Associations: Just because you use ChatGPT doesn’t mean you have an AI strategy
Associations are facing twin problems of declining member engagement and shrinking membership numbers. And many are looking to AI to help reverse these trends.
But too many associations are doing AI all wrong. Encouraging your team to experiment with AI chatbots will do little, if anything, to move the needle in the direction of major organizational impact.
What will? Implementing a thoughtful, comprehensive AI strategy to fit the specific needs of your organization. Keep reading to learn more about what that means and how to get started on yours.
Associations are falling short on using AI to transform their organizations
Association leaders frequently conflate consumer-facing generative AI chatbots like ChatGPT or Copilot with AI as a business or organizational growth tool. Frankly, that’s a big mistake.
From an organizational perspective, the real value of AI is in automation. Gen AI may draw more media attention, but automation is what can make your core operations, processes and workflows faster and more efficient.
However, implementing an effective automation strategy takes, well, strategic thinking. You can’t do this piecemeal. Instead, your leadership team has to sit down and think about AI from a big picture perspective: what you’re doing now and how AI tools can improve your processes to deliver better results.
Here’s what a lack of AI strategy looks like:
- No governance structure: There is no formal ownership and responsibility around organizational AI implementation.
- Motivated by fear rather than innovation: Your team is thinking about AI only in terms of a fear that you’re falling behind the competition rather than as a creative solution to organizational challenges.
- Individual, not systemic thinking: A handful of team members might be experimenting with AI, but no one is thinking much about solving big-picture problems.
- Disconnected systems: You don’t have clean, unified data for your AI tools to analyze; rather, you’ve got an AMS (association management software), marketing system and financial software that don’t talk to each other.
- Manual-heavy processes: Automation is the real business value of AI, remember?
If any of these symptoms ring a bell, your association is probably not implementing AI as effectively as you could.
How does AI automation benefit associations?
To help you combat declining membership and decreased member engagement, you can use AI automation to better connect with members, as well as make more efficient use of your resources and gain the visibility for smarter strategic decisions.
- Enhanced member offerings: Use AI tools like a member concierge to offer information, benefits and opportunities to members.
- Work more efficiently: Spend less time on data entry or administrative tasks and focus more of your efforts on your core mission.
- Clearer visibility for smarter decisions: Automation can help tie together disconnected systems like your AMS, events, marketing and financial tools to unify your data and clearer, more actionable analytics you can use to make smarter strategic decisions.
- More effective website: Interconnected systems and AI can also help you generate a website that allows members to sign up for events, renew membership, buy merchandise and access learnings in one place for a smoother user experience.
These are just a few areas to consider. What helps your association will depend on your specific needs and goals. So how do you implement a strategy to meet those?
How do associations implement an effective organizational AI strategy?
Every association’s AI strategy will look slightly different because yours should fit your specific organizational needs. But effective strategies share key elements like a focus on AI literacy, a culture of innovation and aligned leadership.
1. Build AI literacy
Before anything else, you need to learn more about what AI can actually do, especially for automation. There is a wide spectrum of AI literacy among current association leaders, and even those who understand AI as a personal tool may not grasp how it works on an enterprise level.
Participate in an AI workshop or coaching session. Look for a safe space where you can ask the dumb questions. This technology is still new and constantly evolving — it’s not just okay to not know everything, but expected.
2. Consult an external AI advisor
An outside advisory firm can help you assess your specific organizational needs and recommend AI automation tools and practices to support your goals. This can help you create and implement an AI strategy faster and with significantly less trial and error than attempting to do it all on your own.
Work with your advisor to create roadmap for you and your team to follow moving forward. A capable advisor will also be able to provide ongoing support if needed.
3. Align your leadership
Your leadership team needs to get on the same page around AI. This includes establishing a basic governance structure to determine roles and responsibilities.
Ideally, your association would have a chief information officer (CIO) who would oversee all things AI and automation-related, but many associations don’t hire for that position. In that case, you can turn to your COO or CFO, since an enterprise-level AI strategy will heavily affect your core operational and financial systems.
Regardless of who wears what hat, your leadership team needs to clarify ownership and agree on high-level goals and KPIs to measure success before you can move forward.
4. Set up an innovation pipeline
Put processes in place to begin implementing your overall AI goals. Begin capturing ideas from across your organization about how you can start using enterprise-level AI tools to work more effectively.
For promising ideas, you can then conduct a rapid analysis to examine specific use cases where AI tools and automation can help your organization meet objectives.
5. Create a culture of innovation
If your team can approach AI from a place of curiosity rather than fear, your association will likely benefit. So from your leadership on down, make the effort to establish a culture that values innovation.
This often looks like AI workshops or summits where different team members or departments within your association can come together to talk about problems or share ideas. Clear, open communication with and from leadership is also essential, with leaders sharing how the organization hopes to leverage AI and being receptive to honest suggestions and feedback.
Remember, you’re not going to do this perfectly. Missteps are an inevitable part of any organizational change, and AI technology itself carries flaws and risks that can cause trouble of their own. So approach this challenge with a tolerance for risk and a willingness to make mistakes.
6. Assess outcomes and update your strategy accordingly
Your AI strategy should not be set in stone. Regularly assess your KPIs and outcomes to find out whether what you’re doing is actually producing results.
And if it isn’t, adapt. Reassess your goals and consult with your outside advisor to find out if there’s a better way forward or tools more effective for pursuing your specific objectives.
How Wipfli can help
We help nonprofit associations to navigate change, tackle uncertainty and strengthen financials. Let’s talk about your needs and how to implement an AI strategy, effective automation and an innovation pipeline to transform your organization and better serve your members. Start a conversation.
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