How to Build an AMC Culture That Retains and Sustains

This guest post is provided by Impact AMC.

Impact Association Management was a recent recipient of the 2022 Dane County Small Business Awards. This award recognizes small businesses that make a real difference in their communities and for their employees. As an association management company (AMC) that saw growth through the pandemic, we’re continuously reevaluating our work model and centering it around three main components – maintaining schedule flexibility, building and maintaining real connections, and providing professional development opportunities. We encourage other associations, AMCs, and businesses to implement these strategies to see higher retention rates, better productivity, and overall staff happiness – as we have!

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, Richie O’Neill of Association Management Strategies, Inc. shares his review of How Full is Your Bucket by Tom Rath and Donald Clifton

Personify and the AMC Institute Launch the Business Exchange

Personify and the AMC Institute co-curate a virtual marketplace that delivers non-dues revenue and competitive  advantage for members.

July 29, 2022– Austin, Texas – Personify, Inc. (“Personify”), the leader in technology solutions for associations, nonprofits and event organizers, and the AMC Institute (AMCI), the premier trade association for the association management company (AMC) industry, announced the launch of a next generation revenue platform called the Business Exchange. Now available exclusively to AMCI members, the collaboration represents a shared commitment to advancing the AMC industry through innovative technology tailored to meet the needs of AMC firms and their association clients.

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, Ande Leslie of Smithbucklin shares her review of Six Thinking Hats by Edward De Bono.

Raybourn Group International (RGI) was recently named to the 2022 Best Places to Work list by the Indiana Chamber of Commerce for the second consecutive year. Being named to this exclusive list affirms the dynamic changes we have made for our company, clients and staff. At RGI, we believe in the power of bringing like-minded individuals together to strengthen leaders and associations, and the professions or industries we serve. This success starts with company culture and staffing.

Importance of Work Environment
RGI selected new office space three years ago. The environment in which employees work matters. Even in a great culture, the physical environment of work is a large factor in employee morale and satisfaction. The new space has natural lighting, private offices, an eat-in/meet-in kitchen, multiple collaboration spaces and security.

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, Joe Sapp, CAE, of Talley Management Group, Inc. shares his review of One Second Ahead: Enhance your Performance at Work with Mindfulness by Rasmus Hougaard, Jacqueline Carter and Gillian Coutts.

The pilot process for the AMC Power Index was incredibly helpful to refine and shape the data collection process. AMCI and the Bâton Global research team wish to thank AH, Base Consulting and Management, EDI, MCI, Parthenon Association Management, Kellen and Smithbucklin for their participation in the pilot, making the process even easier, more concise and user-friendly for the full AMCI membership. A data cheat sheet can be found here to help your team prepare for next week’s launch. Hear what members of the pilot had to say:

“Association Headquarters was happy to participate in the AMC Power Index pilot. The industry benchmarking data that this initiative will provide is well worth the time it took to gather and report our numbers. We hope all Institute members will participate as there truly is power in numbers!” – Mike Dwyer, AH, AMCI Board Director and Amy Williams, AH VP Sales and Consulting

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, Justin Lewis of Smith Moore & Associates shares his review of Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up by Jerry Colonna

Re-Engaging with the AMC Industry

Guest Post By Carolyn Lagermasini, CAE, President, Association & Conference Group (ACG). Carolyn serves on AMCI's Community Engagement Committee.

In 2015, I attended my first AMC Institute Annual Meeting. The event was held at the Turnberry Resort & Spa in Aventura, Florida. At that time, my fledgling AMC had 11 clients and six employees. Walking into the Annual Meeting I felt a little overwhelmed and a lot out of place. ACG was (and has always been) a fully virtual company at a time when many AMCs remained traditional. As one can imagine, this fact raised a few eyebrows and elicited unhelpful criticisms. I went to that meeting to learn how to grow my business, how to manage some of the common challenges we all have regardless of size, how to better understand the AMC industry, and to meet my peers. I walked away disappointed, wondering if there was a place for me in the AMCI community.

Guest post by Mike Dwyer, CAE – Association Headquarters, AMCI Professional Advancement Committee Chair

As announced recently, the AMC Institute has recently launched the first certificate program to elevate the proficiencies of AMC professionals in a multi-client environment. It’s an exciting and long overdue effort on the part of a small group of dedicated volunteers serving on the AMCI Professional Advancement Committee working alongside the AMC staff to address the educational needs of AMC employees.

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, Gene Terry, CAE, IOM of Association Headquarters shares his review of Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People by Mahzarin Banaji, PhD and Anthony Greenwald, PhD

AMCI's Annual Meeting is just ONE WEEK away! We are excited to be joining over 180 AMCI members as we gather together at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs. Together we will be inspired by amazing keynotes, educated by our speaker peers, and we will build long lasting relationships as we network with each other. Additionally, we anticipate being filled with amazing food, desserts, and drinks, all while being in one of the most beautiful locations to hold meetings. And we haven't even covered everything that will be happening next week. For those who are attending, this will be a meeting that will be long remembered.

For those who have not yet registered, there is still a little time left to register.

If you are attending, please remember to check your Know Before You Go email for relevant information on:

AMC Institute’s Annual Meeting (February 16 – 18) is quickly coming up. We are excited to see many of our members in Colorado Springs, at The Broadmoor. We are also very excited to be able to share some excellent keynote speakers with our attendees.  AMCI’s keynotes this year are planning to share some very exciting, engaging conversations with you! Want to know more about the speakers and their topics? Continue reading below!

This post is authored by Mark Engle, DM, FASAE, Principal at Association Management Center and Chair of the AMC Institute's Board of Directors for 2022.

Happy New Year!

Are you ready for the New Year? I’m certainly ready (as many of you are) to retire the old one. The encouraging news is, as entrepreneurs, we typically anticipate and respond well to change.

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month,  Paulina van Eeden Hill, CAE of Strategic Association Management shares her review of The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier

This post is authored by Erin Fuller,  FASAE, CAE, MPA, President, Association Solutions, MCI USA, and Chair of the AMC Institute's Board of Directors for 2021.

January 6th was a day with a lot of turmoil in the Washington, DC area. And no, I am not referencing the insurrection on the Hill that day – but rather McLean, VA, where I lugged and installed two huge air purifiers in our largest conference room, so that MCI USA could safely host the AMCI executive committee retreat. Only a year before, Montreal had been generous hosts, and we huddled around dinner tables, toasting the future of our industry. Now, I was placing extra masks at each distanced place and making sure we had plenty of hand sanitizer.

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, AMC Institute's Michael Battaglia, CAE, CNAP of AMPED Association Management shares his review of Michael Jordan:The Life by Roland Lazenby.

Make DEI-aware holidays a year-round initiative 

Guest post by Charles Scogna, Writer, Association Headquarters

November and December are widely considered the holiday season in the United States, with Thanksgiving and Christmas at its core.

This is a guest post by Executive Director, Inc.

When participating in staff interviews with people who have a community non-profit background as opposed to an association background, we often make a point of stating that while the associations that we serve do good, we are not feeding the hungry at Executive Director, Inc. (EDI) – except for two weeks per year. These are the two weeks in December that EDI holds its “Food Fight” to raise funds for the Hunger Task Force of Milwaukee. In a typical year, the winner is announced at the annual State of EDI celebration on a Friday in late December. In 2019, the executive director of the Hunger Task Force attended this event to communicate her appreciation of how extraordinary EDI staff’s contributions were given the size of the company.

For 28 years, EDI has held a competition among staff members (East Side of the building versus the West Side) for the coveted Food Fight trophy. A number of small fundraising events are held each day. Examples include:

The AMCI Reading Corner is a crowdsourced resource share aimed to serve as a platform for the AMCI community to share book recommendations and reflect with personal takeaways. Starting with monthly postings, more ways to engage will be shared as the idea grows.

This month, AMC Institute's Thomas Pigg, shares his review of The Servant Leader, by Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges.