Too often, association conversations around going global begin around uncertainty. The economic picture is cloudy; the market is untested; it requires investment. But in that regard, going global isn’t much different than any other innovation effort you might undertake. So perhaps it’s worth framing internationalization in a different way—it’s about the community you’ve created, and how you might bring more people into it.
That’s the main theme of “Crossing Borders,” an article I wrote for the most recent batch of Associations Now Deep Dives. There, the experts I spoke with noted that associations might do well to worry less about membership than they do about creating a sense of belonging. As Jakub Konysz, MBA, IOM, CAE, founder and CEO of the consulting firm Global Navigators, explained: “Belonging to a group is still a very popular value to people who are based in other countries. There may be a handful of countries that are very popular for associations where membership does not translate—China and a handful of other ones. But in general, people want to affiliate. They want to be a part of something bigger, something greater.”
People want to affiliate. They want to be a part of something bigger, something greater.
Jakub Konysz, MBA, IOM, CAE
Caitlyn Pollihan, CEO and Executive Director of the International Society of Arboriculture, used similar language to describe its approach to international expansion. “We tailor our message but we don’t tailor our offerings,” she told me. “Some places care more about being a part of something bigger and a community, and that’s what membership means to them. And in other areas, it’s more about being able to say that they’re a member, so that they can access our publications or connect with other organizations they might be able to learn from through our component network.”
ISA has expanded its global reach both passively and proactively, Pollihan says—18 percent of its membership now resides outside of the United States. Proactive growth involves less of a formal membership push and more an engagement with the organizations already doing work in the field. “We will work with either a nonprofit group that might be working in forestry, or working with their government on tree ordinance regulations, or climate change relative to natural resources in urban settings,” she says. “That will often be our first connection in certain either new cities or new countries. And then the conversation starts from there to get an idea of their professional culture and what tools they need.”
From there, the conversation is a matter of connecting the dots: “It begins with that the public has to understand that you need healthy trees, and that in order to get healthy trees, you need professionals to care for them, and that those professionals need a professional organization.”
Delivering that understanding can involve air miles, but Konysz notes that the travel doesn’t necessarily have to be to the country that’s attracted your interest. Sometimes convening international attendees at your own annual meeting for a focus group can assist. As can traveling to the conferences where global stakeholders in the field meet.
“There are many sister societies that host international meetings abroad,” he says. “A U.S. organization working internationally needs to be present at those meetings to understand, what does the larger ecosystem look like? Who is involved, who are the players, what are the dynamics, what are the challenges? Just getting a greater understanding of what’s happening.”
[istock/Christoph Burgstedt]
