Chapters & National: Collaborate or Compete

I will be facilitating a call on Wednesday with a great group of people, including my Virtual Lunch partner in crime, Sharon Kneebone. Please join in on Wednesday, if you think you can make it! Here's the description:

Chapters & National: Collaborate or Compete

With resources tightening and no end in sight, we thought it would be good to look at collaboration versus competition between parent organizations and their components. Our email thread on parent-organization sponsored webinars might tie into this. I would also be looking for one or two other guests so we can talk about membership retention and recruitment, marketing and the elusive non-dues revenue.

Guest Panalists:

Scott Oser
President
Scott Oser Associates, Inc.

Alex Aderton
Director of Marketing
Associated Buiders and Contractors

Register here: http://tinyurl.com/d6un6f

Date: Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Time: Noon to 1pm Eastern

Cost: Simply your ideas to share and questions to ask -- plus the cost of a call to Minnesota.

Dial in number: 218-936-7979

Passcode: 189780

You can earn 1 CAE point by registering and participating in this event.

You can also follow participants on Twitter:

@scottoser, @skneebone, @kikilitalien

Driving to nj with the fam...listening to rob zombie, jay z, and radiohead. Easter eclectic!

Using HARO to Your Advantage as a Non-Profit

You gotta love someone who plays matchmaker...especially for the media.

I receive daily emails from Peter Shankman. You may not know of him yet, but he is the mastermind behind "Help a Reporter Out" (HARO), which matches reporters with potential contacts to interview for their stories.

Receiving the HARO emails is a good thing to do if you are looking for opportunities to become an expert or idea leader in a specific area. That said, I often fail to open the emails (they come several times a day) and so everyday I am passing by at least one good opportunity to match myself or someone else with a chance to promote a business/service/expertise to the public. However, today I opened up the daily (morning) email from Peter and voila! an opportunity for non-profits in Massachusetts! Why haven't I shared this with the rest of the association world?

Please add this to your "to do" list: Sign up for HARO reports.

Also, be sure to follow Peter on Twitter @skydiver.

Cheers!

KiKi

Mirror to the Mothership

Sometimes the chapters operating as extensions of an organization can seem very alien to it. The more independent the chapter, oftentimes the more strained the relationship can be with the parent organization.

Lisa Junker's recent article on Acronym ("Chapter websites and donors: Food for thought") provided some data backing up the importance of having a consistent and well-supported brand across all components of a Society. The fact that poor or even mismatched websites at the chapter-level can have a negative impact on donations to the parent organization shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. However, it is easy to look around and see how prevalent this problem is today.

After reading the Acronym article, I ask myself:

• What would it take to bring consistency to our chapter websites?
• What is the cost?
• Whom should I talk to first?

This seems to be a fairly easy problem to address with all of the technology available to us today. Now let's see where I can slide it in for my budget. :)

Coming Soon to a Planet Near You

You may not have realized it, but the American Astronomical Society is celebrating the International Year of Astronomy this year, which includes the 400th anniversary of the use of Galileo’s telescope. Their website even includes a really cool little interactive map showing the different events going on around the world to celebrate this feat.

As part of this celebration, their website states that “there is a 100-hour, round-the-clock, round-the-globe event that includes live webcasts from research observatories, public observing events and other activities around the world.”

This massive event takes place from April 2-5 when “the Moon goes from first quarter to gibbous good phases for early evening observing. Saturn will be the other highlight of early evening observing events.”

What a great reason to have a party! Everyone can drink special martinis until their vision represents the unclear view of the celestial bodies we had BEFORE Galileo's telescope. Good enough reason for me!

DC events

BMore events

SoMD events

Attracting and Retaining Young Professionals Members

Every month ASAE's Component Relations Council produces a Virtual Lunch teleconference about a topic of interest for Component Relations professionals (a.k.a. people who work with membership groups). I just came from this month's call and once again I feel flush with ideas and inspiration from all of the participants sharing helpful ideas.

This month's call focused on "Attracting and Retaining Young Professionals Members."

Samantha Whitehorne, who just published an article for the GW Network Now titled "Young Professionals Unite," was a panelist on the call and shared the Top 6 Benefits Young Professionals are looking for from their associations:

Unique opportunities. Meaning that he mixes the fun with the educational. Hold a leadership event that is also a cooking class or host a networking reception in a cool venue that they do not usually have access to.

Networking. It’s important for Young Professionals to have older mentors, but it’s also important for them to network in their own age group, since they will work their way up in the organizations at the same time. It gives them the ability to foster relationships now.

Sounding board. They can discuss the problems they face in the workplace with their peers, but also talk about career issues like pay or advancement.

Leadership. Some YPs may think they don’t get to display enough of their leadership skill in the office. But by joining these groups, they have the opportunity to do so, which will translate back into their days jobs.

Make it personal. Make them feel invited. Keep communicating with them.

Keep YPs top of mind. For example, the economy. Most have never dealt with a recession. Hold a career or financial management seminar.

For more information on future Virtual Lunch seminars (they are free!), visit the ASAE calendar of events.

Tagged! Volunteer Jobs for Minimal Commitment/Time

I've been tagged by the effervescent and hugely popular Maddie Grant (part of the "A-List Bloggers Network") to comment on one of Peggy Hoffman's meme challenges!

Peggy asks:

"To get the conversation going, I’m tagging the following bloggers to help answer a nagging question – how can we create volunteer jobs that don’t require being on a committee, a long-term commitment or gobs of time? So, share five short-term, ad-hoc volunteer jobs you’d love to have and then tag five more bloggers".

Hmmm...interesting! I like to be involved, but I must admit to being a person who tends to wait for someone to ask me (according to the Decision to Volunteer study, I am not alone!). My answers below are the kind of thing I would respond to:

1. Guest blogger
2. Regular blog commenter
3. Author an article
4. Provide regular and thorough feedback on programs
5. Attending a council meeting as an invited participant (not a regular member)

While I am definitely active and look for opportunities to get involved in volunteer activities, I tend to wait sometimes for people to approach me. The idea that the community wants me appeals to me, although I have had the most success with taking matters into my own hands.

Here are my tags!

Sandra Giarde
Dave Sabol
Beth Ziesenis
Sarah Grace McCandless
Lynn Morton

I am a 2009 Bride's Choice Awards Winner!

The Press Release they sent me:

WeddingWire, the nation’s leading wedding technology company, just announced that DC Makeup Artist KiKi L'Italien has won the 2009 Bride’s Choice Awards™!

In its inaugural year, the Bride’s Choice Awards recognizes and honors vendors from the WeddingWire Network that demonstrate excellent quality of service, responsiveness, professionalism, value of cost and flexibility. This year’s recipients represent the top three percent of WeddingWire’s vendor community, which includes over 100,000 wedding vendors from across the US. That means KiKi L'Italien has been recognized as one of the region's very best makeup artists!

Unlike other awards in which winners are selected by the company, the Bride’s Choice Awards are determined exclusively by recent newlyweds through surveys and reviews.

“We are excited to launch this annual award program to honor high-performing vendors based solely on the experiences of our WeddingWire community,” according to Timothy Chi, WeddingWire’s Chief Executive Officer. “This year’s recipients have set the bar high, exhibiting excellent service and expertise in the wedding industry.”

From me:

I would like to thank past clients for speaking on my behalf and helping me win the 2009 Bride’s Choice Award!

The Award:

Inauguration 2009: Making Up David Cantero

Although I had originally planned to enjoy a nice long weekend with my husband and baby by the warmth of our fireplace, I instead had the good fortune to participate in the 2009 Inauguration by working as a makeup artist for David Cantero, reporter for Televisión Española.

There are more photos to come, but here are several from my phone that I had a chance to upload.

Fortune Cookie Forshadows Changes

Several weeks ago, I cracked open a fortune cookie and my fortune was this: "There is no education like adversity."

It didn't take long for me to forget about the fortune and put it to the side.

Last week I decided it was time for me to invest some effort and energy into making my home office a little more "me" and so I began rearranging and decorating, taking my husband's lighthouse collection out of the room and bringing my daughter's stained glass lamp into the room. I even purchased a fun framed bulletin board to put on the wall. As I was putting everything together, I ran across the old fortune and I pinned it to the bulletin board thinking it was true enough and a good reminder of how to look at uncomfortable situations.

Yesterday and today I had an unfortunate "educational" series of exchanges with a person whom I used to call a friend. At least part of the problem stemmed from the other person not understanding how a platform like Twitter works.

I share this with you so that you may benefit from my experience.

This is what I have learned:

1. If you are active within social media, there could be misunderstandings from people who haven't acquainted themselves with the technology yet.
2. Direct conversation is best when trying to overcome misunderstandings.
3. We are not living in an age when everyone is knowledgeable about popular modes of communication. Don't assume!
4. Ask before accusing
5. People usually strike out when they feel cornered or trapped. Look for causes beyond the immediate for an explanation of why someone is striking out at you and try to be empathetic.

I'm not sure what will happen next with this situation, but I am trying to be reasonable and calm. Are you curious about your own fate? Click on the online fortune cookie...if you dare!