I can count at least two dozen times in my life where I heard “go ahead take the plunge” and most of the time it turned out great. So with that track record I’m sure this latest plunge into blogging will be great. Of course just to be sure, I’ve pulled business (and life) partner Peter Houstle into the adventure.

Peter and I will share our exploration of association components and volunteers through this blog. Over the past 7 years (one of the last great plunges I made was to start a new business with Peter – that’s another posting), we have focused on chapters specifically providing an administration solution through our association management company. Over this time we’ve found that way too often the traditional model for both components and volunteers is at best cumbersome and at worse detrimental. And too often, especially in terms of chapters, associations struggle to apply the right resources to them.

These thoughts are born out in our chapters and in research like the Decision to Volunteer study recently completed by ASAE & The Center. The challenge now is to draw the new model - or models. Looking forward to that challenge too - and to hearing your thoughts as well.

So we’ll plunge in!