Nobody wants to do business with a self righteous protagonist. Trade associations can fall into the trap of sounding like just such a creature. The more that one side piles on their grievances with little admission of failings on their side, the more likely it is that the other side will stop listening, put up… Read More
If the issues were simple to solve we wouldn’t have them as key initiatives nor would the government be living with them as outstanding grievances. So let’s accept that they are hard issues and provide commensurate proactive leadership. It can go a long way to explicitly recognize and acknowledge the interests of all the parties… Read More
Achieving significant public policy wins is seldom a short term process. Consequently, it is essential that both the expected long term and the short term results are identified at the outset. For the long term, the definition of success should reflect the expected impacts on our members` organizations. For example, if we were attempting to… Read More
When we have an opportunity to put our sector’s most senior representative in front of a Cabinet Minister or a Deputy Minister, what is a desirable objective? At a minimum we want that government representative to be able to report – ‘They asked me (to take a specific action) because (of the valid reasons they… Read More
It is always a challenge to achieve public policy wins for trade or professional associations. It is often made much more difficult by approaches that are counterproductive. So below are my Top Ten Rules of Engagement for successful regulatory and policy advocacy with governments. I will be discussing each one in detail in subsequent blogs…. Read More
There is a strong intellectual current that argues for big Boards and few committees (if any). Frankly I disagree. I tend to think this undermines the capacity of associations to maximize their potential. A large Board of Directors can be a difficult beast to keep focused. Moreover, without an executive committee, they can be problematic… Read More
