 Thomas A. Marshall |
What is evident is that the AANS successfully weathered a series of internal and external upheavals that most organizations rarely must confront separately, let alone simultaneously, in the final years of the 1990s and the initial years of this decade. In the late 1990s, the budget was losing between $3 million and $5 million annually, there was a management revolving door of three AANS executive directors hired successively in 1998, 1999 and 2000, and the Executive Office staff, while somewhat inflated in number, was turning over at a rate of 117 percent in 2000 and 2001.
Though daunting, these management challenges were not the real cause for concern. Far more ominous clouds threatened, not on the horizon, but directly overhead.
The AANS had become dangerously reliant on only two very undependable sources of income for its operations: the annual meeting and membership dues. Not only could earthquake, terrorist attack, or, as we just saw in New Orleans, devastating flood wipe out the former, the AANS was not even systematically and consistently collecting the latter. The only thing that was consistent about the dues was that they were raised every year as a budgetary matter of course to reflect a cost-of-living increase. (Dues have not been raised in the last four consecutive successful fiscal years).
Given what the organization faced at the time, how the AANS has reached the levels of stability and service that you enjoy today as a member is worth truly understanding.
While it is true that dramatic restructuring, downsizing and spending cuts at the front end paved the road to recovery, those key decisions are already enjoying too much of the focus and credit. Critical as those strategies were, they were only the “table setting” for the success that followed.
The reasons behind today’s success can be attributed to far more than the belt-tightening tactics of five years ago. Crucial to this success is that simultaneously the AANS augmented a thoughtfully chosen menu of new, and at least for the AANS, unproven revenue streams: the expansion of educational programming; the development of products and services based upon accurate assessment of what you, the member, told us you wanted; the revision of organizational policies covering dues, investment revenue, and a cash reserve; and the measured outreach to a variety of allied publics who had an interest in the health of neurosurgery and its most diversified membership association.
Five years’ worth of AANS leadership and staff can take pride in the success of those basic strategies. But it was always the AANS members who were the intended ultimate beneficiaries of those early decisions.
At a time when most organizations would seek shelter to ride out the fiscal, structural and philosophical storm, the decisions to propel the AANS into a proactive production mode were critical to providing better and expanded services to AANS members. This proactive mode is the core of AANS’ strategic planning for the latter half of this decade and well beyond. The new and improved AANS is an organization ready to move forward in the 21st century with innovative programming for its members, and positioned to launch the specialty to new heights.
Thomas A. Marshall is AANS executive director.