It was heartening to see NESEA seeking candidates for two positions that I have always considered central to the success of our community and the organization that supports us. Having thought (and fought) hard about both membership and communication for over two decades I’d like to catch up with this favorable moment and offer my perspective on the prospect of establishing and growing these positions.
Let me say first that I consider NESEA at its heart a community of committed professionals. Membership in this community has two essential characters. There are those, that I call “the tribe”, who consider their association and alignment with NESEA’s purpose essential to their professional identity – we are “NESEA people” and we share a common understanding of ideas and practices that we have learned and developed together over many years. These are the folks who plan and present at our conferences and events or who gather over lunch or meet in the halls at a conference to discuss and debate what we are learning together. These are the folks who form our chapters and spend countless hours planning for and convening their local NESEA community. We know these folks because they have found a way in. What we need are more diverse, line of sight points of entry to “the tribe”, especially for those in the second category.
This other set of NESEA members are those who “choose” their membership because the conference fee discount is structured to assure that “choice.” While this strategy assures a high membership rate for the organization it offers a fairly poor toehold for those members to value their membership in or commitment to NESEA, and certainly offers no invitation to become involved or more fully engaged. Some of these members will drink the Kool-Aid, make connections, and discover a route to join the tribe, and most of these “members” probably value the NESEA experience, but this (otherwise shallow) membership strategy needs to provide a more deliberate and conscious opportunity for potential members to actively choose to be part of our community and recognize how they might participate with their peers. It looks like now we will have somebody in a dedicated staff position to pay attention to this need. Hooray!
A robust membership strategy is really a community strategy. It includes that initial point of entry, which we might call recruitment, and follows that immediately with a process of orientation (what I am suggesting is absent in my comment above). When defined as a membership strategy, the next phase is retention, which to my mind runs the risk of focusing on a the narrow metric of number of members. If instead the Membership Coordinator were to understand their role as “Community Coordinator” membership alone is no longer the measure of success. Instead the Community Coordinator recognizes that membership is a starting point for an arc of participation over many years in potentially many roles, both active and passive, all thoughtfully structured and organizationally supported to assure that the experience is always vital, fulfilling, and meaningfully contributes to professional growth and contribution. I would call this ongoing phase of member coordination “development.” I have previously recommended Amy Jo Kim’s useful description of this as the “social scaffolding” that can be recognized in any robust and active community. I see hints at this in the job description and am hoping to infer that this role aspires toward this larger purpose.
Communication. Now there is a word! I am confident that, with Mitch Anthony as our partner, there is a discipline about messages and audiences and ambitions that recognizes the determination and persistence, the resources and strategic alignment, and the relentless focus that the scale of campaigns (and I expect there will be many) require. I have been admiring the judicious pace that our new generation of leadership has employed; consistent and patient progress is leading us step by step in what sure feels like a common direction. What a relief!
Effective communication requires skill and too often assumes that messages sent are messages received, messages conceived are messages desired, relationships established are relationships sustained, who we think we are is who others say we are, and that what we do is what actually matters to an intended audience. In other words, as emblazoned over the door of design legend Milton Glaser’s office: “Art is Work”.
My hope is that NESEA’s new Communication Coordinator is wise to all of this. I especially hope that they recognize that internal audiences are as important as external ones. In this case both our member community and its organizational staff are as essential audiences as those in the circles radiating out from this internal constituency. We are the ones with the most immediate fascination and interest in who NESEA is, what it does, and why that matters. The song we sing to the world about that needs a good beat and solid harmony.
“If you practice sustainability, this is where you belong.” I consider this the fundamental value proposition of the organization. It’s result (exemplified by the character and output of our membership) is our point of differentiation and exceptional credibility: “Our members consistently set the highest standards for advancing scrupulous practice.” We are, and have been for nearly four decades, devoted to developing a robust and responsible energy economy and proving it can be done by doing it. I’m looking forward to that message reverberating within and without the organization.
Finally, I am pleased to see these positions characterized as “coordinating” rather than “managing” these two activities. For me it is more than a semantic distinction. A manager takes control. A coordinator assures that a system is engaged to succeed, not always by achieving the ends themselves, but by making certain that everyone who can contribute to that success is involved and organized with others to achieve shared goals. I hope the new hires will act accordingly.
Its been a long journey to reach this new edge. There was a lot of bushwhacking, wandering down rabbit trails, steep climbs and hard weather to endure to get here. I feel like we have reached the shore and are launching a solid vessel across new waters. Its good to see our new captains assemble the needed crew. Here’s to the next stage of this remarkably important journey.
Thanks!
Jamie Wolf / Wolfworks Inc.
