In an era where efficient communication and collaboration are more critical than ever, Microsoft Teams is emerging as a transformative tool for managing meeting notes. This premium version of the widely used Microsoft Teams platform offers a suite of features designed to enhance productivity, streamline workflows, and foster seamless collaboration.
Teams Premium elevates notetaking with its advanced features designed to capture every detail of meetings. The platform offers real-time transcription services, which automatically convert spoken words into written text with remarkable accuracy. This feature is particularly beneficial for large meetings or discussions with multiple speakers, as it ensures that no critical information is overlooked.
In addition to transcription, Teams Premium allows users to tag specific sections of the notes for easy retrieval later. Whether it is an action item, a key decision, or a follow-up question, tagged notes can be quickly accessed and reviewed, making it simple to track progress and stay organized. The platform also supports rich text formatting, enabling users to highlight important information, insert links, and even attach files directly to the notes.
Microsoft Teams Premium is redefining the approach to taking and managing meeting notes. Its advanced features, seamless integration, and focus on collaboration and security make it an indispensable tool for today’s fast-paced work environment. By leveraging Teams Premium, organizations can enhance productivity, improve communication, and ensure that every meeting yields actionable insights and meaningful outcomes. |
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Fostering community, learning, understanding and belonging
Am I the only one reliving my ASAE moments more than a month later, from chest-pounding beats with Nelly to starting an ASAE sing-along band with Choir, Choir, Choir, or Machine Gun Kelly crashing the closing event festivities? I just returned from two other conferences, the iMIS User Group (iUG) Annual Conference and ASI’s iNNOVATIONS, where the topic of music was again leveraged to bridge understanding of digital transformation. ASI’s Director of Client Performance Improvement, Troy Stenback, used a music analogy to drive home the digital evolution when upgrading to iMIS EMS.
Imagine the journey of music formats: we started with records, moved to tapes, then CDs, MP3s, and now we enjoy the convenience of streaming services like Spotify. Each transition required us to let go of the old and embrace the new, more efficient way of enjoying music. We no longer worry about storing and organizing our music collections; instead, we let the digital subscription handle storage and access, allowing us to focus on the experience of listening to our favorite tunes.
Similarly, the transition from iMIS 2017 desktop to iMIS EMS in the cloud represents a significant shift in how we manage our technology. We need to be okay with letting go of the old, stored procedures and methods, and embrace a more streamlined, cloud-friendly technology model. Instead of focusing on the intricacies of the stored procedures, we should prioritize the functionality they provide and leverage cloud solutions to achieve the same goals. Just as we trust our digital music subscriptions to handle storage and access, we can rely on cloud technology to manage our data and processes more efficiently, freeing us to focus on what truly matters.
This music analogy helped to provide clarity for those that don’t understand the intricacies of the transition but can understand with the relatable analogy. This is just an example of how music can help tell the story. Music has a unique ability to bring people together in various ways and here are some reasons why music fosters unity, connection, bridges communication gaps, and fosters long-term memories.
Shared Experiences: Music creates shared experiences that can bring people together. Whether it's attending a concert, singing along to a favorite song, or dancing to a beat, these moments create bonds and memories that connect individuals.
Emotional Connection: Music has the power to evoke emotions and feelings that resonate with people on a deep level. When individuals share these emotional experiences, it creates a sense of empathy and understanding, fostering a stronger sense of community.
Cultural Expression: Music is a form of cultural expression that reflects the values, traditions, and stories of different communities. By sharing and appreciating diverse musical styles, people can learn about and celebrate each other's cultures, promoting inclusivity and unity.
Universal Language: Music transcends barriers and can be understood and appreciated by people from different backgrounds. This universality allows music to bring people together, regardless of their cultural differences.
Healing and Comfort: Music has therapeutic qualities that can provide comfort and healing. In times of stress or hardship, music can offer solace and bring people together to support one another.
Celebration and Joy: Music is often associated with celebrations and joyful occasions. Whether it's a community event or a staff meeting, music enhances the sense of togetherness and shared happiness.
Here are a few ideas for how you can integrate music for yourself and your association:
- Music at your conference – during breaks, during the opening session, prior to breakout meetings, entertainment.
- Music in the office – prior to staff meetings, music analogies.
- Music at your workstation – when appropriate, a tune playing in the background.
When you are planning your next conference, jumping on your next video call, or simply kicking back and working solo, queue up the music and find the joy. I find that the “work” being done with music involved is more memorable, impactful, and brings happiness. 😊 |
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| Learn From Every Member Interaction With the iMIS Engagement Management System |
iMIS® is the only Engagement Management System (EMS) purpose-built to meet the unique needs of associations.
CRM ✔. Accounting ✔. Events ✔. Personalized Web Portals ✔. Automation ✔. Dashboards & Reporting ✔. The list goes on.
With all member data flowing through one data source, your association will streamline processes, automate mundane tasks, unlock new opportunities, and grow your business.
iMIS is designed to support your continuous performance improvement:
- Single Source of Truth: Get a complete picture of your members with a single data source.
- Advanced Accounting: Easily handles your complex billing & pricing structures.
- Personalized Web Experiences: Delight members & supporters with a tailored experience.
Are you ready to transform your association?
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Everyone has their own opinions about what is “easy to use”. And those opinions, based on personal mappings of how things work, often lead to assumptions that “this is the way to go” and “everyone feels this way.” These assumptions can prove incorrect based on the current use case, or even worse, can lead to differences in opinion between stakeholders which ultimately lead to delayed launches.
The only way to understand your audience and find ways to make your website effortless to use, is by usability testing.
In the coming newsletter articles, I will dive into different types of usability tests and how they can better help you understand your end users. But for this month, I will focus on a few key points about usability testing:
- If you want to make your end users happy, you have to test. Looking at a design or using a prototype gives YOU (and only you) time to understand how something works. The only way to find out how it truly works is by watching THEM (your audience) try to use it. Testing reminds stakeholders that not everyone thinks the same way.
- Testing one user is better than testing none at all. Budgets come into play when testing users. But if you could find at least one volunteer who has never seen the site, that is 100% better than spending money on a website that has never been truly tested by your audience. When choosing a volunteer, try different audiences – prospective members, new members, current members – and different use cases.
- Test early, not later. It’s better to understand how your audience will use your site early on. Why spend loads of money first, only to find out your audience will hate it? By testing early, design and implementation teams can find different solutions that will result in happier end users. Testing early does not have to wait until a developer starts coding. Testing can begin right away with hand-drawn designs, or functional prototypes.
- Testing will add some time to your project implementation but NOT testing, will add A LOT more. Testing doesn’t have to add a lot of time to your project. You can learn a lot about your design even with 1 to 2 hours of testing. But imagine if you didn’t test and launched your website, only to find that nobody understands how to become a member or sign up for your annual event. That right there could add 20, 40, or even more hours to go back, come up with a new idea, and re-implement.
Now that you have a better understanding of why you should consider usability testing in your next project, I’m excited to share with you the various types of usability tests, in the coming newsletters. |
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Tricia, Jim, and I had the privilege of attending the iUG (iMIS Users Group, formerly NiUG) and ASI’s iNNOVATIONS conferences, held back-to-back during the second week of September. Both events were a fantastic experience, providing deep insights for anyone involved in the iMIS community. The sessions were highly informative and interactive, spanning a range of topics that catered to everyone—whether you’re looking to optimize iMIS for member management, enhance fundraising strategies, leverage reporting tools, or explore how third-party integrations can improve decision-making. A special focus was placed on new features and upcoming updates to iMIS EMS, particularly around third-party tool integrations and enhanced data analytics capabilities.
Tricia and I had the honor of presenting at the iUG conference with a session on Preparing Your Organization for Digital Transformation. We also enjoyed reconnecting with several of our clients (in person!) and hosted a dinner on Tuesday night for those who were available.
The keynote at iUG was delivered by Tom Morrison, CEO of the Metal Treating Institute. His talk, titled How to Get Members to Scream Your Value, was a highlight of the conference. One key takeaway was his insight on the four must-haves for association employees: technical training, leadership development, a culture of innovation, and an openness to change.
Here are some of the exciting new iMIS features and tips we discovered during the event:
- Password reset emails can now be sent on demand by staff directly to members
- Dynamic Groups for Event Pricing are updated real-time to allow new members to receive member pricing immediately after joining
- A new website theme called Flat White is now available, with clean, modern lines
- Pricing Groups are now centralized under Commerce > Pricing Groups, making them easier to find
- Organization duplicate merge is now possible
- Automatic de-duplication when registering individuals with pre-existing emails
- Stored credit card re-use at checkout is now an option
- Username synch when members update their email addresses
- Easily unapply or transfer payments between invoices
- With iMIS EMS’s cloud-based SaaS, you’ll receive more frequent upgrades, which means faster access to new features
- Online documentation is continually updated for your reference (help.imis.com)
To stay up-to-date on new iMIS features and upcoming developments, we encourage you to attend ASI’s Monthly Sprint Reviews and the Quarterly Product (P)reviews. Simply email productowners@imis.com and request to be added to the invite list for these webinars.
Both ASI and iUG offer an abundance of resources for iMIS users. By actively engaging with the community, you can maximize the value of iMIS—one of your organization’s most powerful assets. |
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| Trade Group Launches Medical Assistant Training Program |
A leading urology group is facing a future workforce challenge. In the meantime, it’s making sure its current workforce is up to speed.
Read More |
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| Why Competitive Analysis Matters More Now |
Your rivals aren’t just other associations. More for-profit and online resources are chasing your members’ dollars. Here’s how to get ahead of them.
Read More |
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We have an archive of our newsletters and industry related
articles available on our website, click HERE to access them.
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| Association Analytics: Data Analytics Network |
Location: Online
Attend the Data Analytics Network meeting scheduled for the first Tuesday of each month. This opportunity is for association professionals to engage in peer-led discussions on topics related to data and analytics.
Upcoming 2024 sessions:
- October 1 - IRL Data Science Fair
- December 3 - Year in Review
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| iUG Webinar: Back-to-Basics Series: iMIS IQA Basics |
Location: Virtual
Join us for the upcoming webinar in our "Back to Basics" series focused on iMIS IQA. This session will provide you with the essential skills to create and manage your own queries within iMIS. You'll gain a deep understanding of IQA terminology and concepts, learn how to inspect and adjust existing queries, and develop new queries tailored with specific filters and prompts. The webinar will also explore how to handle query display settings, sort and export data, and seamlessly incorporate queries on RiSE web pages, ensuring adherence to IQA best practices. This training is crucial for anyone aiming to improve their data management capabilities in iMIS. |
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| ASI iMIS Coaching |
Location: Virtual
This iMIS Coaching - General session is designed to provide you with updates on new features or functions, tips and tricks, best practice recommendations and to help answer your burning iMIS questions.
During this one hour online session, one of our experienced iMIS Coaches will be available to help answer any questions you might have about iMIS. |
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| 2024 Predict - Acumen User Conference |
Location: The Westin Arlington, Arlington, Virginia
Join us for insightful sessions from our data-loving staff and association thought leaders focused on helping every level of your association leverage Acumen and data analytics more successfully. |
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| HighRoad Solutions Webinar: When they stop opening your emails and ghost you |
Location: Online
Being ghosted isn’t a great feeling. Especially when you’ve invested so much time and effort into your campaigns. But the reality is that there’s a lot of noise out there in the digital world, especially when it comes to email, which is still the workhorse tool of association marketers. Join us to hear how to pinpoint the downturn in engagement metrics, gauge the level of indifference you’re dealing with, and plot a strategy to re-engage with members and customers who are the chronic “non-openers”. |
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| NOVEMBER |
| 6-7 |
| 9:00 AM - 12:00 PM CST |
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| Association Forum: Association 101 |
Location: Virtual
Associations are known for having unique cultures, environments, and dynamics that can seem unfamiliar and intimidating for new professionals transitioning from school or another industry.
Association 101 is designed to provide foundational knowledge for navigating these dynamics and achieving success which, in turn, increases the likelihood of career success, the feeling of belonging, and overall job satisfaction. Plus, you’ll have the opportunity to meet other association professionals new to the industry and begin building your industry network. |
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| DECEMBER |
| 4-5 |
| 9:00 AM - 4:30 PM CST |
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| Association Forum Holiday Showcase |
Location: Hyatt Regency Chicago
Get ready to amplify your goals and rock your purpose at the ultimate celebration of the Chicagoland association community, Association Forum’s Holiday Showcase 2024—Amplify. Prepare to be immersed in a concerto of innovation and ingenuity, where groundbreaking strategies and visionary ideas unite, shaping the future of our industry.
Whether you seek to expand your network, hone your skills, or reignite your career goals, Holiday Showcase 2024—Amplify offers a gateway to limitless opportunities. Premier education, ample networking, and incredible resources are just a few key benefits of this must-attend industry staple, now a full 2-day conference! |
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