Two weeks ago, I pledged to offer IABC Scandinavia 12 suggestions for building membership.
After a first suggestion (Start a blog, which drew attaboys from IABC members and was panned by IABC European leadership) I missed last week, between deadlines and a national holiday. But I'll throw out two this week, and then we are back on track next week.
Suggestion No. 2 Be far more local.
IABC, like Rotary, like scouting, like most political parties, operates at several different levels.
1) International: policy, strategy, budgets, global professional development. Boring (except for global PD), but necessary.
2) Regional: membership, chapter support, opening new markets, regional professional development. More fun! And necessary!
3) Local chapter: networking, local professional development, mentoring and being mentored, comraderie, smart thinking on local communication issues. Real value for IABC dues, and lots of fun.
The most important, for building membership, is the local level. We all know this. Members, living or working in a small geographic area, most of whom know each other (or of each other), who have a common purpose "on the ground," are the members who a) enjoy the benefits of membership most, and b) evangelize so much that they attract other members.
Who of us joined Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts or whatever to get the national magazine? You joined because you were in a troop and it was fun.
IABC Scandinavia misses this point, which is why the "chapter" is failing. It should look for instruction to successful chapters in the US and Canada.
First, the geographic catchment area of IABC Scandinavia is enormous, covering an area the size of the Eastern United States. It contains, at last count, 35 members -- to put this in perspective, some office buildings in Toronto contain more than 35 IABC members. This is not a group that can come together regularly or on any sort of short notice.
Second, most members do not know one another, and never will. And why should they? They don't share a common culture, don't speak the same language except in the broadest of terms, and don't move in the same business circles. Hell, they don't even read the same newspapers.
The result? None of the criteria for a successful local chapter are met: small geographic area, members knowing or knowing of each other, common ground from which to work. The results speak for themselves: IABC Scandinavia has had three sparsely attended meetings in 18 months, three all-member emails and... well, that's it.
So, on to my suggestion. Maintain the pretence of a "Scandinavian" chapter if you must, but concentrate on building lots of activity in the local centers of membership: Greater Copenhagen/Malmö, Greater Stockholm, Greater Oslo. Let the locals organize meetings and seminars amongst themselves -- encourage them to do so. By being actively involved in IABC -- and active involvement means more than 2 meetings a year in some city 500 miles away -- they become IABC evangelists. Which builds membership.
In fact, take it a step further: declare an ambition to split IABC Scandinavia, the "on-paper" chapter, into three or more real chapters by the end of 2007. Let the Copenhagen, Stockholm, and Oslo groups build themselves up to 20-25 members -- not a difficult goal -- and form chapters of their own. The result for IABC: three active chapters, instead of one that never got off the ground. The result for local members: a much more interesting and rewarding way to be a part of IABC.
Readers, friends, IABC members, PRSA members, Little League coaches... please offer your suggestions and criticisms.
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{ 7 comments }
Allan — Your comments are on the mark. I'm a member of the Toronto chapter, yet even within a geographically consistent chapter, we face similar issues of needing to be relevant to our members. In Toronto, there are a lot of independent members, who do not work for large companies (who might pay their dues) and don't always find programming relevant for the independent communicator. So in 1998, a group of IABC Toronto members formed a new group within the Chapter called the Alliance of Independent Practioners (AIP) to help to meet the needs of independents within the chapter. The results have been good for the independents (there are now more than 70 members) and for the chapter. Asked on their most recent survey what factor the existence of the AIP played in their decision to renew their membership, 23% said it was the main reason they were still members, while another 43% said that AIP was an important factor in their decision to spend their hard-earned dollars on a membership.
Taking care of the needs of the members at a local level, whether within a city, or a country, will pay dividends at a larger level. Anyone interested in learning more about Toronto's AIP group should visit http://toronto.iabc.com/membership/aip/
Dave, thanks for the insight from IABC's biggest and most successful chapter.
Tip O'Neill, a US politician, used to say "all politics is local". I'm inclined to say "all organizations are 'local'" if they want to be at their best.
Allan,
I was behind you 100% with the blog suggestion. It was an easy, inexpensive solution and involved no huge time committment on any one person. But here you are in essence telling Scandinavia to start a couple of new locally based chapters, like that is easy. To me this sounds like some weight-loss programs I've seen that promise great results: eat less and exercise more. Great advise but not much help. Easy to say, damn near impossible to do. Way to simplistic, Allan. Where's the beef?
Suzanne,
Going the local route is a tough choice to make, and a difficult path, but what are the alternatives?
1) Remain a chapter in "name" but a "European sub region of members-at-large" in practice. That's the status quo, and I can tolerate it as long as the "chapter" doesn't try to levy dues. I'd say at least half our members can now put "IABC chapter leader" on their resumés, and that's important for some folks.
2) Admit the mistake: IABC Scandinavia is entirely the product of an international chairman who needed new non-NA chapters and an overly-enthusiastic, brand-new local IABC member who thought it would be fun and easy to start a chapter. Disband the thing.
Neither option is particularly palatable. The first is a sham, and the second ignores the fact that Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish communicators are doing some pretty interesting communication work. They SHOULD have a chapter — but not a subregional orphan.
Option 3 is to recognize the impossibility of the present situation and move, over a couple of years, to correct it — if possible. Encourage local members to devise their own events, ad hoc works for me, and invite all regional members to attend. Bring in local or external speakers. But make it local, and make it relevant.
Damn near impossible? You bet. But the worst case outcome? We are back to Option 1 or Option 2, which is where we are now. Best case? Relevant local chapters spawn.
Allan,
As a former chapter president, I'm going to say to you what I said to everyone who started a conversation with, "What this chapter needs to do is…". My universal response was, "that's a great idea, why don't you take the lead and make it happen?" Enough arm-chair quarterbacking! Allen, you have great ideas plus the know-how and experience. Quit preaching and DO something!
Allan,
Just two comments:
1) IABC Scandinavia was set up to include three countries not because of any person's individual choice, but following a survey of members-at-large in the area who said that was their first choice.
If at some point in the future there are enough members to drive city-based chapters and that's what the members choose, then by all means, let's do that.
2) Your suggestion about maintaining the administration at the Scandinavia level and trying to make local clusters the hubs of activity is exactly what the current leadership is trying to do. But that still takes local champions to make the thing live and breathe. I think you underestimate the number of "infrastructure" issues that have to be tackled when starting a chapter and the amount of time and other resources that are necessary to put those in place. In a young chapter, it's not the ideas that are lacking, but the many hands to make the work light.
Furthermore, I seem to recall that when the chapter has organized events in other cities, rather than congratulating them for making something happen locally, you made caustic comments about how you weren't getting on the plane to go (your post of 5 April for example). That seems inconsistent with your comments here. Just how can a chapter attract new members unless it organizes these events, and where do think an army of volunteers to build the organization comes from when you only have 25 members to start? Snowball effects begin slow and then gain momentum.
1) No, Kristen, IABC Scandinavia exists a) because David Kistle needed a new chapter abroad and b) a brand new member of IABC thought it would be easy to set up a chapter. Both are long gone (the first chapter president was in Vancouver, but pretended she had never, ever, had anything to do with the chapter), and we are stuck with the result. Yes, members were polled and, all things being equal, who wouldn't want a chapter? But starting a chapter on the backs of 25 members who have never asked for a chapter before seems exceedingly short-sighted.
2) I have never underestimated the work involved, which is why I have always said this was a bad idea. Why does no one pick up the task? Easy: IABC provides a great service on the international level, fairly good service on the European level but — on the local level — simply replicates national communication networks that are already in place. IABC simply provides zero value locally… and it would be hard pressed to do so.
3) Am I caustic about our "chapter" events? You're damned right I am. The last event "invitation" didn't even mention IABC as an international organization, made no link to http://www.iabc.com, and explained nothing — nothing — of why the event was worth attending. And the event was no more than a 30-minute talk by a communicator — not one of our members, by the way — who has told her story in the press so many times that there was nothing new to hear. So why should anyone get on a plane and spend six hours on the road for that?
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