AIA Repositioning
What’s happening and what it means to you.
Over the past few years, our professional organization and been going through an extensive effort to better establish the institute as the voice for the membership and the leader to reinforce architecture as the valued and respected profession it has been through history.
The effort, REPOSITIONING, started with fundamental changes at AIA National. The national board downsized from 53 to 14 members. They refocused and reorganized into an “efficient, scalable governance structure” says the AIA 2014 Annual Report. The bicameral board now operates with a new Strategic Council of 40-50 members, providing new ideas and recommendations to the board. I can imagine that the 14 members are glad they have about forty less votes to corral on any given action.
The repositioning effort has expanded to the state level through the Member Services Resource Task Force. That task force has identified key areas of services to all members through the Member Service Agreement Toolkit, which Nathan Bryant and I picked up at the Grassroots conference last March. This booklet details how key services are provided and key responsibilities are carried out and divided between AIA National, State Chapters, and Local Components or Sections.
AIA North Carolina was one among about a dozen state chapters that secured grant funding to employ Jay Younger from McKinley Advisors, a consulting firm specializing in nonprofit organization management. In this effort we have formed our own Member Core Services Taskforce lead by Thad Rhoden of Sparc Design here in Asheville. The NC Chapter leaders gathered in Raleigh on May 28th to begin work on our Member Services Agreement. This will be our guiding document to provide Members all the services outlined in the toolkit efficiently, with statewide coordination, and support across sections to let each group continue to shine where they are strong, and develop partnerships where we need support or are duplicating efforts.
Our NC Member Services agreement will be drafted in time to vote on any required bylaws changes at the Design Conference at the end of September. We would be glad to hear input you have for the Member Core Services Task Force and the services agreement. If you would like to share ideas or are interested in learning more about the Member Services Agreement or the Toolkit, please contact Jes Stafford at aiaavl.president@gmail.com or Nathan Bryant at aiaavl.presidentelect@gmail.com.
Jes Stafford, AIA
AIA Asheville President
Owner, Modus Operandi Design