I love that AMR strives to make high quality-training and ongoing professional development available to all members of the team. But when planning the inaugural IdeaCON internal association management training conference, we knew that just providing education wouldn’t help us achieve our goals of becoming a stronger, more collaborative team… 

Volunteers are the lifeblood of our association’s efforts.  Their performance affects our association’s outcomes and reputation.  Despite this, associations tend to avoid giving volunteers formal feedback like the plague. 

Image credit: Forbes.com

What if you could increase the influence and reach of your association, make it the first organization that legislators, media and like-minded groups turn to for information, and set it apart as a national leader in your field just by dusting off your high school research paper skills?

In his book Dream Teams, author Shane Snow sets out to illustrate why some diverse teams excel and some do not. His early chapters emphasize perspective and how the addition of new and different perspectives to a team can help the group uncover ideas or solutions they never could have before. He uses the illustration of a mountain range. If everyone starts hiking the range from the same starting point, you may all get to a peak, look around and say “we’ve done it, we’re at the summit.” But, if someone else starts hiking the same range from the other side, they may come to a taller, more stunning mountain that you never even knew existed. This, he argues, is one of the aspects that makes some teams great. They look for people with perspectives not like theirs who can start tackling an issue at a completely different angle, ultimately bringing everyone to a better, stronger solution.

Associations create content – research and publications, conference presentations, professional development trainings, webinars and podcasts, etc. – all to support the learning and advancement of professionals in their given industry or practice. Of course, there are many reasons an association may choose certain educational offerings but, ultimately, the goal is to drive learning and build skills which professionals can use to improve their work.