Archive for October 24, 2015
Edgewood Chamber Director Resigns
by John Weckerle
Word has reached New Mexico Central that the Edgewood Chamber of Commerce’s Executive Director, Brenda Murray, has resigned to accept a sales and marketing position, leaving the Chamber’s Board of Directors with the unenviable task of replacing a person who will likely be a tough act to follow. Ms. Murray’s efforts were noteworthy enough for us to allow a glimmer of cautious optimism with respect to the Chamber, and it remains to be seen whether the Chamber’s Board will be successful in hiring a similarly capable and dedicated executive director.
Small Chamber of Commerce executive director positions can be hard to fill, or at least to fill well. A good part of the reason for this is financial as budgets tend to be very limited. Looking at the Chamber’s web site, we see about 110 members. Assuming that they all pay $95 (unlikely, as a number of members listed are individuals and nonprofits, who pay less), this amounts to $10,450 in membership fees, which doesn’t go far in acquiring a capable and dedicated executive director – at least not for long. The Town of Edgewood’s Economic Development page indicates that the Town contracts with the Chamber for economic development services; however, the most recent budget posted (which, like much of the information on the site, is out of date) appears to contain no funding for economic development and both the Chamber’s and the Town’s economic development pages appear not to have been updated for a long time. While we are sure the Town is spending some money on economic development, the information on the two entities websites suggests that this is not a major source of revenue for the Chamber.
Your editor has been a member of three local/regional nonprofit organizations: The Edgewood Chamber of Commerce, the Estancia Basin Resource Association (EBRA), and the Estancia Valley Economic Development Association (EVEDA). Of these, EBRA stood out in terms of meeting its goals and fundraising and your editor remains a supporter, having resigned from the Board only for reasons associated with earning a living. At one point, your editor received training on the responsibilities of a nonprofit Board of Directors member, which have evolved over time, and we think it timely to discuss at least some of those roles and responsibilities in the hope that the information may help the Chamber and other organizations increase their probability of success.
During one of your editor’s Board adventures, the opportunity arose to take a class on Board roles and responsibilities provided by Jean Block, Inc. The class was quite revealing, and we recommend it to Board members of nonprofits of all kinds. Of chief interest to the current situation is the role of Board members in fundraising: in short, that is one of the chief responsibilities of Board members. As articulated on the Bridgespan Group’s (and numerous others’) web site, “One of the board’s foremost responsibilities is to secure adequate resources for the organization to fulfill its mission.” That means fundraising. However, many nonprofits, Chambers included and perhaps especially, tend to delegate this function to the executive director and/or staff, who then are forced to essentially find the money to pay themselves – leaving less time for work associated with the Chamber’s actual mission.
Of course, there is often confusion on what that mission is. Both the Edgewood and East Mountain chambers’ web sites have what amounts to mission statements, although these tend to be a bit short on language associated with implementation. What we’ve observed at times is that chambers appear to view themselves more as community organizations than business organizations, and efforts seem to focus disproportionately on community events, placing fundraising, business advocacy, economic development, and member recruitment/retention in subordinate positions. Many events do little to bring in revenue for the Chamber and perhaps benefit only a few businesses that may see some increased traffic as a result. Events are good for the community, and it is appropriate for the business community to “give back” to the community at large, but when resources are scarce it makes little sense to focus strongly on community events at the expense of building/maintaining a strong Chamber.
We wish the Edgewood Chamber Board good luck in securing a new executive director – and in focusing on the fundraising activities so greatly needed to acquire and retain a competent and capable individual for the position.