you think that’s more trouble than it is worth?
Please just stick to your responsibilities; I’ll worry about everything else.
The way we’re doing it now is working just fine.
Because I said so.
I began my career in association management at the age of 23. Through a fortunate series of events, I landed a great association continuing education job for which I was (on paper anyway) under qualified. I should have had 5-10 years of experience and a master’s degree. I had neither. But, in true GenX style, that didn’t stop me. I set out to transform my little corner of the association world. I had ideas and was ready to make an impact. Sadly, however, I hit roadblocks at every turn - many of them in the form of the statements above. Indeed I was young and inexperienced (naive, as I was reminded more than once). I didn’t know how it was supposed to be done in associations. My boss at the time did not see that maybe that was a good thing, maybe that allowed me to see the possibilities. My boss just saw my youth and asserted that I just needed to “stick with the program” and not try to change anything until I had more experience (until I was fully entrenched into the way they’d always done it?). Well, the status quo isn’t really my thing, and I would not have lasted long under those conditions. Luckily for me, a consultant came in to lead the department during a time of transition and she supported and even mentored me in making significant changes. I will never forget the contrast of the WHADITW and “you are too young to know” attitude of the boss versus the consultant’s value of ideas and change and her ability to see beyond my age. (BTW, they were approximately the same age.)
I’ve now been in the field 17 years — yes, I’m 40, the eldest of the Independent Thinkers, I might add. 
— and I am ashamed to say that every once in a while I catch myself starting to question the merit of ideas based on the age of the idea holder. To be honest, I more often jump to the conclusion that a Boomer or beyond is of the WHADITW mindset than I conclude youth equals ill-informed idea. But when that happens, so far I’ve been quick to catch and scold myself not to make any conclusions until I hear them out. Do you?
Do you let preconceived notions about people hamper your ability to hear them? Are you so entrenched in the ways you do things that you close yourself off to the possibilities? Are you stifling the creativity of those around you?
The next time someone approaches you with an idea, just stop right there. Don’t judge; don’t react. Pause. Say, “Tell me more.” Then, really listen (not listening with the intent to respond, but listening with the intent to understand - which is very different). Then, even if you are not convinced about the idea’s merit, consider the risk of idea failure relative to the potential learning and empowerment opportunity for the individual. What do you really have to lose?
And, by the way, if you ever hear me utter the words, “Because I said so.’, just shoot me.
Planned Reflections and A Reflection Blog?
Earlier this week I wrapped up a client meeting and enjoyed lunch at Cordoroy’s while passing time for my flight later that day. (Side note: Goat cheese and black olive pizza was awesome.) So often we are rushed from one meeting to the next, to the airport, and on. Too often we don’t even think about the meeting we just left before we move on to our next thing. Lately I’ve attempted to be purposeful in scheduling reflection time. I actually could have booked an earlier flight. With two small children at home, I usually book the latest flight in and the earliest out. But, this time I didn’t. Why? The value of the immediate reflection after a meeting. Too often we have a great idea or thought on process or content, but don’t make a note of it. Then, the next meeting comes up and we default back to our last meeting plan/agenda as the starting point (yes, the way we’ve always done it). We trust our memory - and that’s a mistake. Often too much time passes and the improvement idea is lost. Or, is this just me? Am I just getting old? (My 4 year old did just ask me this morning, “Mom, when you are as old as you, can you still do gymnastics?” Note to self: get to the gym.)
So, I’m vowing to schedule reflection time when at all possible. I’m thinking about starting a private blog of my reflections, ideas, and learning. Quite a while back Amy brought up the idea of a personal learning blog here on WHADITW. Anyone doing it? To be able to capture and categorize my ideas as a blog easily does has real appeal - the blogging platform seems a good fit. My notepad notes sure aren’t working. A bunch of ideas written down that I never refer to again. One downside of the blog formats is that it is web-based. Are there platforms that allow drafting off-line? David, help.
Don’t Feel So Bad
For all the criticisms we have of “always done it that way” thinking, we should probably point out that there are some strong psychological forces that push us in that direction. This quote is from an article by Donald Sull in the MIT Sloan Management Review:
Psychologists have documented a depressingly long list of factors that keep people locked into the confines of their established mental models. For example, people often escalate their commitment to a failed course of action in order to avoid admitting any mistakes, or they fixate on data that confirm their expectations while ignoring or downplaying any contradictory information.
Sull’s suggestion, then, is to ensure that organizations build in “frequent and rigorous” opportunities to make revisions to strategies and plans.
Call for Topic Ideas
We are busy gearing up to write a second edition of the book and will be posting quite a bit of new material in this blog as our first draft of the expanded book.
Since we have this lovely interactive forum for talking with many of the people who have already bought and read the book, I thought I would start up a conversation about what you would like for us to address.
- What burning issues do you have in your organization?
- What have you “always done that way” and desperately need an alternative?
- What did you like most in the original book and want more of?
- What made you the most uncomfortable in the original book?
Please share your thoughts below or post your ideas to your own blog. Thanks!
(P.S. We also have a new design in place on the site. Come on by to check it out if you are reading this from our feed.)
WHADITW and Measurement
There has been an interesting and varied blog discussion lately about the importance and role of “measurement” in associations. It strated with Scott Briscoe’s post (lots of comments), and then include related posts by me, Kevin Holland, and another by Scott.
Kevin then did another post, and it has a good WHADITW quote in it:
“The solution to a declining or stagnated membership is almost never a marketing campaign. I suppose there might be some organizations that offer enticing programs, stellar service, and rock-solid value whose only problem is that they’ve been too quiet about it. But far more likely, the best thing a declining association can do to grow its membership numbers is to stop caring about them — and start providing the types of programs and services that its customer base actually wants. (As opposed to what its always done, or what certain volunteers want done, or what certain departments want done.)”
It reminded me of an interesting point, though. Kevin says associations should provide stuff that the people actually want, as opposed to what it’s always done, etc. I just want to point out that those two things aren’t mutually exclusive. Sometimes what a certain volunteer wants is perfect. Sometimes a certain department is right. And sometimes what you have always done is PRECISELY what you need to keep doing. What we point to in our book is the EXCUSE of “we have always done it that way. As a rationale, that is very dangerous. But if you can show that your customers actually want something (through—gasp—measurement?) then it’s okay to keep doing it that way (as long as you stay disciplined about continually showing that customers want it).
Beyond PowerPoint
Fellow author Mickie started an interesting conversation on her own blog about the need to change the way we’ve always done PowerPoint. As I think about it, I can’t BELIEVE we didn’t write a post about that in our book?! Amy mentioned powerpoint in her post on Learning experiences not Conferences, but only briefly. I can’t think of a more worthy WHADITW topic than the way we use powerpoint in presentations in the association community (I remember sitting through a presentation where the presenter actually numbered the slides. It was even MORE painful knowing that that list of bullets was the 63rd I had seen that session!)
Mickie and others have been putting up good responses to the original post, linking to resources on this topic. Dave Sabol linked to Seth Godin’s writing on the topic, which, of course, contains some great WHADITW language:
The home run is easy to describe: You put up a slide. It triggers an emotional reaction in the audience. They sit up and want to know what you’re going to say that fits in with that image. Then, if you do it right, every time they think of what you said, they’ll see the image (and vice versa).
Sure, this is different from the way everyone else does it. But everyone else is busy defending the status quo (which is easy) and you’re busy championing brave new innovations, which is difficult.
Beyond PowerPoint
Fellow author Mickie started an interesting conversation on her own blog about the need to change the way we’ve always done PowerPoint. As I think about it, I can’t BELIEVE we didn’t write a post about that in our book?! Amy mentioned powerpoint in her post on Learning experiences not Conferences, but only briefly. I can’t think of a more worthy WHADITW topic than the way we use powerpoint in presentations in the association community (I remember sitting through a presentation where the presenter actually numbered the slides. It was even MORE painful knowing that that list of bullets was the 63rd I had seen that session!)
Mickie and others have been putting up good responses to the original post, linking to resources on this topic. Dave Sabol linked to Seth Godin’s writing on the topic, which, of course, contains some great WHADITW language:
The home run is easy to describe: You put up a slide. It triggers an emotional reaction in the audience. They sit up and want to know what you’re going to say that fits in with that image. Then, if you do it right, every time they think of what you said, they’ll see the image (and vice versa).
Sure, this is different from the way everyone else does it. But everyone else is busy defending the status quo (which is easy) and you’re busy championing brave new innovations, which is difficult.
Reflections on Life and Always Doing it That Way
Shel Israel (co-author of Naked Conversations) has a simply outstanding post on his blog about reflections on life at age 63. Really, read the whole thing. It’s great.
But I’ll quote a couple of lines that struck me as kindred thoughts to We Have Always Done It That Way:
Without discovery, you start growing old fast. Those who adopt a “been there-done that” grow old rapidly from not going anywhere new.
Habits can make you too comfortable, so every now and then break them just to see what happens.
I have outlived the eras in which conventional wisdom complacently knew that IBM, DEC, HP, Microsoft, Google and the old AT&T were too entrenched and too powerful to be disrupted by some upstart entrepreneur.
Thinking about the Middle-Term Time Horizon
I’m not the only one who sees the value in “middle-level thinking.” There is an article in Harvard Business Review titled “To Succeed in the Long Term, Focus on the Middle Term” that argues for the strategic importance of the middle-term time horizon. His analysis is at the large corporation level (his case study is Cisco Systems), but the lessons should be relevant anywhere. Most organizations build themselves around the short term (are we making out numbers this year) and long-term (what is our vision?). But there is a middle term where you launch new initiatives, lay the foundation for future success, and build your brand, your reputation, your R&D infrastructure, etc. The problem is, anything done in this time horizon is viewed as a failure, because our measurement systems tend to be either long-term or short-term focused:
“All companies have their established ways of assessing performance. Many have also devised their own methods of gauging whether research and development projects are progressing as hoped. Unfortunately, few have found a way to measure Horizon 2 [middle-term] efforts that takes into account their particular challenges. Instead, companies compare these projects either with those of Horizon 1 (which are much more reliable and lucrative) or with those of Horizon 3 (which are much more inspiring). Regardless of which standard Horizon 2 offerings are held to, they fall short, and whatever organization is sponsoring them is found wanting.”
ASAE PD Section Review
Thanks to Carolyn Thompson for reviewing our book in ASAE & The Center’s E-newsletter for the Professional Development section. The review is online, but only for members of ASAE & The Center.
Don’t Try to Be Distinctive via a Committee
Chip and Dan Heath have a column in Fast Company magazine related to their “Made to Stick” book, and in June they discuss word of mouth marketing. In short, they argue that in order to authentically generate conversations, you have to be distinctive. One problem: distinctive tends to run counter to “always done it that way.”
“Most organizations systematically snuff out anything that’s distinctive enough to spark conversation, usually thorugh processes and committees. Would woolen caps for smoothie bottles [done by a successful bottler in England] have survived a committee decision at Coca-Cola? Could a formal market-research process have justified the VW Beetle’s bud vase? …When people with different opinions compromise, they meet in the middle, not at the edge. But the edge is what sparks conversation.”
We have created organizations that are all focused on the middle. On pleasing the most people. That’s fine–we don’t have to give that up–but why not create some structures that at least allow for distinction?
The Psychology of Always Done It That Way
The folks at 37 Signals put up a nice post that gets at the psychological traps that can snare us in WHADITW thinking. Their solution is to start projects with ONLY four hours of work, before they “come up for air” and reevaluate.
“When you’ve done nothing, you don’t have a realistic view of what it’s going to take. But when you’ve spent days or weeks on something, you can get too invested. It becomes hard to change, admit you’re wrong, or that what you’ve been doing isn’t actually worth more effort.”
Imagine if you’d been doing it that way for years! Oh…right….you can.
Thanks for the Link
Thanks to Rosetta Thurman for including us in her “Friday Four” links on Friday. Rosetta has a blog called “Perspectives From the Pipeline: Observations on the Nonprofit Sector from the Next Generation.” She liked the post that I did about constraints-driven solutions. How about this quote from Rosetta:
What’s that you say? We don’t have to automatically increase our budget every year? There may be different and cheaper and better ways to do things? Hmmm, now can we just brand that on nonprofit leaders’ foreheads with hot fireplace pokers?
Ouch!
Equating Consensus with Agreement
There comes a point in many high-level conversations in the association community where someone plays the “we need to have consensus” card. These conversations often involve Board members or at least senior staff members, and the focus of the conversations is usually contentious. Examples: what should be our strategic priority this year? How should we word that policy so it is fair to everyone? Whose budget should pay for this new program? What program are we going to cut to make room for this new program? You typically start the conversation with great energy, because the topic is truly important. As you progress, however, you discover some intense disagreement among the members of the group, and the conversation stalls. You are not able to overcome the disagreements. People are now officially uncomfortable.
So there is a call for “consensus.” The underlying message is, “We’re not agreeing on this and it is important that we agree.” Of course, if you’re honest with yourself, a more accurate translation might be, “You are not agreeing with me on this and it is important that you agree with me.” But either way, the focus is on agreement or the lack thereof. When people become aware of a deep disagreement on an important topic, they feel they are failing in the conversation, and there is an urge to push towards agreement. What else can I tell you to get you to agree? We’re running out of time, so please just agree! This is a natural tendency, but it is a huge mistake.
At the root of this mistake is our lack of understanding of what consensus really is. It is commonly defined in terms of agreement, and this comes, understandably, from our negative experiences with “majority rule.” In situations of majority rule, those in the minority are often quite unhappy with the decision”â€so much so that during implementation, they can sabotage or derail the process, either consciously or not. In seeking to avoid these problems, we try to reach what we call consensus”â€where everyone agrees.
Getting everyone to actually agree, however, is often impossible. And as experts in the field of decision making tell us, it is not required. Michael Roberto provides an excellent definition of consensus that will help association leaders move more effectively through this dilemma. Consensus is defined as a high level of shared understanding combined with a high level of commitment. Note the absence of the notion of agreement. This is ultimately a more sophisticated way of understanding a common way of talking about consensus: “is this a decision everyone can live with.”Â
So when you encounter a tough conversation where there is clear disagreement, focus your attention on deepening the understanding, and then talking about commitment. The shared understanding piece is too often ignored. When we disagree, we argue more vehemently for our particular answer, and our opponents do the same. But neither side actually seeks to understand why the other side holds their position. When you do this, you will deepen the understanding enough that, even if neither side changes their mind, they at least understand the reasoning. This means that if the decision doesn’t go their way, they at least understand where the other side is coming from, and, more importantly, you know that the “winning” side understands your arguments (this strongly increases the chance that you’ll implement even if you’re on the losing side).
Second, make sure you have a conscious commitment on all sides to implement the decision. Don’t skip this step, and don’t assume that an awkward silence means everyone is committed. Ask people to express reservations. Ask people what their action plans are. Make it clear that everyone will work together to hold each other accountable. This becomes partly an issue of group culture. Sometimes you have to develop a culture where people are willing to speak their minds before you can have success in reaching a high level of commitment. You also develop this over time by actually holding people accountable. In the future if people do not come through as promised, you have to be able to discuss that openly with the group. If you avoid that uncomfortable conversation, then you will undermine any future attempt to achieve consensus.
Is there an imagination deficit in associations today?
I’ve been thinking about this difficult question for quite some time now, but I’ve been reluctant to write about it out of a genuine concern that the question itself might sound like an unprovoked attack on hard-working association staff and volunteers. This is definitely not my intention. Rather, I’m hoping we can make our colleagues’ lives a bit easier by creating a more favorable climate in which they can always bring their imagination to bear on the work of their organizations.
Albert Einstein suggested that “imagination is more important than knowledge,” and who am I to disagree with him. In a time of paradigm shift, what we think we know is increasingly less useful than what we can learn, imagine and create. In a recent post, Micropersuasion blogger Steve Rubel suggested that “the most important ‘tool’ you can have today in business is insatiable curiosity. The minute you lose it, you’re dead.” I think Steve is right on target and, from my perspective, curiosity and imagination go hand in hand: our curiosity feeds our imagination, and our imagination drives our curiosity.
Which brings me back to my inquiry about the possible imagination deficit in our community. I suppose what I’m really wondering is whether the work environment in associations today cultivates and nurtures the curiosity and imagination of staff and volunteers. One specific source of concern in this regard is the recent emphasis placed on so-called “data-driven strategies,” as advocated by ASAE & The Center’s 7 Measures of Success report. Without a doubt, there is a need to infuse the strategic decision-making process with useful data. But we must also recognize there are limits to what data can tell us, and there is good reason to challenge the notion that backward-looking information will always illuminate the wisest course of action for the future of our organizations. Associations definitely need clear, simple and focused strategy, but it should be “driven” by the value it will create for members, customers and stakeholders. Identifying and implementing that potential value necessarily will involve some combination of what we know, what we can learn, what we can imagine and what we can create together.
The powerful forces of paradigm shift are reshaping our society, and associations are going along for that very bumpy ride. But in the midst of this uncertainty, association professionals and volunteers have an extraordinary opportunity to envision a very different and more vibrant future for the organizations to which they have committed themselves. I challenge you to do just that by remaining curious and using your imagination everyday. If you’re able to do that, then in time the more important question won’t be whether there once was an imagination deficit, but what we did to eliminate it for the benefit of our community.
Equating Leadership and Authority
Organizations are hierarchical, and associations are no exception. As membership organizations, a hierarchy is unavoidable. There are thousands of members, but you can only have so many on the Board. Authority cannot be distributed evenly, so structures are created to hold that authority, giving the small number of people in those positions the ability to wield the authority.
But we do not refer to it as authority. We call it leadership. Most associations refer to “volunteer leadership” when they are speaking of the specific positions of authority and decision making power that they have created for members (Board, committees, etc.). On the staff side, “the leadership” refers to the CEO and, if the organization is large enough, the senior management team. These people get the title of leadership simply because they have authority to make decisions, commit resources, and tell other people what to do.
There is nothing wrong with authority, but it is not the same as leadership. I would challenge association executives to actually develop a clear definition of leadership (it is one of those words whose meaning is assumed, but never made explicit). In order to get you thinking, I will provide a definition of leadership given by management guru Peter Senge (author of The Fifth Discipline):
Leadership is the capacity in the human community to shape the future.
Senge broadens the definition by referring to the “human community” but you can replace those words with smaller systems, like “your association.” Leadership is a capacity that exists throughout the system, not just in the positions of authority. While your positions of authority are important, they are only a small slice of leadership in your association. Think about the implications of this.
Leadership development activities on the volunteer side typically include a multi-year journey through task forces, committees, and, eventually the Board. What else can you do with your members to enable them to better help you shape the future? Do they need to meet in person twice a year to do this? Do they need to have been in the association for ten years? What can you do at our annual meeting that develops leaders, but without expecting or promising a tour on the Board?
On the staff side, the same questions apply. What are you doing to develop the leadership capacity of your entry-level employees? Feel free to continue training your authority positions in how best to wield authority, but don’t stop there. Senge mentioned in a lecture recently that nearly all positive, long-term change programs in organizations are created by line managers (not the executive team). The Executive Team has a critical leadership role in making that change happen, of course, but if you want to more effectively shape the future (and get better results), you need to build capacity at all levels.
Support for No More Committees
Seth Godin was reflecting on the possibility of Microsoft buying Yahoo! and he made this statement (which seems to support Jeff’s “No More Committees” post):
“The best things to ever come out of Yahoo, as far as I’m concerned, have been the work of individuals. Not of some hyperbolic purple and yellow machine, but from people, strong-willed individuals willing to buck the bureaucracy. And all the worst stuff the company has done has come out of committees.”
