President's Quarterly Note: Membership Matters

Membership Matters

I don’t have to tell anyone about the current state of the market. We have all been touched by the economic downturn that some days seems like it will never end. In these times, everyone is watching every penny they spend and reevaluating where they spend and invest their money. One easy target is professional organization memberships.

Rather than pay for a membership, it may seem tempting to save the money and just attend events as a non-member. I confess that there are organizations where I do just that. The value of membership is something that we all try to quantify and determine whether it’s worth it.

So, why does SMPS membership matter?

First, the strength of the organization is in its membership. In 2001, we split off from a joint chapter with San Antonio and created the Austin Chapter with only 16 members. It was a struggle at first. But as our membership grew, our volunteer base grew, and so did our collective knowledge, talents, insights, and skills. Our programs improved and became more sophisticated. Our reputation developed as the leading organization for A/E/C marketers and business developers. We started attracting more important decision makers to speak at our events to give us insights to help us in our business. In a nutshell, the quality of our chapter improved as a result of our increased membership numbers.

I know that there are a lot of people out there that get this notion already but I’d like to invite the non-members to give this some thought. Ask yourself, has SMPS had a positive impact on my career in some way? A program? An insight? A project lead? A connection? A friendship? And then ask yourself, would this have been likely back in 2001 when there were 16 members?

This is the power of membership: we are only as strong as our membership base. And if you believe in an organization and its value, membership is the best way to support that cause and ensure the strength of the chapter.

We have a strong group of members that do a great job in putting together programs, seeking out sponsorships to help us raise our game, running the organization, and communicating with our members through our website, Twitter, LinkedIn page, and even this newsletter.

If you have not joined SMPS yet, I hope you will consider what it means to our organization, your industry peers, and, most importantly, to you and your company, and decide that it is a worthwhile investment in your future and in the future of our A/E/C community.

Erika Passailaigue, CPSM
Datum Engineers