Chapter Management Awards 2016 PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

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1 CHAPTER IABC Ottawa REGION Canada East CHAPTER BOARD TERM July 1 to June 30 TIMELINE July 1, 2015 to November 15, 2016 DIVISION CATEGORY CHAPTER CONTACT Division 1: Large Chapter (201 or more members) Kaleigh Maclaren, Executive Vice President, IABC Ottawa evp@ottawa.iabc.com 1. BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT IABC Ottawa connects over 200 members and the greater Ottawa marketing, communication and creative community to learn about best practices, develop skills, create connections and access resources in a welcoming community. Established in 1976, the Ottawa chapter of IABC has a rich history of striving for effective chapter management to benefit our members, community and leaders. Our focus is on building a strong community, developing and supporting inspired leaders, and positioning our members as experts. We focus on helping our chapter members grow in their career by providing them with the skills and connections to succeed in their jobs. IABC Ottawa creates a demand for membership through a diverse slate of focused quality events, workshops and professional development opportunities. We also create innovative communications content, such as our popular podcast, The Voice, available around the world. The Voice helps listeners keep on top of the industry s hottest topics at both the local and international level. Chapter History/Challenges Despite stable membership and successful programming for the past six seasons, IABC Ottawa saw a decline in membership over 2015 and into 2016, which also impacted event attendance. To attract new members and retain current ones, we refocused and revamped our PD portfolio, offering more price sensitive and value driven events that addressed audience needs. Additionally, we have added an emphasis on the value IABC Ottawa can have in developing leadership roles and invested in our leaders. To sustain and develop the chapter, we continue to ensure that we focus on the things we do well, achieve our goals and deliver the most value to our members. 2. OVERVIEW IABC Ottawa connects members with a range of opportunities including the chance to grow in their careers and develop skills with volunteer leadership roles. Our board members and volunteers are a critical component in helping us achieve the chapter s vision as they act as brand ambassadors in our community and are responsible for making our vibrant chapter run. Understanding the value of volunteers, we strive to make each role about more than completing tasks and to make volunteering with IABC Ottawa an enriching experience. The diverse and supportive IABC culture is evident throughout the IABC Ottawa community and most notably within the volunteer sphere where we strive to have a board composed of Senior Communicators, mid-career and young professionals as well as students working together. To better support and engage our growing membership, a number of the board Vice President roles (membership, marketing communications and professional development) are shared by two people and supported by a group of directors who VPs oversee. This approach, with shared workload and a group of volunteer directors, is a key strategy when it comes to both volunteer retention and succession planning. These are two key challenges in a volunteer-run chapter that we continue to work to address. IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 1

2 Going into the season our chapter experienced a high turnover in board members after a large number of them completed two or more year terms. We wanted to ensure that the momentum and strong chapter management was not lost in turn over so, as a result, we decided to include inspiring our leaders as a key pillar of our vision. This pillar articulated our belief that volunteers are leaders, the importance we put on volunteer leaders as well as the opportunity in IABC to build leadership skills. It also is the pillar we think of in recruiting, retaining and developing our leaders and the work we have done to further enhance these areas to truly inspire our leaders. 3. GOALS & OBJECTIVES The overarching goal for leadership development is to inspire our leaders. The following objectives were set to help us achieve our goal of inspiring our leaders to position them as brand ambassadors and provide a valuable development opportunity: To have no vacant board positions and specifically to recruit for the seven vacant board positions to present a full slate for the season. Align new and returning Board members and volunteers with the Chapter s vision throughout the season to further engage them and show the value of contributions. To offer training and professional development opportunities to Board members so they can take on their portfolio with confidence. To celebrate and recognize volunteers by having ten outstanding volunteers of the month and an annual volunteer of the year. 4. BUDGET Activity Expenses Revenue Volunteers $ $0.00 Leadership Institute $5145* $0.00 * In the 2016 budget we have been looking specifically at how we can invest more in leadership development we currently have no expenses but later in season we will. All things so far have been in-kind leadership development. 5. IMPLEMENTATION ACTIVITIES A. Volunteer Recruitment Program As a volunteer-run association, IABC Ottawa s success is wholly dependent on the recruitment and retention of highly engaged individuals. General Volunteer Recruitment Process IABC Ottawa primarily recruits volunteers online and through word-of-mouth. The Board has identified professional development and networking events as a key opportunity to gauge the interest of attendees in contributing to IABC through volunteerism. At all events, Board members are encouraged proactively seek out interested individuals and to provide them with a process to formally apply. This process is the online volunteer recruitment web form, where prospective IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 2

3 volunteers who have heard about IABC Ottawa through an event, Jobline posting or social media can articulate their skills, experience and desired level of involvement. This form requires that applicants articulate their experience, skills, and reason for volunteering, as well as submit their resume, to ensure prospective volunteers are considered for positions that positively contribute to their professional development and meet the needs of the role. Applicants that meet the needs of a specific available role are interviewed by the Vice President leading the portfolio, empowering the Vice President to assess the candidate for fit, skills and the unique needs of the role. This approach helps Vice Presidents to gain experience in recruitment and hiring with the support of the VP, Leadership Development. In the cases where specific opportunities are not available, IABC Ottawa ensures to follow up with prospective volunteers to thank them for their interest, gauge any specific future roles that might be a good fit, and to encourage volunteers to attend events. All volunteers are invited to join an IABC Ottawa Volunteers Facebook page, where members are informed of upcoming events, roles, and the Volunteer of the Month program. IABC Ottawa receives volunteer submissions on a weekly basis, at approximately 3 5 per month. These prospective volunteer submissions are tracked in a database on Dropbox that is accessible to all Vice Presidents, ensuring that they can review the database to recruit within their portfolio in a timely manner. As volunteer interest typically outweighs volunteer need for IABC Ottawa, the association is currently developing a volunteer engagement event that would encourage prospective volunteers to contribute to the chapter s strategy and focus, serving as a way to keep volunteers engaged as well as providing a funnel for future director and Vice President positions Board of Directors Recruitment A key activity for the incoming president is to fill the Board of Directors for the next season. The goal is to have a full slate of Vice Presidents and ensure a diverse group of board members who understand the importance of good governance and chapter management. Starting in March 2016, the incoming President met with all of the current board members to identify their interest for the next season and identify directors who may be interested joining the board. Following those meetings there were a number of positions that would need to be filled for the board year. To fill these vacant positions, we: Approached professionals who were active directors or involved as brand ambassadors in our community. We also asked past chapter leaders for suggestions to engage them in the process and keep them connected to the chapter operations. Recruited interested members starting in spring 2016 through an online form on the Ottawa.iabc.com website (see Work Sample Appendix E). Our incoming president met with each potential candidate to ensure they were a good fit for the board and what position would be best for them and their interests. Board role descriptions helped support these discussions to provide clarity of responsibilities in the role and as a board member overall. Following the recruitment of interested volunteers, prospective Board members were selected through a formal election process (discussed in section E of implementation). B. Connecting Leaders on International level Being part of an international community is important to the IABC Ottawa chapter in the IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 3

4 connections that provides members, the global standard it represents for our profession and the support it provides the chapter. We encourage the community to embrace both the local and international IABC communities and ensure that board members understand the connections as well as activities going on. The chapter is active on the Canada East region board where the President actively represents the chapter and contributes to support other chapters. Members of IABC Ottawa are involved in the IABC community judging awards and sitting on taskforces such as the Leader Centre taskforce. All opportunities at the regional and international level are actively promoted on IABC Ottawa social channels and in our monthly newsletter. C. Training and Development Program Training and board development is a key part of the strategy for the season and the VP Leadership Development has been working hard to enhance our current training activities to add more development opportunities for board members. It is believed that by developing our leaders this will strengthen the chapter, show the value volunteering with the chapter can have and help retain leaders. The first part of the training program is orientation. Orientation is provided to all board members as part of the annual summer strategic planning session. They learn about the chapter, its role in IABC internationally, role descriptions, and governance aspects, including the chapter policies and bylaws. Additionally, each board member does their own orientation with the director volunteers and develops tools to help them succeed. Specifically, the Professional Development portfolio created a complete guide on all their processes that run one of the most demanding and well established portfolios. Additionally, resources are shared on Dropbox and our Slack channel to help orient to roles, ask questions etc. Continued training happens throughout the season at board meetings. At each board meeting, we take time to ensure that all board members understand what is happening at the local, international and regional levels of IABC, answer questions and share resources available. This helps ensure that board members can be ambassadors among the membership. Our activities are also connected between portfolios and we use tools from other chapters available on Leader Centre. We also do a regular post-meeting survey to get feedback from board members to remain strategic (see Work Sample Appendix B). To support the further development of board members two members went to Leadership Institute in 2016, the incoming president and the then VP, Partnership who is now the next incoming president following attending Leadership Institute. We created a comprehensive report of ideas and things learned at LI to share with board members. Part of our plan this year is to send at least two board members to LI to support IABC development and association management skills. The past-president, president and incoming president work closely together to help the overall strength of the chapter, address issues and support each other in leadership roles. This strong relationship helps with transition and building strategies that succeed from one season to the next. Additionally, past presidents and leaders are regularly consulted and engaged in special activities. Board of Directors Professional Development Survey To support a renewed focus on the development of the Board of Directors, the chapter conducted a professional development survey for Vice Presidents. The survey focused on identifying development requirements that would enable the VPs in fulfilling their responsibilities (individually and collectively) as Board members. IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 4

5 The survey was conducted in the Fall of 2016 and received 9 responses (see Appendix A for work sample). VPs indicated the areas of developing vision and mission and leadership and ambassadorship to be strengths of the 2016/2017 Board. The Board was also asked to identify areas of focus for development, and indicated goal setting and measurement (identified by 80% of respondents) and establishing strategy to achieve vision and mission (identified by 66% of respondents) to be preferred areas of focus. The Board was also asked to identify formats that they felt would be most effective to achieve the development goals of the Board. VPs indicated a preference for a speaker with expertise in areas of interest to present to the Board, with additional interest in courses and small-group coaching. These survey results will be used to design ongoing professional development for the Board. Additional feedback indicated that VPs are interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the regional and national level of IABC, which will be an ongoing priority of the President and Executive Vice President. Moving forward, this survey will be conducted at the beginning and end of each season to establish a Baseline and assess progress of the Board s professional development. D. Strategic Planning Annually the IABC Ottawa board holds a strategic planning session over the summer to plan for the upcoming season and set an overall strategy. These sessions are led by the new President and each board member is asked to present their one big goal or idea to help achieve the vision. Following the overall session, most portfolios hold planning sessions with their directors to make tactical plans for the season. The outlines for Chapter Management Awards are an important consideration in portfolio planning as they help identify gaps and provide clear areas to plan. To enhance the July 2016 session, we invited a speaker from a company called Leading Board to present tactics for keeping our board engaged and accountable. The presentation was highly rated in our post-session survey. We hoped doing this would help board members understand governance and the role of the board to make us more efficient in meetings and overall. For the past two years we have found it to be valuable to end the session with a speed dating style activity where board members discussed how they would support their respective portfolios. With this year s strategy including a pillar focused on leadership development we looked at key ways we could get feedback to help support this. We started board meeting evaluation surveys starting with feedback on the strategic session (see Appendix B). The feedback we received for the session suggested that the new members needed more information to prepare for their roles going into the new season. We developed or updated the following tools to meet their needs: An IABC 101 terminology document outlining things locally, regionally and internationally (see Work Sample Appendix D). Job descriptions for volunteer positions (updated) Updated the Board Manual; this is currently in progress Ongoing post Board meeting evaluations (see Work Sample Appendix B) Board members are responsible for attending monthly meetings, contributing agenda items and reporting on the progress and achievements of their portfolios. Full reports are uploaded in advance of the meeting (outlining what had been done, in progress, agenda items, questions) and prereading done. This helps ensure that discussions are kept at a strategic level and here are key updates on each portfolios tactical plans as they relate to the overall strategy. There also is always a IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 5

6 strategic agenda item that focuses on a specific challenge that connects to the strategy that is given more time for discussion. E. Recognition Programs Celebrating volunteer contributions is something that is very important to the IABC Ottawa chapter on an on-going basis. We believe that leaders who feel appreciated and supported is key to inspiring them therefore this is an area we continue to enhance. Our activities to recognize volunteers include offering special pricing for events, recognize a volunteer of the month and have special annual volunteer awards. At each board meeting a member of the board puts forward any volunteers whose contributions stood out in the previous month. The board then votes on the volunteer to receive the recognition and we send a signed card with a gift card as well as recognize them on the volunteer Facebook group. To enhance this activity and further recognize volunteers in Fall 2016 we started mentioning the volunteer of the month at social or professional development events. This approach helps ensure that a wide selection of volunteers from different portfolios are celebrated and get recognized among the whole membership. From all of the volunteer of the month recipients we determine a volunteer of the year to receive the award for the extemporary contributions to the chapter of the season. The award is presented that the Annual General Meeting and Season closer event in June. Further we have a special Distinguished Service award that is awarded to a member who is involved in IABC locally and internationally and has excelled in their communication career to recognize our community. Both of these awards are voted on by the board of directors. We have developed an IABC policy that all volunteers working at an event receive a complimentary ticket and a policy for all board members to receive a 10% discount to events. This is to help make the obligation of attending events not a barrier to representing the chapter and to provide access to professional development for their contributions. This discount can be shared with volunteers who stand out at the discretion of board members. As well, we incorporate a volunteer celebration event with our season closer party and provide complimentary tickets to all volunteer to attend the June event to celebrate the season and everyone who is part of the chapter. All of these collectively, along with regular check-ins, ensure leaders have the support, information and tools they need help recognize volunteer s value. F. Election Procedures The chapter bylaws state that members must vote to approve board members on a slate put forward by a nomination committee following an open call for members to be nominated for election. Candidates applied to the call for nominations and were vetted by the selection committee. The selection committee was composed of two active members, the immediate past-president, the executive vice present and the president. (See Work Sample Appendix E for nomination submission). The nomination committee put forward the slate to be elected at the AGM by the IABC Ottawa membership. 10 board members were elected at the AGM (there is automatic succession for President to Past-president and Executive Vice-President to President) for a total of 12 board members. The board is elected in June, attends a summer strategy session and then begins meeting monthly in September. While board members are expected to commit to fulfilling at least a one-year term on the board there are personal or professional situations that arise creating vacancies through the season. If a IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 6

7 vacancy occurs the board first assesses if the position is crucial to be filled, identifies the skills needed and determines an active director that can fill the position. The President then can put forward the appointed candidate and the board votes to approve them. All other volunteer director positions are appointed, we have approximately 20 director positions changing based on the projects and time of year. G. Communication Tools to Support Volunteer / Board Engagement In 2016, we implemented a communication and collaboration tool called Slack. It was initially tested to discover how it could be best used and in September 2016 we took a focused approach to use for the board season. This helped us create open communication, reduce clutter and ensure that all board members are kept aware of local, national and international activities. The tool has been very well accepted by the Board and is used on a daily basis as we can see from the analytics showing public and private messages being sent. Additionally, to support open communication and engagement, the IABC Ottawa Volunteer Facebook page is a place for volunteers to keep up to date on new opportunities and gatherings, plus connect as a group as professionals within the local Ottawa community. All volunteers are encouraged to engage with one another on the page by posting relevant content, asking questions, or their thoughts on recent IABC events. Furthermore, this page is also a hub for career opportunities, providing access to open positions and possible referrals. (See Work Sample Appendix C for more on Facebook Page). This space is also used to celebrate the accomplishments of our volunteers, with VP Leadership Development posting a spotlight each month celebrating a hardworking volunteer. This type of recognition performs well and encourages other volunteers to continue to strive for excellence within the IABC Ottawa community. 6. MEASUREMENT & RESULTS Objectives To have a no vacant board positions and specifically to recruit for the seven vacant board positions to present a full slate for the season. Align board members and volunteers with the Chapter s vision throughout the season to further engage them and show the value of contributions. Results Kept all board positions filled for the season as we encountered a resignation during the season Put forward a full slate for season filling 7 vacant positions with 5 being promotions from either other board roles or directors. For transparency and good governance followed bylaws for election process. Diverse board composed of: Senior Communicators, Mid-career and young professionals, one student (consistently maintained July 2015 to November 2016) Strategic session rated a success by board members highlighted good learning opportunity in post survey but also highlighted more opportunities for learning about IABC that led to creating a IABC 101 terminology guide (see Work Sample Appendix D). Started Post board meeting evaluations: 100% of the board agreed or strongly agreed the three meetings of board term have all been a good use it a good use of time and 90% of strongly agree board believe we engaged adequately on strategic issues in meeting. Board vision presented to all members at season opener. Since starting to use Slack over 1185 messages have been sent on IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 7

8 board related channels and additional messages have been sent privately between leaders. To offer training and professional development opportunities to Board members so they can take on their portfolio with confidence. Successful presentation from Leading Boards at summer strategy session feedback included that there was more understanding on governance and all board meetings have been able to be conducted in the 2 hour or less time frame vs. previous season without this training where board meetings could be 3hours. Sent two members to Leadership Institute in February 2016 Put in place tools like Slack and use of the Facebook volunteer group as well as Dropbox to support open communication and resource sharing. Regular check-ins between President, past-president at incoming president with each other and with other board members to ensure feel support. Created a IABC 101 document to help inform leaders about things within IABC locally, nationally and internationally. (See Work Sample Appendix D). Voted on key policies to create Conducted Board survey on professional development requirements, with an 81% response rate. Identified areas for development based on current skills and self-assessment. (See Work Sample Appendix A) To celebrate and recognize volunteers by having ten outstanding volunteers of the month and an annual volunteer of the year. IABC Ottawa continues a strong track record of chapter Presidents going on to key leadership roles after their terms illustrating how e foster leaders and have a wealth of community to help develop our chapter leadership. The past four Presidents have all taken sr. business communications related roles following their terms showing the role communications plays in business and importance of leadership skills. 12 volunteers recognized during submission period Ashlea McGrath, Podcast producer awarded volunteer of the year award and Tara Lapointe 22 volunteers registered for a complimentary ticket to the season closer event in June 2016 IABC Ottawa Chapter Management Award Submission: Leadership Development 8