Greater Rochester, NY Chapter #314 Enhancing the success of women in the construction industry in Rochester since 1985 MEMBER RETENTION FOR THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN IN CONSTRUCTION (NAWIC) PREPARED FOR NAWIC AMEC 2016 San Antonio, Texas Prepared by Jillian Penkin Chapter President 2015-2017 August 1 st, 2016
MEMO DATE: August 1, 2016 TO: Members of NAWIC FROM: Jillian Penkin, Chapter President, Rochester NY SUBJECT: IMPROVING MEMBER RETENTION Congratulations to the entire membership on the huge growth of membership and of membership retention over the course of the last few years! It has taken hard work and dedication from all members and the boards to create the groups that we have today. I am proud to be a part of such an inspiring group of women. However, the hard work has only just begun; now we need to tackle membership retention and keeping all the members that we have gained over the years. BACKGROUND and PURPOSE The purpose of this proposal is to address the issues surrounding member retention and to find ways to keep our current members while still reaching out to new women to join our group. Member retention is an important part of what we need to focus on as we move into the future. Having women join our organization only to leave it after one year is a sign that we are not reaching our members in the way they expected. In Rochester, for example: membership sat stagnate; our membership has skyrocketed in the last 5 years. We have grown from a membership of 13 women to a current roster 59 members! With such a huge growth in membership, it is as important as ever that we are listening to our members needs and delivering on their expectations. An unhappy member is unlikely to renew. This proposal will illustrate ways we can effectively reach our membership and keep them renewing year after year. It is always important that our members know who the power in the room is! Our membership covers a wide range of job titles and job descriptions, all somehow relating back to the construction industry. This list includes but is not limited to the following: Business owners Project Managers Architects/Engineers Admin Staff/Executive Assistants Insurance Professionals Accountants Legal Professionals It is also important to keep our member companies engaged and apprised of what NAWIC is doing locally so we stay relevant on their list of charities to donate to each year. When these companies hear all that we are doing in our communities- they simply want to be involved! It is key that we keep their member employees happy and engaged with NAWIC because that information has the potential to travel to the owners of these companies. Any negative feedback on our organization can be very costly to the efforts we are trying to raise money for. 2
PROBLEM Retaining members is a key element to being a successful group. It is equally as important to get people interested enough in our organization to join us as it is to keep them interested and renewing their membership each chapter year. Using Rochester as the example here, the Rochester chapter is currently at 80% retainage. The goal is to get our retainage to a sustainable 90-95% retention of membership. (East Region used for example) It is important to understand why members would choose not to renew with NAWIC. If we can understand the reasons why our members would leave us, we will be better equipped to make changes for a positive impact. 3
After performing a survey of current members and former members (Rochester area), the following were reasons given that members tend to leave our organization: 1. Job loss 2. Job Change/no longer in construction 3. Speakers/meeting topics not relevant to member s interests 4. Not seeing the return on investment (ROI) 5. Cost Unfortunately, there are some things that are simply out of our control. If a member changes her career or loses her job, if a member moves out of the chapter s area, or they are involved in too much at work and can t make the meetings. These are common reasons members leave that may just be out of our control to keep them. SOLUTION Understanding why our members choose to leave is the first step in finding ways to keep our members engaged and coming back for more In a case where a member leaves because of something we are under performing on, it is absolutely in our control to adapt and change. This organization is anything but static, we should be constantly updating to meet the ever changing construction industry, our members look to us to be at the forefront of construction and constantly aware of any changes. Making sure the speakers that we invite to our meetings are speaking relevant and interesting topics is something that we should not take lightly. Members should look forward to our meetings. Our chapter meetings take place at 6:00pm the end of a long work day so it is important that we can keep our attendees attention and give them information while staying interesting and keep them engaged. An even more important part of the survey given was reasons why members do stay with us. The following are a few of the reasons given by current members on why they continue to renew with us, year after year: 1. Networking 2. Welcoming 3. Meeting topics 4. Learning experience 5. Socialization 6. Powerful group of women What this positive list tells me is that we are doing good work! We have happy, return members that are getting their needs met. It is our job to take the negative feedback and improve. The following items will help us to pin point where we need to start and what areas we need to strengthen as we move forward with this plan. 1. Retention Committee: I propose we start a committee dedicated to tracking retention just for our chapter and working out strategies to increase our retention rates. I feel we should have 3 members to this committee; 2 members from the board of directors and 1 member from the 4
general membership. The reason I feel we should have one non-board member is to get an honest representation from the membership and to get members interested in board proceedings for future board of director nominees. This committee should plan to meet monthly, either in person or on a conference call outside of the regularly scheduled board of director meeting. This will be the committee s time to discuss problems and solutions, changes in chapter procedure, and any feedback from the general membership. It will also be a responsibility of this committee to generate the questionnaire that will go to the membership and to stay on schedule for the chapter year. This committee will ultimately bring any findings or proposed changes to the board of directors where a vote will be taken and majority rule will decide the next steps taken. 2. Stay Informed: It s the board s responsibility to communicate to both our prospective and current members what NAWIC can offer, not just at the local level but nationally as well. Our members need to be informed of all the resources they have available to them just by being a member with us. All this info can be accessed from the National Website (http://www.nawic.org/nawic/value_of_membership.asp) 3. Be industry leaders: Our members are looking to us to keep them informed on any changes in the industry. For example: A change in OSHA standards A new project is being discussed by Rochester Downtown Development Company mergers Seminars put on by members from their respective fields. We have the power in the room- let s use it! All of the above are just examples of the ever changing construction industry. It is up to us to try to get this information to our members in a timely fashion. If we can stay informed and therefore keep our members informed, that will only further our value in their minds. 4. Event Committee: The event committee should consist of at least 3 board members. Planning events can be difficult and is very time consuming. I feel if we have 3 members to this committee, they can evenly distribute the responsibilities which will not only save burnout from having just one person planning 10 meetings, but also has the opportunity to bring in fresh ideas and new discussion. Member 1: Food/Location Member 2: RSVPs/Payment Member 3: Speakers/Topics Splitting up these responsibilities, we can be much more effective. The committee will work with each other on what our meetings will consist of and will be voted on by board majority by October 11 th - the date of our October board meeting. Anything that has not been decided by that date, can be discussed via board emails or at future board meetings. SCHEDULE Member retention has to be constantly kept up on and maintained. This is not a static plan or idea, we will continue to work on and evolve our efforts to maintain all of our member s full attention. 5
This plan will start effective immediately. I expect each current member of the board to take the items laid out in the proposal and put them into action. We will have a kick off meeting to discuss our strategy in August (date to follow) Our chapter year starts in September so having the meeting in August will be a good way to get us on track before the year officially starts. As a benchmark for dates, I have proposed the following schedule: August 7 th Board member planning meeting- generate questionnaire September 1 st Send questionnaire to membership (deadline September 7 th ) September 7 th First chapter meeting of year September 13 th First board member meeting of year September 28 th Take all findings and put together report October 3 rd Start new action plan! BUDGET In an effort to stay as low cost as possible, I feel we should e-mail the questionnaire to the membership rather than mail hard copies. This will save us hundreds of dollars in printing and postage costs. Our 2015-16 board has proposed a budget line item to take effect in 2016-17 that will help cover costs of bringing guests to meetings, this was met with great enthusiasm. It states: If a board member brings a guest and pays for them, if they become a member within 60 days the chapter will reimburse the cost of their guest meal. I propose to expand on that and if a member is struggling to cover costs to attend and are truly using NAWIC to the best of her abilities and is fully engaged, the board can vote on helping to cover the costs of chapter meetings and/or membership dues. The incoming board can discuss an appropriate dollar amount. Any amount not used for this purpose can roll into the new year or be put towards NEF/Scholarship. CONCLUSION/AUTHORIZATION Based off my research and first-hand experiences with this organization over the last 6 years, I feel confident that we can increase member retention 10-15% with the introduction of the Retention Committee and the feedback from our membership. I feel it is our duty to this organization to do our due diligence with seeing our membership happy and returning to us year after year. Sincerely, Jillian Penkin, Chapter President Greater Rochester, NY Chapter 314 6