This time of year—the days immediately before the holidays hit—might feel like your busiest. Do you remember when associations used to reliably enjoy a “slow time of year”? National Fluid Power Association CEO Eric Lanke does.

“One of the painful realities of losing the slow time of year for associations is the negative impact it has on [an organization’s] ability to engage productively with its members,” he writes in a blog post this week. “Because we association staff are not the only ones who have lost our slow time. Our members have lost it, too, and they likely lost it long before we did.”

And that means your members have less time to volunteer. The lesson for execs: Your staff needs to keep a sharp member focus and make time to ensure members have meaningful volunteer experiences. Check out Lanke’s post for more thoughts.

Thought of the Day

Did Seth Godin write this post just for #associations? 2 quality spirals worth avoiding https://t.co/NpVBfty83M #AssnChat

— Amanda Lea Kaiser (@AmandaLeaKaiser) December 12, 2016

It’s a bad idea to keep cutting corners. It’s an equally bad idea to set expectations so high for your organization that there’s no turning back when you reach the summit.

Both are bad places to be, marketing guru Seth Godin explains, and can lead to a death spiral of sorts if you’re not careful.

“The productive professional realizes that keeping promises is often enough,” Godin writes. “Randomly exceeding those promises is magical. But the key is ‘randomly.’ Unexpected delight is priceless, and something you can deliver on.”

Other Links of Note

If you’re looking to switch from Mac to PC—as Microsoft claims lots of Mac owners are doing nowadays—this guide from Forbes’ Ewan Spence tells you what you’re signing up for. It’s not so bad on the other side, apparently.

Slow down, you move too fast. At Meetings Net, Sue Pelletier highlights the value of slowing down the information presented at a conference to limit content overload.

Don’t screw up your brainstorms. At Inc., Christina Outram of DogVacay breaks down the kinds of mistakes folks commonly make when brainstorming.

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