How To Revitalize Your Membership

Christopher Ward

Austin Chapter President

@WebWorksChris #coffeninja

VisionProbably the most important step to revitalizing your membership• The vision for Technical

Communications • The vision for STC (http://

stc.org/about-stc/the-society/mission-vision

• The vision for the chapter

GoalsThis should be a collaborative effort and align with the vision• Measurable

• We want to make the world a better place.• We want to make the world a better place by

educating 3 businesses, a year, on the value of documentation.

• Visible• Post them on the website.• Speak about them at meetings.• Put them in an email.

• Report• Progress (Good or Bad) should be reported.• Changes in any goal need to be announced and

the reason why.

• Failure is an option, deal with it

Know your obstacles

It’s the ones you ignore that will get you.• I don’t like …….

• How do you tell if someone is just venting, or suggesting?

• You don’t have to fix it yesterday• Look for alternatives/compromises

Celebrate

• If you win • Not every celebration has to be a party or a

meeting.• Acknowledgement is the biggest prize of all.• Does not matter how big or small or even if it

was a mistake, a win is a win.

• If you lose• Celebrate the effort.• Celebrate what you learned.

• If nothing is happening• Hey, that is what you are here to fix – let’s party!• Something is always happening, so celebrate the

progress.