Make Volunteers VIPS

In the course of doing some long overdue catching up our reading, we came across an article in the May issue of Associations Now that struck a chord. Cynthia D’Amour wrote an interesting piece titled, “How to Make Your Volunteers Feel like VIPs.” We all know that our organizations count on volunteers to thrive. The really good volunteers help us set our strategic direction and guide our organizations to future success. Do we do enough to thank them for their contribution? Do we do enough to make their jobs easier?

D’Amour includes some helpful tips in her article—ones that are relatively easy to implement.

Give volunteers prep materials several weeks in advance

Arrange a dinner for out-of-state travelers

Encourage and support participation and conversation from ALL participants

Acknowledge volunteers at opening cermonies

How else do you recognize your volunteers and help them to do a better job? Send us your thoughts. Visit www.asaecenter.org for access to the Cynthia D’Amour’s article.

What Challenges are Certification Programs Facing?

In our recent governance survey, we asked respondents to tell us what challenges their programs currently face. If you completed the survey and received the results, you saw that the most commonly mentioned challenges were:

Marketing

Managing growth and/or transition

Issues related to global/international operations

Addressing competition (especially from programs with lower standards/criteria)

Implementing a new business model and/or changing the organizational structure

Recertification/continuing competence issues

Recruiting qualified board members

We were a little surprised not to see something about the current state of the economy listed as a challenge. Maybe it’s time for a little more digging on this question. What impact does a downturn in the economy have on certification programs?

For those that are linked to licensure and/or regulation of some kind, maybe the impact isn’t as high. The certification will still be required to practice whether there is a dip in the economy or not. But, for others who are strictly voluntary (which, according to our survey results, is about 74% of the respondents) the impact may be more significant.

For example, if a nurse’s employer doesn’t reimburse for the certification exam fees, is he/she less likely to pursue it right now? If earning the credential means a salary bump, probably not. But, if he/she has an employer that also doesn’t reward recognition with salary increases, what happens to the drive to earn the credential?

We’d like to hear from you. Submit a quick comment on how the economy has impacted your certification program, if at all. If we receive enough feedback, we’ll compile the feedback in the next issue of Credentialing Notes.