Here's someone who really gets it.

Lee White rocks. His blog articulates his own questions about social media and Enterprise 2.0, particularly in relation to his new consulting business.

His new elevator pitch:

Other person in the elevator: “So, what do you do?”

Me: “I facilitate the development of community as an organizational structure within organizations.”

Other person in the elevator: “Cool! Tell me more about that.”

…or something like that.

Basically what this means is that I can talk about what is happening all around us with regard to social media, enterprise 2.0, WOM, etc. within the single context of community, where all of these instances are simply examples of “the integration of the many into the one”.

From this basis I see many themes that I want to develop:

• The cognitive dissonance that occurs when organizations attempt “community” marketing while operating internally as an authoritarian hierarchy.
• The practice of community is about continually working to include the next the next layer “outside” into the whole.
• The “tools” of community, both new and old.
• Why is community a viable organizational model “now”?
• Can community and hierarchy co-exist?
• Examples of community that can serve as models for the enterprise.

We should get him to dip his toes in association industry waters...!

Agile Planning = a model for strategic thinking?

I had a bit of an epiphany this weekend.

I picked up a textbook on my dining room table that my husband Andy was reading for a software development and project management course he's taking. The book was called Agile Estimating and Planning, by Mike Cohn and Prentice Hall. I start leafing through it, and at first I was thinking, this might as well be in Greek, then I started to "get" some of it and it suddenly struck me. If you take all the software development jargon out of it, and extract the basic principles, I could have been reading about a methodology for how to foster strategic thinking in an association context. And it is stupendous!

Check this out.

The wikipedia entry is here. It's a little heavy going but if you skip down to the principles and comparison to other methods you'll see what caught my eye. This is the Agile Manifesto, written by a group of 17 software developers in 2001:

We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.

Also check out the Principles behind the Agile Manifesto (my bold):

Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer
through early and continuous delivery
of valuable software.

Welcome changing requirements, even late in
development. Agile processes harness change for
the customer's competitive advantage.

Deliver working software frequently, from a
couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a
preference to the shorter timescale.

Business people and developers must work
together daily throughout the project.

Build projects around motivated individuals.
Give them the environment and support they need,
and trust them to get the job done.

The most efficient and effective method of
conveying information to and within a development
team is face-to-face conversation.

Working software is the primary measure of progress.

Agile processes promote sustainable development.
The sponsors, developers, and users should be able
to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.

Continuous attention to technical excellence
and good design enhances agility.

Simplicity--the art of maximizing the amount
of work not done--is essential.

The best architectures, requirements, and designs
emerge from self-organizing teams.

At regular intervals, the team reflects on how
to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts
its behavior accordingly.

Agile planning is based on the idea that you can plan in shorter iterations which are continuously adjusted. I would say it's like a cyclical spiral, always moving, as opposed to the linear straight arrow plan with a set start date and finish date. It is highly collaborative between team members, it relies on trust between team members, and it is extremely nimble and responsive. As per wikipedia,

Although agile methods differ in their practices, they share a number of common characteristics, including iterative development, and a focus on interaction, communication, and the reduction of resource-intensive intermediate artifacts. ... From an organizational perspective, the suitability can be assessed by examining three key dimensions of an organization: culture, people, and communication. In relation to these areas a number of key success factors have been identified (Cohen et al., 2004):

• The culture of the organization must be supportive of negotiation
• People must be trusted
• Fewer staff, with higher levels of competency
• Organizations must live with the decisions developers make
• Organizations need to have an environment that facilitates rapid communication between team member

Now, if you google "agile planning" or "agile software development" you will get tons of really complicated project management methodologies. That's not what I am interested in. What is important here are the principles behind agile planning, which seem to me to be entirely in sync with what some of us have been talking about for a long time in the association world. Namely, how to foster middle-level strategic thinking. How to incorporate decision-making through collaboration and communication throughout an organization (task forces rather than departments or committees). How to be nimble, continuously proactive and reactive. How to incorporate the possibility of failure through continuous beta-testing (so there will be no such thing as failure, only lessons learned and goals adjusted). How to really engage our members so they have a participatory role in the development of the association.

Jeff and Jamie talk about these ideas in their 2005 article, Building Strategic Capacity by Design, which I was reading for my CEO Dialogues course. But I was thinking to myself, we all talk about this stuff on a theoretical level, but I think what people really want to know now is "How can we IMPLEMENT this within my organization? How can we get started?" The article talks about developing "design principles", "processes that facilitate strategic conversations". But here I am, Joe Blow association executive trying to get my head round it and wanting to start changing my association's culture - and I'm thinking, I get the theory, but I want some concrete examples of how to get there!

I know they are not easy to come up with because everyone's organizational culture and history is so different. However, I think what may be missing now, what is keeping us in the association world from the widespread adoption of the technologies behind the cultural shift we are experiencing but have little idea how to deal with, is to have some kind of basic methodology for strategic thinking, some kind of "control", not necessarily a benchmark but something to start with, that an association can compare their own processes against and modify to suit their own organizational culture.

So, I have a lot more thinking to do about this, but maybe the ideas behind agile planning could be developed into some usable model or template for how to get started in moving towards strategic thinking, responsiveness, innovation and creativity - over linear strategic planning, slow reactivity and risk aversion, rigidity of thinking and top-level-dominated leadership.

What do you think?

This made me smile...

Never underestimate who might be reading your blog. From post to conversation to action - in large and small ways, I bet that happens ALL THE TIME.

Busy busy bee...

Sorry I have been a bit quiet here recently... Busy managing a conference this past weekend. Always lots of mopping up after...

Some miscellaneous other stuff worth mentioning.

Just started a big project offering individual webpages to my members, based on a template, and tied to their directory profiles. This will hopefully be a great source of non-dues revenue, for a start, and an ongoing one, since we're charging a small annual fee. But it's clearly a win-win, because all these individual members' pages should come up in searches, and anyone clicking through will see our website and links to all our other programs and events and whatnot.

I'm also encouraging everyone to post pictures of themselves in their profiles. You'd be surprised what a big deal this seems to be. But we bought a small digital camera, and offered to take thumbnail pics for free for anyone who stops by the office. I heard that someone surfing for a doctor/therapist is more likely to choose someone with a photo than not - when I remind them of this, I suddenly get more interest. Shyness seems to prevail here, though, and boundary issues, and all that... pish posh, I say. Excuses, excuses. Ya want more patients, or not? : )

I set up a new alumni committee for one of my programs, whose graduates seem to have mostly drifted off into the mists of time. The goal is, of course, to keep our students involved and engaged after they graduate, and if we are lucky, to attract some of these lost folks back to the ranch. There a long history of exclusion, though, which I am battling against, but I'll get there. As I mentioned in a previous post, sometimes all it takes is to reach out to people and prove that we care what they have to say.

It's budget time here - I'm losing hair already, since I have to manage the whole process, but at least this is a great way to get a snapshot of where programs overlap and might be able to share costs. At least that is what I tell myself, when I am not screaming inside....

Have a good weekend, all.

Your life in ten words or less

I read Steve Fossett's obituary this weekend. Though he has been declared legally dead, five months after he disappeared over the Nevada desert, it made me smile because I happen to know that he's now flying alien aircraft for Area 51....

Regardless, what really caught my eye was the headline of his obit: Steve Fossett, 63; Adventurer of the Seas and Skies. How AWESOME is that. We should all be so lucky to have our lives captured in a nutshell as inspiring as that.

Dream big.

In case you missed this...

Dave Witzel of ForumOne Communications interviews our very own Dennis McDonald on "Web 2.0 adoption: Lessons from associations, corporations, project management, and disaster response".

A couple of his questions:

It seems to me that associations should be natural matches for Web 2.0 approaches but that they have been very slow adopters? Do you agree? Why do you think?

Does adopting web 2.0 processes really require a "culture change"?

What can those of us who advise organizations do to make them more amenable to trying these new approaches? Anything?

I would say Dennis is exactly the kind of consultant who might be able to bridge that divide between the enthusiasts and the "control" crowd.

In the interview, Dennis also talks about the Alexandria Web Strategy group he recently set up. I am in this group, along with a few other blogoclumpers (Matt Baehr, Lindy Dreyer, Jeff De Cagna among others), and if anyone ever has issues they would like raised at the meetings, please do not hesitate to contact us. At tonight's meeting, for example, one of the topics to be discussed will be the myth of control and how we might bridge that gap.

Could everyone please stop saying...

...we're "drinking the Kool-Aid". (Sorry Lindy!)

According to Word Spy,

"This phrase comes from the 1978 "Jonestown massacre" in which members of the Peoples Temple cult committed suicide by drinking cyanide-laced Kool-Aid."

Or here are the Urban Dictionary definitions. The associated bad karma won't help advance our cause!

Sorry for the grumpy post. It's a whole blimmin' week of Mondays so far.

Generosity as a business model

Read this great post from Jeff De Cagna.

I am currently taking an ASAE online course, CEO Dialogue: Leading Associations in the 21st Century. This week (week 4 of 6) we're talking about "Strategic Technology", or technology as a strategic imperative. This is all the stuff I know about - yay!! But, by coincidence, in my online class discussions, we're still talking about the "need to be relevant" - boo!!

Being relevant is a totally moot point. If you are not already relevant, you are dead. Relevance is not a goal!

But the future is, as Jeff says, being generative, or as he quotes Kevin Kelly, having generosity as a business model.

"We can build associations that function in a generative manner by helping our contributors make sense of emerging issues and challenges through the creation of meaningful, real-time context. We can enrich their personal and professional lives by redefining the way they engage with the membership experience as part of trusted markets, networks and communities. When we focus on being generative, we can create new dimensions of success both organizationally and for our stakeholders, but only if we’re willing to think differently about how we do our work."

It's about sharing information, sharing resources, sharing trust, sharing connections, sharing networks, sharing love and friendship. All of which generate more of the same and create ongoing value for our members and for the good of the order. Reminds me of a post I wrote very early on about my plan for world domination. I still believe what I wrote about sharing, and I think sharing and generosity are two sides of the same generative coin. You need to give it out, and you also need to respond to what others give out. The association industry has to stop being afraid of this or it will truly become irrelevant.

Vinay Kumar joins the clump!

So happy Vinay Kumar has decided to jump in. Subscribe! Vinay is one of the most respected, lyrical and inspirational regular commenters on the ASAE listerves. He was truly born to be a blogger.

Vinay, welcome to the blogosphere! You're going to love it.

Also just wanted to point out this is my 100th post! Really happy to share it with Vinay' on his first day of blogging. Call it poetry in motion....!

Dear Mr Carter... on leadership?

A question for Virgil Carter, great commenter in the blogoclump.

On Jamie's post about my post, On Collins' What Makes Powerful Nonprofit Leaders, Virgil posted this in his comment:

"Why is it that ASAE and some of our association bloggers can't figure out how to align and communicate membership mantras and leadership mantras? For example, when we hear ASAE talk about membership, we often hear incessantly that the membership is why we exist, whom we serve and how we should measure success. We hear that all too often association leadership is "out of synch" or disconnected with membership.


Yet when we hear about leadership, for example, we hear how important it is for leaders to be visionary, strategic, energetic, bold, courageous, making hard decisions that are best for the organization, yada yada.


Come on. Does anyone besides me see the complete mismatch (and conflicting results) these two independent disconnected views of membership and leadership represent? Do we have the membership specialists espousing the membership mantras and the governance specialists promoting the leadership mantras, in some sort of ridiculously competitive song and dance?


When will ASAE & the Center reconcile membership and leadership into one single, integrated and comprehensive continuum? They really aren't separate, stand alone issues, you know?"

I am a bit confused and wanted to post on this and get some clarification, if possible. Are you talking about the "serving members" vs. "leading members" debate? (Here, here and here, for example).

If so, isn't the concept of "CEO as broker of ideas" precisely the single continuum you are asking for?

A momentous occasion

So I just wanted to let everyone know that my article on leadership for Association Trends is now out (subscription may be required). It's the first in a series by all the "2007 Young and Aspiring Association Professionals", and I had the scary honor of being asked to do the first one, to be based on a conversation begun on this blog - here.

When Mike (my boss) read it, he said, "congratulations, you are now a published author!" - and I was floored - I somehow didn't even think about about it in that way, with all the blogging I have been concentrating on, but that is entirely true! (Random stuff I wrote in high school notwithstanding). So once again, thank you to everyone for reading. Onwards and upwards! : )

More on the Myth of Control

Whoowee! The Blogoclump is all abuzz with talk about the "myth of control", or the fear that associations seem to have (as I saw first hand at the Technology Conference and also at the Great Ideas Conference in Florida) about losing control - over their content, their communications, their marketing, you name it - if they were to embrace collaborative social media technologies.

Check out the conversation here, here,and here, for a start.

I also read a great post by Jay Deragon on SMT on this issue - I wouldn't normally quote this much but this really resonated with me. His emphasis.

"Today’s business managers cannot comprehend the power of a connected world without borders and a web that is open, seamless and free. The power is shifting to the individual self organized into swarms with affinities and influence. No one individual is in control rather the conversational rivers control and ignite the influence.

The power is not self defined rather a phenomena created out of collective relationships and subsequent conversations, a self developed and self organized community. These concepts and phenomena go against all the training and education today’s business manager have received from our educational institutions and the on the job training of the past.

Who Has The Experience to Understand What is Going On?

Historical management models have been centered around control. Control of people, processes, media and outcomes. When the outcomes are not what shareholders expected management simply “steps in and makes changes to achieve the end results”. This perception of control has been the result of self defined power and controlled organizations as well as controlled conversations. But society has changed, we now have a web of relationships connected to everything, everywhere with influence over markets, conversations and the economy.

This new “connected global virtual society” rejects control rather is self controlled by the conversational transactions that form like rivers and swell with influence, one to one to millions. The lack of control is the very issue that perplexes many business leaders because how can we use, define or understand something we cannot control?

Business leaders are turning to traditional consulting firms for help but most don’t understand rather treat this movement as marketing methods enhanced by technological tools. Business leaders are seeking best practices to copy. There isn’t any “practice” to copy rather there is a mindset to understand.

An understanding of the dynamics of conversations based on open relationships of affinity in thinking, content, interest and talent. The dynamic is unique and not conventional to traditional business mindsets or cultures aimed at control. Unless there is synergy in mindsets and activity which demonstrates an understanding of the dynamic then the basis of a relationship cannot be formed and subsequently conversations cannot be facilitated effectively.

Traditional consultants with traditional mindsets cannot provide a “practice or a mythology” which provides understanding. Most of today’s consultants can provide business with the tools but unless you know how to “build a community of relationships” the tools are useless.

I think this is very true. I think there are, on the one hand, enthusiasts, first adopters, 1%ers and 10%ers, beta testers and the like who are very much in favor of trying these new technologies out and reporting back on the successes and failures. And on the other hand, there are the old guard, the traditionalists, who view all of this stuff with suspicion, who fear the loss of control.

But what I think we are sorely lacking in is a new group in the middle, a group of consultants, perhaps, or mid-level leaders, who can actually show people how to jump from one side of the divide to the next in a mission-driven way. Who can show the old guard exactly how to leverage these new technologies, these social communities and this peer-produced content, in such a way as to show that they can create value for their associations and that the perceived "loss of control" is actually (or will soon be) irrelevant.

80's dance party - the gory details

Hehehe - only joking. We rocked the house. Check out the video over on PITV here.

This is pretty cool if you need a new website

AssociaDirect is giving away a website package, valued at $5k, every 6 months to a randomly selected association. It includes several pages, custom design, sitemap, domain registration, web hosting, email newsletter integration, SEO. Check it out at http://www.associadirect.com/giveaway/

Another opportunity to beta-test the Non-Profit Finance Game

I posted about this here and here. It totally rocks and here's another chance to be a beta tester for it.
If you are interested, contact Libby Bingham - lbingham at asaecenter.org

What: The Bottom Line: The Nonprofit Finance Game (pilot)

Date: Friday, February 15, 2008

Location: ASAE & The Center Building, 1575 I Street, NW, Washington, DC (Conference Center - East Room)

Time: Check in at 8:30am, program from 9:00am – 5:00pm

Fee: $125 (includes coffee, lunch, materials AND the program!)

Using video to promote a social networking strategy

Another of my favorite Social Media Today bloggers, Jim Tobin, posted some staggering stats about user-generated videos on sites like YouTube:

"One of the things that social media is great at is soliciting and distributing user-generated video. With all the platforms available now (from YouTube to Viddler to Seesmic and JustinTV), creating and sharing video has never been easier. As a social media agency though, we come across clients all the time (usually old-school marketers or PR types) who are just skeptical.

"Sure, Jim, you can get the video and put it out there, but do you really think people sit around and watch this stuff?"

Um, yes. They do. And not just a little–a lot. Only 22 billion views of user-generated video in 2007. This is projected to rise to 34 billion views in 2008. So, yes, note to all clients, people are watching this stuff."

22 BILLION views??? Holy Moly!

He continues, "The bottom-line lesson here is clear: There’s a tremendous opportunity for video to help folks with their social media marketing. If you do it right, people are clearly willing to watch."

Along with everything else web 2.0, the percentages of people participating is growing exponentially every year. Whether or not we are ready right now, I think it's our job as "promoters" for our associations to have our eye on the ball all the time, so that when we are ready, we can just go for it.

Oh and by the way, you can always try posting videos on PITV if you want to dip your toes in, maybe get some feedback...!

Cool tool

Check this out! The most interesting thing about this 60 Emerging Technologies session is that the whole presentation has been run from one of the presenters' Blackberries using Showmate from Impatica.com. Anyone who speaks in public should look into this. Free yourself from your laptop!