Conference Mangement for LCPs & OCPs
About to host a conference, but don't know where to start? Every LCP of a hosting LC and OCP should go through the conference management orientation below:
LCP Governance
Governance 101: How Many Can You Get Right?
Legislation and governance within the national plenary is an important part of being LCP. Read the quiz below to see which parts of our governance you need to freshen up on!
1. How are officers hired into the organization?
2. How do we amend the bylaws?
1. What are the due dates for motions and legislation packages?
2. What is a motion to put, point of information, and general discussion?
3. What is the difference between a mandate and a motion?
1. What is the difference between a session and a period, why is it important?
2. What are the three outcomes when an LC's membership is under review?
3. When are appeals due?
4. How many elements of Standard 6 must be fulfilled for the whole Standard to pass?
5. How many exemptions are there for Standard 3?
1. What are the stages that an Expansion must go through before becoming an LC?
2. At which stage can an Expansion start facilitating exchange?
BoA Management & On-Boarding
How do I Standardize my BoA Management?
In order to answer this question, we have to know what the role is of the BoA at the local level. Their role is:
- To reinforce accountability of the LCP
- To provide resources such as referrals to important company and university contacts
- To provide functional advice related to the LC's operations & projects
- To act as the organizational memory of the LC, due to its yearly turnover
In order for a BoA to NOT represent the poor creature displayed on the right, your BoA must have all the right information to support you. This information is:
- LC goals versus actual & scorecard
- LC financial performance
- Your current projects & asks
Here are some FAQs regarding how to provide your BoA with this information so they can support you in return!
1. What information should the BoA get on a quarterly basis?
A: At the bare minimum, in every meeting you should go over what percentage of your year goal you have achieved. This is known as a scorecard (see right).
Second, your BoA should be aware of the following aspects of financial performance;
- Total Liabilities & Equities (Statement of Financial Position)
- Income/Loss to date (Income Statement)
- Budget Variance (after a budget review, assess wether or not LC is on track with budget).
Last, you should provide the BoA with updates on projects as well as what has been working well, so that the BoA can understand for future years what is helping the LC grow.
2. What asks should we have of the BoA on a quarterly basis?
As you can see, this is a continuation of the last image because the two lists combined form your agenda for a quarterly BoA meeting!
The asks should include discussion on which functions of the LC are not going well as well as a list of referrals, training, resource, and advice relating to where the LC needs more support. As an example, if iGT has the lowest goal achievement in the LC, try asking your BoA for referrals to specific companies in the city as well as professional sales training if there is an expert on your board.
3. What information should I give my BoA on a monthly basis?
LCPs don't always have to send information on a monthly basis to their BoAs. But if you want to make the most of them, here are some milestones and discussion points you should hit!
4. What information does my BoA need when they first start the year?
As LCP, you should supply your BoA with the following prior to the full start of the calendar year:
- Their mandate/role (see above)
- Your year plan so they understand what you are working towards
- The dates for all upcoming BoA meetings so that the whole Board & EB is aware
- Any context regarding AIESEC Canada (e.g. conference hosting policies if you are hosting a conference; updated membership code changes if applicable)
5. How can I organize my BoA so that they provide more focused functional support?
One idea that several LCs have already implemented is dividing their BoA into sub-committees based on each BoA member's area of expertise. If you follow the guide above, you will want BoA Members with the following backgrounds:
- Health Management: BoA members with HR and People Management expertise
- Conferences (only if you host one): BoA members with event management & sponsorship expertise and/or connections in the community
- Programs: BoA members with knowledge on operations management, marketing, sales, and customer experience delivery
- Focus Area: This really depends on what is the strategic initiative that your LC is focusing on for the year.
6. How can I organize my BoA so that they provide more people focused support for the EB?
You can implement a mentorship program! We suggest sending your EB members a questionnaire to fill out prior, and then taking the inputs to support your BoA Chair as they assign the mentors.
Remember that mentorship only works if the EB wants to do it - so set expectations accordingly and only move forward if your EB commits!
7. How can I aid my BoA in really being our organizational memory in the LC?
By completing an annual report to give to your BoA, which highlights key successes and failures within each function, as well as key stakeholders to follow-up on for the next year. Of course!
So by this point you AND your BoA should feel like this:
But if not, here's the TLDR below...in the form of your own BoA Quarterly Meeting Template!
Team Management & Accountability
How do I Hold a Team Accountable in My Touch-Points?
Once you have a team that is bought into a vision and that is equipped with the skills they need to get the job done, nothing will happen if there is not a consistent cadence of accountability.
In what touch-points do these happen? Here three tips on how to hold effective touch-points to enforce accountability in your team!
Step 1: Know the Basics of Running a Great Meeting
Small things make all the difference in the way you run a meeting. Watch the video to learn how you can make your meetings on point!
Step 2: Learn to Use a Hammer Tracker
What gets tracked gets done! Hammer Trackers should answer the following questions about your team:
- Do the priorities of each individual help get them closer to their targets?
- Is each team committing what's required to get their priorities done?
- Do the priorities of each team align with each other to work towards a common goal?
- Does the team understand the bottlenecks in their processes?
STEP 3: DO A MONTHLY REVIEW
The purpose of the monthly review versus a regular weekly meeting with a Hammer Tracker is to have a bigger pool of data (qualitative and quantitative) to examine that will tell your team whether or not they need to shift gears in their strategy.
While after one week you may have a gap between your goals and actuals, a strategy may take more than one week to take into effect - so a monthly review is a great way to analyze over a longer period of time whether or not the team needs to try something new.
A monthly review has an updates section for each role and should cover:
- Goals versus actuals
- Key milestones by the VP/portfolio for that month
- Things to improve on
- Strategic questions for the rest of the team to give input
Do you have any other tips on encouraging accountability within teams? Post your tips and good case practices in the comments below!
How to Use the Growth Model
What Even is A Growth Model?
A Growth Model consists of the following elements:
- Aspiration & Targets
- Development Steps
- LC Structures
- Service Delivery (Coaching, Visits, Other)
1. Aspiration & Targets
The aspiration for LCs this year was to be Strong & Healthy. While targets and tiers are important for LCs, the best way to get an LC to grow is for an LC themselves to adopt these targets into planning. Thus, every November, LCs go through an LC Year Planning audit where an LC Coach should ensure goals are carefully planned. To achieve the goals themselves, LCs should work towards productivity in their membership and by monitoring the alignment between their team sizes to their goals. Thus, while in real time the measure for health is achievement of goals, the long-term is a combination of healthy membership, finances, growth, and productivity/member contribution.
Sound easy? Only two out of 29 entities have achieved the long-term criteria for Strong & Healthy LCs.
2. Development Steps
Once we have targets, how do we get there? Development Steps for an LC focus on the elements. After completing two case studies of LCs, we found that the following elements lead to growth:
- Integrated Experiences: # AIESECers that actively run operations after having gone on exchange
- Productivity rate: # of exchanges each member has to facilitate
- Time to contribute: time it takes for a member to achieve a raise in iGT or approve in OGX
- Structures: what structure & customer flow management each function should follow
- Projects: # projects/sub-products to sell per operations team
3. LC Structures
Aligning your LC structures to those provided in the Growth Model are important because...
- It allows you to follow the recommended process to optimize your customer flow
- It allows you to build a smaller, but stronger and therefore more productive team
4. Service Delivery
AIESEC Canada's Service Delivery Model includes coaching, Growth Driver & coaching visits, conferences, & campaigns.
Have questions or comments about our Growth Model or how you've used it? Comment below!
Summer Re-Planning Ideas
How Do I Run Operations in the Summer?
Let's face it. The image on the left represents almost every LCP during summer.
How can we avoid feeling this way? By following these three steps:
1. Having a different structure for a different team & talent capacity
2. Having a different plan for a different semester
3. Having a different way of running operations in a different peak time
Summer is different and that's okay! We just need the tools to approach this semester a little differently.
1. A different structure for a different team & capacity
Option A: Running one or more programs based off of previous exchange performance. This option (shown on the right) involves even allocation between iGT & OGX and should be implemented if your LC has the capacity to run 2 programs over summer.
Option B: Focusing based on timeline; this option should be implemented if you only have enough talent to run 1 program in the summer.
Option B is applicable if: It should be implemented if a) you achieved strong results in OGX for Summer Peak and you need to focus solely on iGT for the summer o b) if you are projected to become a Specialized Unit, at which point oGV should be the one focus over summer.
2. A different plan for a different semester
Check out the guides below for how to lead a re-planning for an LC and how to align your operations and teams!
3. A different way of running operations for a different peak
Look into the physical marketing guides below for universities that will help tailor your activities for summer!
Have any GCPs from your summer operations? Submit in the comments below!
Great Campaigns
What's a Local Campaign that ACTUALLY Drives Growth in an LC?
Part 1: The Brain Behind It All (Mechanics)
Remember that this is our criteria for Strong, Healthy LCs by the end of the year? The key to a campaign that drives growth is one that achieves these criteria - but at a product level.
Wait what does that mean? It means we need to tailor how we are doing operations for each of our products so that we can achieve absolute growth, 1:1 productivity, and pass the minimums for those programs.
In other words, it needs to align with our LC Development Steps:
Now that we know that we need to tailor the productivity level, time to contribute, and # projects that are being sold by each team, and we know that we need to collapse our teams so they are all working towards the same goal - we just need to translate that into mechanics!
Here's a simple & customizable way that every LC can do this:
THE TLDR: Have a products-first mindset. Organizing your campaign by products and putting MoS for each product team to beat creates a competitive culture and pride within the products. It also makes member productivity simpler to measure.
Part 2: Walk the Talk (Branding)
Your mechanics are only to align your leadership team to tracking & pushing growth. For your external viewers (the membership), the mechanics do not matter. What matters most is the brand & how easily your compelling scoreboard is accessible to the membership.
Here are a few tips we've learned about branding:
1. Graphics & Title: Should align with your LC Stance & Vision.
2. Scoreboard: Try to create something automated like Salesforce dashboards. Whatever you choose, make sure it's easy to update and easy to access.
3. Incentives: LCs can plan investments into high-performing members such as subsidizing their IXP exchanges and/or their attendance to upcoming conferences. However, some of the most meaningful incentives can be recognition through shout-outs of members on social media. Make an editable template show that multiple EB members can participate in this.
4. Updates: Updates should be consistent - e.g. every Monday of the week. In addition to showcasing the scores of each team, it should showcase GCPs, MVP shout-outs, and any other relevant information. You should also put the link for your Salesforce/other scoreboard in the update's post.
Here's an example (see left). Ultimately, posts should go beyond providing simple score updates; it should create a sense of community, pride, AND give audiences tools to do better.
THE TLDR: IMAGINE YOU ARE A MARKETING TEAM AND YOUR MEMBERS = YOUR CUSTOMERS. WHAT KIND OF BRAND, AESTHETICS, AND TOOLS WILL MAKE THEM LOVE THE PRODUCT YOU ARE PUTTING FORWARD AND BUY INTO YOUR MESSAGE?
Part 3: It's an EB thing, not a TM thing (Execution)
As you can see, everyone's role is equally important. Easy way to think of this:
LCP: Alignment of mechanics to year plan targets & LC growth strategy.
TM: Branding & coordination of launches, LCM updates, and internal comm updates.
VPs: Product-specific challenges, critique of how it is driving program growth; shout-out of MVPs in their teams; accountability in portfolio meetings.
Still lost? Click here for some more campaign learnings:
Let us know your good case practices for campaigns in the comments below!
Great LCMs
WHAT EVEN IS A GREAT LCM?
YUM. I'M GONNA DRINK THAT UP. SLURP!
Snacks, bubble tea, and pizza = optional. But always serve a cup of this at all LCMs (left).
In all seriousness, LCMs can take a variety of forms but should ALWAYS have:
- State of the LC
- Training to erase the CF/team bottlenecks
- IXP Fairs
- Campaign Updates & Goal for LC
- Action Items & Accountability System
Spring 2017 Edition: Coaching Visit Sessions
Coaching Visit Sessions for Team & Operations Alignment
While our LCs were experiencing high growth rates in the first quarter of 2017, we identified the following key bottlenecks in growth across the majority of our entities:
Find the links to all the sessions below to use in your next team retreat/touch-point!
Need to edit some of these sessions to tailor it for your team & agenda? No problem!
Great 1:1s
4 FAQs for Great 1:1s in Team Leadership
Conducting 1:1s with your team members (different from performance reviews) are important because they give you a pulse check on the level of motivation & engagement with your team. There is no perfect way to do a 1:1, so we've decided to do this post in an FAQ style to go over the most common problems when Team Leaders first start their 1:1s.
Q: WHAT SHOULD A 1:1 EVEN CONSIST OF?
A: 1:1s, whether it be for coaching towards operational performance or development & contribution in the team, will not go anywhere if the person being coached doesn't want to go anywhere. Therefore, these conversations should always start with understanding the current state and where the individual wants to go in terms of achievement.
From there, the person conducting the 1:1 can ask questions to prompt the person to find their own solutions and can also offer some solutions of their own. The framework on the left includes all these points - so make sure to apply this in your next 1:1!
Q: I KNOW MY TEAM MEMBER IS NEEDS TO BE MOTIVATED, BUT I DON'T KNOW HOW TO UNDERSTAND IT NOR HOW TO FIX IT. HALP!
A: The video on the left covers two factors that help us understand why the person is not motivated towards a task - after all, there is no such thing as "demotivation." There is simply the question of whether or not what an individual is motivated towards is aligned to where you need them to go. Watch the video on the left to learn more!
Q. I NEED TO FACILITATE A CONVERSATION TO RESOLVE A CONFLICT AND I'M AN INFJ. WHAT DO I DO?
A: Whether you're one of the most conflict-averse personalities out there or if you openly embrace conflict, you always want to resolve conflict in a way that is as FAIR as possible.
The FAIR conversation method was originally intended for group facilitation. BUT: it's a great way to use prompts that actually enable both people involved to empathize with each other's point of view and to come to an actionable resolution. And once we put ourself in the other person's shoes, conflict makes a lot more sense.
Q: WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FEEDBACK & ASSESSMENTS?
A: We often talk about the importance of feedback in teams, but assessments can be purposeful as well. They differ in two ways. First: Feedback tends to be a two-way dialogue where as assessments tends to be one-way. Second: Feedback is used as a basis for improvement by exchanging comments on a task completed or a product - something that can go through multiple iterations to be better. Assessments are an evaluation of a quality or ability - something that takes longer to improve. Try an assessment in your next 1:1!
Coaching for LCPs & VPs
Coaching Model in AIESEC Canada
The coaching model in AIESEC Canada is used by MC and NST coaches for LCPs & VPs. There are three parts to this model: coach, consultant, & colleague. While we use this to coach our EB members, LCPs should also start adopting this model when coaching VPs and members 1:1.
STEP 1: CONSULTANT
The "consultant" stage is used to analyze the gap between the LC's current results and their year goals. From there, the coach should use the LC Development steps and consulting questions to help their coachee erase the operational bottlenecks in the way. The coach should have the Teacher's Cheat Sheet on hand during every call is
STEP 2: COACH
The "coach" stage upholds the principle that behind every operational bottleneck, there is a way we could better mobilize our people to move through it. Coaches should use people management concepts and ask their coachees questions to push them to improve how they are managing & leading their teams.
STEP 3: COLLEAGUE
Last, the "colleague" stage of the coaching call involves the coach asking the LCP or VP feedback on current initiatives happening in the organization. This step views both parties as equals steering progress in the organization. The coach should ask about specific changes & elements of service delivery (e.g. training, campaigns, conferences) and should ask questions directed at where they want feedback.