One of the CAE exam’s maxims is “always put a member between the staff and another member,” especially when conflict arises. Pragmatically speaking, sometimes that’s generally accepted as a best practice, and sometimes it’s just, well, complete B.S.
I continue to be amazed, though, at how real-world association politicking has spilled over into the virtual world. However, I’m not at all surprised about how social media efforts from members frequently carry more weight and exercise more influence than the association’s efforts. Realizing this, recently I’ve felt it necessary to ask members to leave comments on blog posts critical of some association decisions, compose blog posts to help support certain association activities, and respond to negative comments left on our own association’s blogs.
Simultaneously, I’ve also been working some social networking sites to build coalitions and drum up support for certain association initiatives. Good initiatives, mind you, but ones that need some one-to-one personal touches to really make them work.
I think about this stuff constantly (I was up past my bedtime the other night thinking about how to mitigate negative comments on a blog post about one of my association’s initiatives), yet it’s still hard to put into context employing social media, and directing members’ use of it, to advance our association’s objectives. Honestly, I never thought I’d be doing this kind of thing on the interwebs — and getting paid for it, nonetheless — when I first started blogging four years ago.
This much is for sure: You can’t escape association politics, even on the web.
Tagged: Association Management; Associations; CAE; Certified Association Executive
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