Powerful Career Advice for Your High School Student
It is decision time. Your daughter or son is entering their final year of high school. They are at the age when they should be preparing for what’s next. However,…
Programs to Create Effective Member Engagement
Member engagement fuels your core objectives. It needs to be a component of your strategy. Every association is different; there isn’t a magical “one size fits all” method to increase and maintain member engagement. We offer you programs that you can customize to fit your context.
By consistently keeping member engaged, you attract and retain more members giving you leverage to push through legislative wins, promote your advocacy agenda, increase in event attendance, and strengthen your profession and industry.
Member engagement is a reasonably elusive concept—member engagement is a big challenge is that there is not a clear-cut process.
A member engagement strategy is an ongoing initiative. A successful engagement strategy includes current opportunities for members to engage. This takes a consistent effort for your organization to deliver constant value to your members while adjusting your plan. By consistently keeping your members involved, you will attract and retain more members and increase in event attendance and other types of revenue. We offer customized programs for your members to:
- Support the growth of the next generation of members
- Provide personal and team development
- Enhance the selection process for board members, management, staff and companies posting on your job board
Supporting the growth of the next generation of your members
About 80 percent of students in the United States end up changing their major at least once, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. On average, college students change their major at least three times over the course of their college career. In most cases, these students struggle with the decision because they do not know how to face their loved ones about a career change that the loved one may have pushed.
Students' selections were not profoundly explored. We use SuccessFinder to find where their behaviour traits best align. Also, should the student align with your profession, our program engages your members to give information about what it is like to work in your profession.
We have done research and found that among the senior ranks of our user base, nine out of 10 people have said they want to give back. Paying it forward is a powerful force. All of them received help on the way up and now want to find a way to give that help back to others. — Hari Srinivasan, Head of Identity Products at LinkedIn
Being a mentor offers the following benefits: learn new things, share your knowledge with a potential future leader, build new relationships, develop leadership skills, and give back to your industry and association.
Students and New Graduates
High school student considering the profession
- assessment of potential using SuccessFinder to predict career satisfaction and success
- feedback session with the student to inspire them to explore their most successful career paths
- members serve as mentors for those who have a career benchmark within the profession
Post-secondary students considering changing their major
- assessment of potential using SuccessFinder to predict career satisfaction and success
- self-managed guide for the student to career journey
- feedback session with the student to discuss their key strengths and the transition to obtain the new technical skills
- members engaged as mentors for those students who should stay or change major to your profession
For students graduating and entering the workforce
- assessment of potential using SuccessFinder to predict career satisfaction and success
- feedback session with the student to identify key strengthens and critical developmental needs
- members engaged as advisors on entry to the profession
- option for a one-year development plan
Selection Processes
Board Selection
- selecting the right Board members is critical for successful governance
- assisting the Nominating and Governance Committee by evaluating suggestions for candidates from directors, management, membership, others
- customizing Board Skills Matrix to help the assessment process and to make sure the Board has the range of skills, expertise and experience to allow the Board to carry out its mandate and functions effectively
Management Selection
- bulk screening of top 10 candidates to develop the interview list
- three behavioural questions per candidate based on SuccessFinder findings
- for the top two - full assessment of executive potential using the SuccessFinder and a feedback session
- development/onboarding plan for the successful candidate
Staff Selection
- bulk screening of top five candidates to develop the interview list
- three behavioural questions per candidate based on SuccessFinder findings
- a full assessment of executive potential using the SuccessFinder and a feedback session
- onboarding plan for the successful candidate
Talent Pool
- value-added postings on Job Board
- employers have access to the highest potential members who completed SuccessFinder
- value added for members - selected on talent not the quality of resume and interview
- opportunity for the initial screen of candidates on a job benchmark using SuccessFinder
Leadership and team development
High-Performance Executive Talent Management Program
- assessment of executive potential using the SuccessFinder
- reports: interaction styles, career success, career summary dynamics, leadership behavioural competencies
- feedback session
- high-performance executive development plan and briefing with the person and their supervisor
- the multi-year plan includes leadership competencies strengths and restraints, development of competencies opportunities, right development activities, defined performance level for satisfactory performance and coaching as needed
Complete Leadership Series for the Senior Leadership Team
- evaluation of executive potential using the SuccessFinder
- reports: interaction styles, career success, career summary dynamics, leadership behavioural competencies
- team survey - half-day workshop with the team member on the interactions, attitudes, and behaviours that are at the core of the team’s culture
- development of the 90-day improvement plan
- retake the team survey in 90 days to measure progress
Team Development - Organizing your teams to maximize skills
- SuccessFinder assessment completed for all (use the earlier report if previously done)
- feedback session
- appraisal of clarity of purpose and task assignment and team composition based on competencies and behaviours
- ensure that employees are working in areas where each has the best opportunity to succeed
- team questionnaire - half day team workshop
- follow-up in 90 days with a survey to measure progress
Succession Planning
Build Your Next Generation of Leaders
We know it’s not just the top of the pyramid leaders that make a difference. It’s first-line leaders who make decisions day in and day out that will move an organization forward. And we know, organizations are dragging their feet to promote young leaders.
By 2025, Millennials will account for 75% of the workforce (50% of these will be women) and they are looking for opportunities and growth. Our Future Leaders Program takes your top leaders identifies top performers, provides segmentation based on core behaviours, and provides targeted coaching to accelerate their development and teach them the skills they will need to successfully move up the leadership ladder.
Invest in Women Leaders
- Better Financial Performance: The presence of more female leaders in top positions of corporate management correlates with increased profitability [1]
- Better Problem Solving: Women leaders provide a greater diversity of thought, which, in turn, leads to improved problem solving and greater business benefits.[2]
- Development Culture: Female leaders were rated higher in 12 of the 16 competencies required for outstanding leadership. Developing others was one of them. Female leaders are more effective than male leaders when it comes to improving their employees.[3]
- Trust and Collaboration: Women are more attracted to cooperation and relationship building.[4] Canadian women in public service have shown to have had a positive impact on “policy, programs and operations” that arises from leadership styles that are open, collaborative and less hierarchical. [5]
- Better Engagement: Employees who work for a female manager were more engaged than those working for a male manager. Women who report to a female manager had the highest engagement at 35%.[6]
[1] Firms with more women are more profitable, HBR Feb 08, 2016
[2] Global Leadership Forecast 2014-15, DDI
[3] Are Women Better Leaders Than Men, HBR March 2012
[4] Are Women More Attracted to Cooperation Than Men, National Bureau of Economic Research, April 5, 2017
[5] Women’s Leadership Matters, Carleton University 2016
[6] Employees of Female Managers Outscore Employees of Male Managers on Most Engagement Items, Gallup, 2015
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Insights — Associations
FAQ — Associations
Is there an ideal number of members on a team?
Think about the benefits of a large group versus the ideal number of people. The more people you have, theoretically, the better chance you have of getting the best information to make the best decision. Research has shown that collective intelligence does exist. But, according to research reported in Science, the October 2010 issue by authors Anita Williams Woolley, Christopher F. Chabris, Alex Pentland, Nada Hashmi and Thomas W. Malone:
This “c factor” (the group’s collective intelligence) is not strongly correlated with the average or largest individual intelligence of group members but it correlates with the average social sensitivity of group members, the equality in conversational turn-taking, and the number of women in the group.
Emotional intelligence and soft skills are more important to the functioning of teams than focusing on the ideal number. Our assessment of the performance traits of the team members using SuccessFinder can create the needed diversity of thought for the team to be extremely effective.
Hackman and Vidmar (1970)
Moreover, their research on optimum group size for member satisfaction showed a similar outcome. They determined the ideal number was 4.6 members, let's call it 5. The number is just one factor. Social sensitivity and being able to read emotions are attributes of successful team decision-making. Consider the number and consider the members. Maybe they’ll need a little training in empathy and being sensitive to others as well as having a culture that allows all to fully take part.
What are the performance competencies necessary to enable career success and satisfaction?
In addition to the technical or professional skills, education and years of experience, research has shown that specific performance competencies are necessary to enable career success in a particular profession.
Engineering as an example
The SuccessFinder competency model (refer to the image below) is made up of 26 competencies that are organized into five broad categories of performance. As I spent my career in engineering and lead large engineering organizations for 15 years, I will use engineering as an example. The same approach applies to all professions. However, performance competencies are different. We work with associations to make this powerful analytics available to young people considering your trade as a career. Through our CareerSuccess program, we also make this analytics available to students and new graduates as they embark on their journey to career success and satisfaction. We encourage this journey to start before considering your college major. Most don't, and 80% of college students change their major!
When the SuccessFinder Researchers benchmarked the performance competencies of engineers against the full range of skills, the researchers found ten dominant competencies that high-performing engineers demonstrate in the workplace.
| Competency | Description |
|---|---|
| Reasons Critically | Demonstrates the ability to tackle difficult problems by using logical, quantitative reasoning to identify patterns relevant to problem-solving. |
| Builds Consensus | Enjoys working as part of a team. Emphasis is on appropriate compromise, demonstrating tact, maintaining emotional control and interpersonal tolerance rather than making demands. |
| Demonstrates Character | Honors interpersonal commitments, maintains the courage of high-minded convictions, values living rightly and plays by honourable rules. |
| Thinks Conceptually | Demonstrates the ability to comprehend theoretical concepts and be curious about the broader "why?" or holistic perspective on problems. |
| Strives for Excellence | Demonstrates a desire to produce the best quality products or service and conscientiously tracks and double checks the accuracy of work. |
| Overcomes Adversity | Demonstrates an ability to persevere when pursuing difficult challenges and responds positively to adversity in the face of failure. |
| Maintains Accountability | Demonstrates an attitude that is defined by taking responsibilities and loyalties very seriously, by assuming a sense of personal accountability of one’s results, as well as co-workers’ actions without seeking to blame or provide excuses for failures. |
| Establishes Alliances | Establishes friendly relationships, enjoys expressing one’s views and participating socially with others in a manner that reflects genuineness and interpersonal intimacy. |
| Initiates Independently | Demonstrates a preference for taking action, pursuing high risk and initiating projects independently of prior approval or requests. |
| Focuses on Results | Prepared to make the personal sacrifices or expend extraordinary dedication to one’s work when frequent overtime is required to complete assignments. |
All ten programs for associations look great to engage our members. Which program should we start with?
Engaged Members
For associations, engaged members are their reason for being, so getting and keeping members truly engaged in the organization is critical for survival. In his post, Building a Strong Nonprofit Part 7: Engagement Pyramid and Cycle, Michael J. Brennan offers a simple equation for looking at engagement:
Engagement = Relationship + Action
We recommend that you start with the program that creates opportunities to engage your members.
- Relationship — All members know students. Most members like to help students, especially when they are interested in their association or their profession. So that is a good place to start.
- Action — An hour or two of conversation with one of your members can set a student on their journey to career success and satisfaction. The action is easy, no special training required.
So that is a good place to start. Our CareerSuccess program is the best way to start and keep a student on their career journey for success and satisfaction. You members can play an important role in that journey.
We are happy to walk through all ten programs with you. You can assess the value of the program on how it may engage your members.
Affinity programs must be more than just getting your members a good deal. So focus on how we complement your goals.
