How membership organisations are

changing their internal culture

OCTOBER 2013

white paper

On 16 October, membership organisations and trade associations met for a breakfast briefing at the top of the Gherkin to discuss

how they are changing their business cultures. We drafted a white paper following the event and some of the findings are in this Slideshare. To download the white paper, go

to http://bit.ly/1aJakyw

Professionals are developing their own personal online networks – what is your role?

“Members, whether competitor or not, will always want to share

good practice.

You need to worry if your list of reasons to change your culture is shorter than the list to stay as you are.

“With our members, there is great

nervousness internally about what voice we

give them.

It’s not about how you engage, so much as who are you engaging with?

“We’ve been asking ourselves, who are

our customers now?

How do you manage your public remit?

“We aren’t doing a good job. We need

to change members’ perception of us as a

transactional business.

What is your true engagement level? “In reality, we are only

engaged heavily with 10-15% of our

members.

Membership organisations are achieving low engagement.

“50% are achieving one-way communication and

50% are achieving shallow two-way communication.

Membership organisations want to change within three years.

“Two thirds want to achieve self-organised

engagement.

How are you going to jumpstart your engagement?

“Organisations need to get smarter at asking

members the right questions.

What is your true culture?

“Do you present plans to staff without

allowing a Q&A?

The CEO sets the culture

“There are five states of culture determined by how you engage with

staff.

One third of organisations are ‘inform’ culture, one third are ‘consult’ and one third are ‘collaborate’ – what are you?

It is rare for member organisations to be above ‘consult’. “You have to be careful

about the espoused culture versus the true

culture.

How are you empowering staff?

“Internal comms is a big issue and we are trying to find a better way to

understand what’s going on.

There needs to be a significant culture change to achieve better member engagement.

“everything is run through boards and committees. It’s hard

to challenge decisions.

Social engagement starts from within at every level.

“Email is the way we communicate. It

takes so much time.