First Things First: Understanding Member Data Needs

Have you ever worked so hard on a benchmarking study that your whole organization was so excited for, just to have it fall flat with your members? I’ll be honest; I have, and while it’s certainly not fun, you do learn some valuable lessons along the way.

We say it time and again, benchmarking is valuable, benchmarking is important. Your members tell you they WANT benchmarking, they NEED benchmarking. So how is it that something so valuable and so desired can miss the mark so completely? Let’s take a step back and revisit the basics of why your organization exists in the first place.

Your organization was founded on some basic principles. Most likely they have something to do with advancing your industry, developing and promoting best practices and helping your members succeed. These principles are your mission, your philosophy, your value proposition. It’s why your members join. THAT is where your benchmarking studies really begin.

For your benchmarking study to succeed, you need to dig into what your members’ businesses truly are and what they need to succeed. 

• Do I know how my members run their operations?
• Do I know what economic or market challenges they are facing?
• Do I understand the state of the current talent pool?
• What’s keeping them up at night and what are the questions to which they wish they had the answers?

Convening a focus group or steering committee of either a sampling of your membership or esteemed and experienced experts in your field can help develop the questions and get to the answers that your members will value. If you don’t have the resources for that, consider a brief survey or even some informal, face-to-face conversations. In short, you need to ask your members what they want and what they need.

Once you’ve developed your pool of questions, take a long, hard look at them and start to refine your study. One of the biggest complaints we hear about benchmarking studies is that they simply take too long to complete, so be harsh and cut deep. Ask yourself the following:

• Is this data available elsewhere?
• Is what you’re asking measurable?
• Are you asking for data in a format that is readily available/accessible to members?
• And, above all, is what you’re asking of true value to your members?

If you can’t answer yes to all of the above you should seriously consider cutting, or at the very least, rephrasing the question. Develop questions that get to the goal and are measurable. Questions that can measure trends over time to show individual/firm progress as well as industry cycles and trends are of the greatest value.

By developing questions and gathering data that keep the long-term goals of your members in mind, you’ll be much more likely to develop a benchmarking study that your members will truly value and utilize. By getting back to the basics and taking the time upfront to develop a study  that’s easy to complete and delivers meaningful business intelligence, you’ll have a successful study and happy members.