STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect? (take III)

Subject: STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect? (take III)
From: Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Sun, 06 Mar 2005 08:42:06 -0500


Three strikes and I'm out. Here's the pitch! <g> T.W. Smith wondered: <<In pushing this back to a discussion of local chapters, what can the local chapter do to reel in the apathetic, motivate the masses, and energize the general chapter population so that things of real value happen...?>>

An excellent question, and alas, not one I can answer. Members of any organization must be the ones who take responsibility for curing their own apathy. (You can lead the hordes to water, but you cannot make them think. <g>) I'm not interesting in playing the anesthetizing role of a TV set; I expect people to take some responsibility for their own motivation.

We do market our meetings agressively without being offensive about it, and have a reputation for presenting relevant talks by good speakers, but it's still rare for us to get more than 10% of our membership turning out at any given meeting (ca. 20 people). I'm told that's actually a good rate by comparison with many chapters, but it's still disappointing. Our social events usually exceed a 20% turnout, which suggests to me that perhaps we should be doing more social events.

<<IOW, if the employer is willing to pay, but the pubs manager is uncertain that they can justify 6 memberships to the point that he does not try, what can the local chapter do to turn this around?>>

One thing we're trying to do here in Montreal is work with the local human resources professionals to explain the value we bring to a company. I've written up a short, punchy article for their monthly newsletter, but haven't been able to get it published yet because they only accept articles from members and I'm not interested in joining; I've finally found a member who may be willing to submit it under his own name. I'm also hoping to convince them to invite me to a monthly meeting so I can establish direct contacts and provide ongoing feedback.

To demonstrate the value of the membership, members must show that they've learned something that makes them better at their jobs. For example, a manager can see the ad for my talk on onscreen editing, and say "I want all six of you to attend, and at least one of you to come back from that talk ready to try implementing this new approach". Or the manager can say "we're thinking about single-sourcing -- I want you all to go to France Baril's talk on March 15th* and learn about XML and DITA, then tell me by the end of the week how we could try that."

* That's an actual example from STC Montreal, by the way.

As manager I'd turn the problem around: "We have three killer problems at work: managing SMEs, demonstrating value, and getting donuts before the engineers see them. Go to the STC meeting and find out how everyone else deals with these problems." In my experience, STC members are more than willing to share their solutions, and there's nothing like a focus on your own specific problems to motivate you to work to solve them.

<<At the very least, an employer should think of the following as important for employee retention>>

All good, but you left out why I left my most recent employer--formerly the best boss and best job (pre-freelancing) I'd ever had. At my performance appraisal a few years ago, my boss said to me "you're full of all this wonderful theory and great suggestions, but you never do anything with it". I pointed out half a dozen things I'd proposed in the past year alone that had been turned down cold, reminded him that I'd been doing this for nearly 10 years with few successes, and mentioned a few of the big-payoff things I had done (several without permission). He admitted that I had a point and apologized for the organizational inertia.

If you have intelligent, motivated employees who go to a conference or meeting or who join a professional society and come back supercharged with energy and great ideas, let them try out a few of those ideas. Sure, they may fail. But if they succeed, you've repaid your investment in the membership costs and given them a reason to stay on and try again.

Bill Swallow added a few thoughts: <<Plan events around common areas of interest to start, and don't make them simple "meet and greets". I hate simple meet and greets...>>

See the problem we face? You don't like meet and greets, which is fair enough, but as noted above, roughly twice as many of our local members attend meet and greets as attend technical meetings. The point here is not to pick on Bill, but to emphasize that in an organization like STC Montreal (ca. 200 members), there's a wide and often nonoverlapping range of interests. No one idea motivates everyone to attend. We do have a core of regulars at our meetings, but the audience tends to vary with the topics, and some people never come to any meeting: too many other commitments, too far to travel, whatever.

<<how likely will an employer shell out for a conference that features several job hunting and positioning sessions?>>

Let's play devil's advocate here: Does the employer send their software developers, engineers, middle managers, and even senior managers to conferences that feature job hunting and positioning sessions? Do these people belong to organizations that make them vulnerable to headhunting? You bet they do. Why should we be any different?

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Geoff Hart ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca
(try geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com if you don't get a reply)
www.geoff-hart.com
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References:
RE: Control Issues: From: Oja, W. Kelly
STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect?: From: T.W. Smith
Re: STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect?: From: Bill Swallow
Re: STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect?: From: T.W. Smith
STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect? (take II): From: Geoff Hart
Re: STC chapter question -- what should an employer expect? (take II): From: T.W. Smith

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