A NUMBER of association executives in Singapore embarked last week on a course to master the art of association management, through a programme jointly offered for the first time by the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE) and the Singapore Business Federation (SBF).
The Certificate Program in Association Management, which features five modules that participants can cover at their own pace, kicked off last week with a training session for local facilitators who were “specially selected” based on their experience in managing association affairs, said Doris Chow, assistant executive director of SBF Business Institute.
Greta Kotler, ASAE’s chief global development officer, who conducted the training sessions for local facilitators, said having “local trainers will bring local context and examples” to the US-developed certificate programme which covers the basics of association management, volunteer committee and task force management, membership recruitment and retention, communication and public relations, and leadership potential development.
“While the principles of association management remain the same; our local facilitators will look at the best practices in the US and provide a local application,” said Chow, adding that the course is designed for people new to association management.
Commenting on the profile of participants, Chow said: “We have acting executive directors and heads of department for the first module while senior management and executive directors have signed up for 2015. Senior management as well as representatives of professional societies, NGOs and trade associations including SBF have participated in this programme. We also have enquiries from association management companies for future intakes.”
SBF plans to offer the programme to affiliates in Indonesia.
Kotler also revealed that ASAE and SBF are now in talks for another “valuable programmme that will connect executive directors and counsel chairs” in the near future.
She added: “To continue learning about association management, we encourage graduates of the certificate programme and other association executives in Asia-Pacific to attend the Great Ideas in Association Management conference in Hong Kong, March 22-24, 2015.”
