Keeping a volunteer association alive
Years on the board of a small youth association in Ticino, including a stretch as its president: budgets, sponsors, events, and the harder job of keeping unpaid people motivated.
GMSI is a small youth association in Ticino, a couple dozen members, that organises events and community projects and supports local minorities, with backing from the canton’s integration service. I spent years on its board, handling public relations and sponsorships, and served as its president.
Running a tiny association teaches you a version of every management problem, miniaturised and with the difficulty turned up. There’s a budget, but it’s small and you raised it yourself, writing to sponsors and applying for funding. There are events, but the venue is borrowed and the speakers are favours. There’s a team, but nobody is paid, so the only currencies are purpose, momentum and how people feel after working with you.
That last one is the real lesson. In a company, a demotivated person still shows up for the salary while you fix things. In an association, they simply stop coming, and the feedback loop is brutal and honest. You learn to notice early, to hand out ownership rather than tasks, and to celebrate loudly, because recognition is the entire compensation package.
Afterwards
After my term I stepped back into a coaching role, helping the next board avoid my mistakes and make entirely new ones instead. Watching something you led keep running without you is the least flashy achievement on this page, and quietly my favourite.
Cover photo: Piazza della Riforma, Lugano, by JoachimKohler-HB.jpg), CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.