Associations can model the engagement culture they expect employees to create, beginning with the hiring process.
Association professionals spend much of their careers helping organizations build lasting relationships through member engagement, volunteer leadership, donor stewardship, and community building. Yet one audience does not always experience those same engagement principles: professionals exploring opportunities to work with our organizations. Ironically, these are the very people we hope will go on to build lasting relationships with our members, volunteers, sponsors, donors, and broader communities. If engagement is central to the work we expect them to do, shouldn't they experience those same values throughout the hiring process?
After spending time as a job candidate, I found myself reflecting on engagement from a different perspective. We know how quickly communication influences trust and how a single interaction can shape someone's perception of an organization. Yet the hiring process does not always reflect the same engagement principles we work so hard to cultivate elsewhere.
This is more than professional courtesy. Associations continue to compete for experienced talent in a challenging workforce environment. In a recent ASAE workforce report, 78 percent of association executives identified talent acquisition and retention as a top organizational challenge. The experience prospective employees have during a search can shape their perception of an organization's culture, influence its reputation, and affect its ability to attract experienced talent.
If communication and engagement matter so much for the people they serve, shouldn't they matter just as much to the professionals considering a role with our organizations?
That realization became much clearer through my recent interview experiences. Over the past several months, I participated in multiple searches, and while every organization handled the process differently, certain patterns began to stand out.
Many applications were submitted directly by email without any acknowledgment that they had been received. Some searches progressed quickly while others stretched over several months. In some cases, updates arrived regularly. In others, long periods of silence were part of the experience, even after multiple rounds of interviews.
One opportunity involved four interviews over the course of two months. The conversations themselves were thoughtful, professional, and engaging. What stood out most, however, were the long stretches in between. Weeks would pass without an update, and even two “touching base” emails after extended periods of silence went unanswered.
I never expected the process to move quickly. Search committees are balancing competing responsibilities, priorities shift, and decisions do take time. What I found myself thinking, however, was that if one of our members, volunteers, sponsors, or donors experienced that same uncertainty after investing significant time with our organization, I would have viewed it as a missed engagement opportunity.
The experience reinforced something I have long believed: every interaction, including periods of silence, communicates something about an organization's culture. It also reminded me that prospective employees begin forming impressions of that culture long before they ever become part of it.
One of the most valuable lessons I have learned is that clear communication goes a long way, especially when expectations change. A brief update explaining that a search is taking longer than expected can preserve trust and goodwill, even when there is no new decision to share.
Association professionals spend their careers creating meaningful experiences for the people they serve. We encourage timely communication, thoughtful follow-up, transparency, and relationship building because those practices strengthen trust.
Why should the hiring experience be any different?
The professionals we recruit are the same people we hope will go on to build those relationships within our organizations. The hiring process is our first opportunity to demonstrate the engagement values we expect them to deliver throughout their work with our organizations.
The association community is remarkably interconnected. Careers often cross through conferences, volunteer leadership, consulting engagements, and future employment opportunities. An applicant who is not selected today may later become a conference speaker, consultant, volunteer leader, sponsor, vendor, or even return as a future candidate.
For that reason, the hiring process can be about more than filling an open position. It is an opportunity to model an organization's culture, reinforce its values, and demonstrate the engagement it hopes employees will extend to every member, volunteer, sponsor, donor, and stakeholder they serve.
Improving the hiring experience doesn't require expensive technology. It starts with practices associations already know well.
Three simple ways to improve the hiring experience:
These are not new ideas. They are the same relationship-building practices associations rely on every day with our stakeholders. Applying them consistently throughout the hiring process is simply an extension of the work we already do well.
Every interaction with an organization communicates something about its culture long before a person becomes a member, volunteer, employee, or partner.
For prospective employees, the hiring process is often their first meaningful experience with an association. It is also their first introduction to the engagement approach they may one day be asked to create for our communities.
If engagement matters throughout the member journey, perhaps it should matter just as much throughout the employee journey.
