The Most Underappreciated Benefits of an AMS for Board Collaboration

Updated: Mar. 7, 2022  |  Categories: Board Productivity, Board Overload  

Association management software (AMS) provides a lot of value to your association chapter members, including registering online for events, getting communications directed specifically to them and accessing your job board and members only content. That same AMS can help your association chapter board members, by giving them back the time they lose trying to make decisions and collaborate when they have to use multiple systems and manual, complex, multi-step processes.

Here are five ways an AMS helps your association chapter board volunteers improve how they work with each other.
1. Speeds up decision making. Board members can access all the information they need, even when they can’t find the people they need. As a central repository, an AMS allows everyone on the board to easily find and retrieve information. No one has to worry about waiting for the association chapter president to return from vacation before getting a copy of your strategic plan or wait to connect with the secretary to get the minutes from your last board meeting.
2. Streamline communication. With electronic document sharing and forums, an AMS can make it easier for board members to have open, complete discussions with each other. Everything they need in terms of background materials can be accessed online and immediately. Instead of waiting to ask specific questions of someone or request additional documents, documents can be searched, and information easily found. Your association chapter board members can talk to each other about topics of consequence, not administrative needs.
3. Continue the conversation outside of meetings. No longer do you have to wait for the next meeting to find out that no one has completed the tasks that were assigned to them. With online forums you restrict to just those who need to be included, you can communicate and collaborate between meetings. Votes, survey tools, discussion boards, etc. allow your association chapter board members to reply as their schedule permits, not wait till the next meeting or follow a long email chain and get feedback in (almost) real time.
4. Improve organization and information dissemination. All the materials you need, like board orientation materials, audit reports, and membership data, are in one place. Preparing for your board meetings takes a lot less time, as everything you need to rely on to create and support your agenda is exactly where you expect it to be. And instead of sending materials to the entire board, you can provision access so that only the people who need to see something can, like, the draft version of your financial report the treasurer doesn’t want anyone but her committee to review till it’s finalized.
5. Decrease burnout. This may be one of the most important benefits of an AMS to an association chapter board. With everything at your fingertips, board members no longer spend so much time hunting down information or people. By automating many of the chapter tasks they’ve been spending so much time on, they better enjoy their volunteer time and are more likely to stay on the board, rather than become overworked and overwhelmed, and ultimately stepping down.

Gone are the days of waiting to connect with someone in person or waiting for them to return a call or email, and by the time you hear back, you’ve forgotten what it was you needed to know. The advantages of an AMS for association chapter board management are important ones. From streamlining administrative tasks and removing bottlenecks, to just making it easier for your board members to work together, an AMS allows your board to make stronger decisions that benefit your entire association chapter.

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