Well, it's Day 2 of The Seven Days of Blog and we're having some interesting discussions in this space. I want to encourage you to get your friends and colleagues in the association community involved in reading and posting to The Association Innovation Blog. TAIB (that's The Association Innovation Blog) is intended to be a dialogue with the association community, and we need to get more people in the conversation. So join us!
Okay, just a few random musings this evening....
+I was down at The Center for Association Leadership for part of today for its Great Ideas Conference. In the morning, I attended a very interesting session on building community that examined the experiences of three different associations. Each experience had similarities and differences of course, but I believe they were bound by the common idea of leveraging social capital to create an engaging, welcoming and compelling space in which community members want to actively participate in co-creating their own value.
Lately, however, I've heard the phrase "building community as a core competence of associations" thrown around a great deal and I'm not sure what to make of it. Specifically, I'm not sure whether we should contemplate something as deep and complex as creating vibrant, lasting communities as the core competence of every association (not every association has it), but rather as an unevenly distributed competence held in part by a number of different organizations in the association world. There are implications to be drawn out here, but I'm still reflecting on this point, so I'd appreciate your perspectives.
+I also participated as a panelist on session that focused on the value of coaching. I worked with a coach for a four-period from 1999 to 2003. It was a great experience for me--one from which I benefited tremendously--and I wholeheartedly encourage others to consider it. You can find coaching resources online at the web site of the International Coaching Federation.
+In the last week or so, there has been a very interesting discussion on strategic planning taking place on the ASAE Executive Management Section listserver. I have been something of an instigator of that conversation since I exclaimed that strategic planning is dead. (I'm not the first, of course, and doubt I'll be the last.) Loyal TAIB readers know that I find strategic planning to be an outdated methodology better suited to an operating environment that no longer exists. In other words, strategic planning is mostly a waste of the association's limited resources. I know that this perspective disappoints many association community leaders, but I believe it's time to face facts. Strategy-making in times of great complexity and limitless opportunity require fundamentally different approaches to get to the clearest, simplest and most focused strategic direction for the organization. Strategic planning just doesn't get us there anymore, so why should we keep on doing it? Why can't we just let it go and move on to what's next? Everyone else has...
+Once again, I want to thank everyone who sent me birthday greetings yesterday. I also want to extend a special thanks to Jackie Huba, yesterday's opening keynote speaker at The Center's Great Ideas Conference for a terrific birthday present: a big-time plug of AIB to conference participants. Apparently, Jackie had very nice things to say about my blog and about me. While I wasn't there to hear any of this, it was reported back to me by multiple sources. Of course, I'm flattered for TAIB to be held up as an example of what associations should be doing. I agree with Jackie that associations must leverage the power of blogs, wikis and social network tools to enrich virtual interaction, create meaningful conversations and support innovation. At the moment, the blogosphere (as the universe of blogs is called) includes relatively few association-related sites. What do we fear from blogging? If anything, I think we should be the ones who are embracing it to the greatest possible extent. I mean, if associations are serious about creating communities, where are the communities of bloggers hiding?
I'm done for tonite. I'm pretty tired, so who knows how coherent it is. Let's learn again tomorrow as 7DoB continues!
David:
What if nothing replaced it? What would be different about your organization? Do you see that as inherently better or worse?
Jeff
Posted by: Jeff De Cagna | April 01, 2004 at 01:52 PM
I guess my problem when I hear that 'strategic planning is dead' is wondering what replaces it?
Posted by: David Gammel | April 01, 2004 at 01:38 PM
Funny coincidence, I also used an executive coach from 99-03 and found it valuable.
2 Questions where I'm interested in dialogue:
What is a community?
What associations do you respect for their community building strengths?
As a beginning, a community is a relationship among a network of people based upon common interests. I respect by observation and participation:
GWSAE
The ASAE Tech Microcommunity
NTEN (nonprofit technologists association) nten.org - just got back from their annual conference
Thanks for your blogging on association matters.
Posted by: Mathew | March 31, 2004 at 07:57 AM