After my last post on the importance of member engagement to mutuals and cooperatives (‘mutuals), I was asked a great question on Linkedin. For me, the question had echoes of my work in social collaboration and employee engagement. The question was
“How should boards of mutuals measure member engagement?”
This post will explore the potential measures and the role of a board in governance of member engagement as a key part of a mutuals strategy
There’s No One Number That Rules All
Best to save time by supplying the answer in a heading for those looking for an easy answer. There isn’t one, but the discussion of what matters to track is more important.
Just as there’s no single number that best explains employee engagement or collaboration for every organisation, there is no single number that can describe member engagement universally. If you spend a moment considering the idea, it would be unusual if it was the case. Every member organisation is different, comprised of different groups of members with different inclinations and each organisation has a uniquely different strategy (at least ideally).
Start and End with Strategy
The mutual’s strategy should be the source of the measures that the board tracks and where membership engagement measures should be found. Membership engagement is not something that sits outside of strategy. It needs to be fundamental and connected. The issues that organisations seek to address and the connection that organisations seek to make with members are found in the purpose and strategy of the organisation.
Boards of mutuals, should be governing this aspect of strategy and assessing performance the same way and with the same frequency that they do on customer, people, financial, risk, compliance and other non-financial dimensions such as sustainability and resilience. Questions that can help define the right measures of engagement include:
- If members are customers or employees, does the measure start and end with employee engagement or customer engagement measures? What else is needed to define the unique characteristics of a mutual strategy over a commercial one?
- What role do members play in our strategic success? How will we know we are winning with and for members?
- What role do members play in governance of the organisation in our constitution and strategy?
- What issues that we exist to address matter most to members and how are we seen by members in addressing these issues?
- Do members feel like the belong to a cause that matters to them? this is more than a NPS score. It is a willingness to see the organisation benefit others in line with purpose and strategy and to feel ownership of that work.
That’s a lot of questions. As always when there are lots of possiblities, Boards of mutuals can be at risk of slipping into dashboard mode and considering too many minor measures to the detriment of effective strategy governance. The purpose of these questions is not to guide a lot of measures but to ask the kind of questions that prompt consideration of what matters most to success of the strategy. Let governance start and finish there.
Some Minimums to Consider
Whatever the strategy of the organisation it is worth considering that a mutual is an organisation that operates according to cooperative principles. This gives rise to a few issues to consider from the perspective of organisation structure:
- Do the customers of the mutual understand that they are members if it is a consumer mutual? Members with a purely transactional relationship with the organisation can hardly be engaged in the strategy. This is particularly important where a mutual may engage members through intermediaries or online digital experiences.
- Are members using the benefits available to them as members of the mutual? If their purchasing or other activities are spread around or there are benefits unclaimed, is the strategy effective enough? Does the organisation need a deeper connection with its members to succeed?
- Do members participate in the organisation: open rates, clicks, conversion and depth of engagement? Does the organisation have contact details that are up to date? it’s hard to engage the uncontactable and unresponsive.
- Are members exercising their rights to vote or otherwise contribute to governance?
Governance of a mutual is never simple, easy, or sleepy. Performance accountabilities are sharp when the performance of the organisation for members is the sole point of existence and when capital must be earned. A well-set strategy will consider a wide range of performance measures and the right cycles of review and iteration based on performance. These measures will adapt and evolve as the strategy moves through its cycles of delivery. Setting and managing that is a role for the board and management together. Done well, it can be the defining conversation at the heart of strategic success.
