“Young people in the sector want to associate with each other, both socially and in terms of career development and learning. A lot of the draw is that it's all by and for young professionals, so there's that sense of buy-in and belonging,” says Solomon. “There's a tremendous desire to learn from each other because we feel like we're doing something new and so, in some ways, we're one of our own best resources,” he says.

YNPN has never surveyed members to find out if they belong to other associations in the nonprofit world, says Solomon. It's also not known how many have “graduated” to other more established associations that represent nonprofit professionals once they reach a certain career goal or age.

All he knows is that growth has been explosive and that YNPN is filling a need. “People will hop on every relevant listserv they can find and it'll spread by word of mouth.”

Change the Music

A warning bell went off for the leadership at the National Athletic Trainers' Association, Dallas, when they realized that for the first time in 50 years, membership numbers were declining.

It wasn't much, but it was enough to make the brain trust at the association stand back and wonder why. They started by looking at their membership base and realized that the average member was in their mid-30s. So they asked: “Are we delivering the benefits that the younger age group wants?” says Teresa Foster Welch, associate executive director.

They started re-examining everything — including their meetings — in an attempt to make the organization more relevant to younger members. “Like most organizations, our meeting was pretty baby boomer-centered, because that's who had been running the organization,” says Welch. “So we looked at this as a great opportunity to revitalize our meeting. We want to make sure that our students and young professionals, not only want to come, but when they get on site, they feel welcome and they see activities that they want to participate in.”

The association has already made changes to its governance structure to expand opportunities for young members to serve on boards and committees, and it is in the process of making changes to its 2008 meeting.

In the meantime, leadership is communicating the message out to the established members informing them of the changes on the horizon. “We credit the success of our association to the baby boomers, and we tell them we are building on their success,” she says. “If we don't, we're not going to be able to move forward and be successful as an association. So we tell them, ‘Thank you for bringing us to the dance, but now we have to change the music.’”

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