Ten days ago, Linton Weeks posted a provocative piece on the NPR.org blog page that generated much huffing and puffing in the blogosphere about the sidebar on funny trade association names, yet few comments from association execs on Weeks' headlined question: Time for Associations to Trade in Their Past?
Weeks cites futurist Jim Carroll, author of Ready, Set, Done: How to Innovate When Faster is the New Fast, to make the argument. "In 2010 Carroll wrote that many of the trade groups 'remain stuck in a rut of complacency,' they:
- deliver the same old program.
- focus on the same old issues, generate the same old knowledge, plan the same old conference, and have their agenda managed by the same old membership has-beens.
- bemoan the fact that membership is declining; that the Millennials seem to have little time or inclination to join them; and that the world is just becoming, well, too complex to deal with."
"'So they form a committee, hire a consultant, study the issue, and lull themselves into a false sense of future-security. By doing so, they are almost guaranteeing themselves a march into oblivion.'"
"If an association 'doesn't evolve at the same pace,' Carroll says today, 'or doesn't keep up, or doesn't define the future, it risks becoming obsolete.'"
Fair enough. John Graham then makes the case for relevancy, noting the formation of new trade groups lobbying for emerging industries. Weeks agrees: "... Washington without associations would be like New York without hipsters or Los Angeles without starlets."
As a grab from my Associations 2030 essay is included, I wanted to add a comment, but that option is now closed. I missed the wave, vegging out in the Tuscan countryside that week. So thanks to Rhea Blanken BTW for forwarding the link to me!
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