Posts by Karen Grover

Selling Advocacy as a Members-Only Benefit Selling Advocacy as a Members-Only Benefit I have recently seen articles by so called association gurus and leaders implying that issue advocacy is not “sellable” and that it is “nonsense” to try to convince a person to pay money to join an organization to get what they are already…

Why Conflict Matters Why Conflict Matters: Unanimous decisions by your board could be masking bigger issues. You’ve just finished another board meeting and it couldn’t have gone better. Everything went exactly according to the agenda and all votes were approved unanimously, with very little debate or drama. Time to celebrate! But maybe that smooth board…

Engaging and Empowering Your Employees Engaging and Empowering Your Employees A funny thing happened to me recently at a nearby pizza place. The restaurant was running a special for two slices of New York style pizza and a medium drink for $8.49. I ordered my pizza and moved down to the cashier to get my…

Strategic Planning for Non Profits: How to Prevent your Strategy Session from Turning into a Looong Board meeting Over the past fifteen years, we have employed numerous strategic planning tools and resources with varying degrees of success. In this article, we will review five of the more popular resources we have used, compare their common…

Losing Out On Good Candidates? Going Beyond the Resume When you have an association job opening, one of the first items commonly requested is a resume. After all, you want to know about the candidate’s background, their degree, and try to find out a little more about their personal interests. You post your job to…

Governance Audit Checklist Download checklist: Federal Governance Documents ___Copy of Articles of Incorporation State:_____________Date:_______________ ___IRS Determination letter: Date:_________ ___501(c)3 ___; 501(c)6 ____; Other _______ ___Tax returns for last three years ___Related entities:_________________________________________________________ State Governance Documents ___Business license / registration State(s):____________________Date:___________________ ___State Tax Filing for latest year end ___Most recent state annual report Financial Documents ___Bank…

Continuous Improvement for Your Association “If I Can Be Measured, It Can Be Improved” You may not be aware of the Japanese term “Kaizen” which literally translates into kai (change) and zen (good) and means “improvement.” This term is often used in manufacturing settings as a process to eliminate wasteful steps and streamline operations. The…