Here's a quick summary of some of the upcoming alumni relations professional education opportunities from CASE, the Council for Advancement and Support of Education.
Note that some content on the CASE website is region-specific, so consider selecting América Latina, Asia-Pacific or Europe as a selection when looking at the site.
Of course there are non-CASE offerings as well, too numerous to list here. However, I will mention one specific opportunity in which I've participated in the past, and which will be of interest to some:
If you work on alumni travel programs and want to see other planners, international destination reps, and tour operators all in one giant place, this is a great conference to attend.
What are your professional development plans for the coming calendar year?
CASE-NAIS 2012 will be in San Francisco. Photo of Bay Bridge with rainbow by Andy Shaindlin.
This week they share some specific outcomes from these efforts, as well as a few challenges and success stories.
Key Outcomes from LinkedIn Thunderbird counts 25% of its 40,000 alumni among its LinkedIn Group. Here are key results, with "how to" tips:
Outcome 1: Countered the impression that Thunderbird didn't do enough to help alumni obtain jobs Katie Mayer, alumni relations coordinator, says: "Complaints about this issue have decreased from several per week to virtually none." How did they do it?
Posting jobs and career tips regularly
Giving real-time access to Career Management Center staff
Encouraging alumni to post job openings
Actively matching alumni with one another for networking
Outcome 2: Identified and tested a new giving opportunity How did they do it?
A Campaign appeal via LinkedIn, through a Group notification (which hits e-mail boxes and posts automatically as a "Discussion"). The appeal was a direct ask from Mayer, their community manager.
"This was the second-most successful appeal of any kind all year, resulting in more than 100 gifts in a few days, plus numerous comments – all positive."
Not over-reaching. Mayer: "This tool is powerful, so we’ve decided to use it only once per year. There was something about asking as a person, instead of as the institution, that touched this group."
Outcome 3: Created a closer relationship with alumni Thunderbird now communicates with alumni more via LinkedIn than via e-mail. Mayer: "There's a more personal connection because of the profile photo and bio. Alumni feel that they already know us when we meet in person."
Outcome 4: Generated more balanced Group conversations A larger number of members means more diverse viewpoints, instead of a handful of vocal alumni.
[Thunderbird communicates with alumni more via LinkedIn than via e-mail]
Key Outcomes from Twitter Half of Thunderbird's content is purely informative and focused on international business – it is a global management school after all. Thunderbird's Mayer and colleague Samantha Novick subscribe to various digital news outlets to get timely content to share with followers.
For fun sometimes they'll post trivia questions from The Economist Book of Facts. Novick: "Since more than half our students are international, we Tweet holidays around the world. We schedule Tweets for certain times to take care of our alumni who are in time zones throughout Europe and Asia."
Outcome 5: Positioned Thunderbird on Twitter as a source of insight on relevant, important issues "It bolsters our credibility and fosters lifelong learning," says Novick.
Outcome 6: Increased alumni engagement Fast responses, retweets, favoriting their tweets, lists, mentioning them when they mention Thunderbird, and remaining transparent – even in controversial issues – all these factors increase interaction.
But what about Facebook? Mayer: "We are focusing our Facebook presence toward prospective students, and haven’t generated as much interest with our alumni via Facebook." In other words, they have chosen specific channels and are pursuing an intentional strategy that fits their communication and engagement goals.
["It was an honest – and at times upsetting – discussion"]
Case Studies: Experiments Good and Bad
Mayer mentions two controversial experiments that generated mixed responses.
A rap video (with student callers and Thunderbird's president dancing) generated negative student comments on YouTube. "They felt it looked unprofessional for an MBA school. Alumni mostly found it humorous, but the project was time-consuming and we couldn't measure its impact, beyond a brief increase in web traffic."
Thunderbird's Director of Annual Giving asked the LinkedIn Alumni Group, “Why wouldn’t you give?” This generated more than 100 comments, some criticizing the school and others defending it. Mayer says it was "an honest – and at times upsetting – discussion that resulted in institutional changes as well as some online gifts."
Finally, Mayer tells a cross-platform success story:
"We divided alumni globally into geographic regions and pitted them against one another. Some regions were very competitive – there was a buzz about it across platforms. The best aspect is that it allowed us to discuss giving every day without angering or upsetting anyone. A tweet might say, “D.C. knocked New York out of first place this week! Who will win it in the end?” We updated a leaderboard every week and the winning region's donors' names were published in Thunderbird Magazine, they got a letter signed by the school’s president, and formal recognition at Homecoming. And little prizes along the way kept it fun."
These tangible examples show that online channels can drive meaningful, measurable engagement with alumni around the world. I found the lessons useful – did you?
Add to these ideas, or react to them, by leaving a comment.
Photo: Thunderbird campus (Glendale, AZ, USA) by Kristen Jarchow. Used with permission.
I recently noticed that the Thunderbird School of Global Management(Arizona, USA) was generating steady, relevant interaction and growth in its LinkedIn Alumni Group and its Twitter feed. I asked Thunderbird's alumni relations coordinator Katie Mayer for insight into their approach. She and Samantha Novick (T-bird's PR & new media specialist) generously provided the following tips:
Driving Engagement on LinkedIn
1. Don't wait for alumni to join your LinkedIn Group: go get them. Use your alumni database to target alumni to join, en masse. "We invite 200 alumni per day to join," says Mayer.
2. Try to understand graduates' needs. Then actively fulfill those needs. "Form a relationship with your Group and put your members' needs first."
3. Listen closely, respond only when necessary, and be brief.
4. Find and share valuable content, and develop a distinctive online voice for doing so.
5. Run interference for your Group. Set up clear rules for online channels. Don't just post press releases, and don't let a small number of Group members dominate the discussion.
6. Don't censor."We prohibit profanity, personal attacks and hate speech." Anything else is potentially in play.
7. Once you've earned members' trust and attention, you will start to see returns, and can ask for gifts and involvement.
8. When a group trusts and likes its manager, it brings a return on your time investment. "They'll support you, defend you and become your allies in return for your commitment to them."
["Alumni will support you, defend you and become your allies in return for your commitment to them."]
Driving Engagement with Twitter
9. Alumni expect immediate responses on Twitter.
10. Twitter puts you on people's radar frequently, so choose content carefully.
11. Retweet and favorite alumni followers' tweets regularly.
12. Build Twitter lists of alumni to help them find each other on Twitter.
13. If someone mentions T-bird by name, Thunderbird mentions them in return.
14. Diverse groups of stakeholders follow Thunderbird on Twitter. So "we diversify our content, and try to be inclusive."
15. "We're in the education business, so we regularly provide valuable educational content to followers."
16. Stay transparent and don't shy away from all controversy. "We post information even if we know it will generate negative comments."
Next Up: Real Life Examples Next week, we'll learn about six real-world outcomes from online engagement at Thunderbird. And Katie and Samantha will share some difficulties and success stories from the online world.
Many think of "alumni career services" as a recent invention – born of necessity as institutions struggle to provide graduates with practical, useful services.
Not so.
In 1996 Paul Lukas stumbled across hundreds of discarded student records in a disused New York City school building. Luckily, he recognized that what appeared to be a few hundred old report cards were valuable historical documents. Understanding these records became an obsession that, in Lukas' words, changed his life. He pursued their origin and their meaning.
[What he uncovered makes great reading – part history lesson, part detective yarn, part human interest story]
One fascinating aspect of the story is Lukas' description of the way in which the school, called the Manhattan Trade School for Girls, helped its graduates find work, and continued to do this for many years after the girls had become alumnae. He writes that the school
had kept track of its students' employment history for years after they graduated, which provided a look into the students' post-school lives and also painted a striking portrait of the Depression-era labor market.
Later, he goes on, he found out the reason they kept these records:
The school had its own job placement office – essentially an in-house employment bureau – and had helped the students secure those jobs...Many graduates continued to obtain work via the school for years—sometimes for a decade or more—which speaks to the unusually strong bond the school had with its students.
How did the school maintain such strong bonds with students who generally attended for just two years, usually between the ages of about 14 and 17? One motivation for staying connected with alumnae was the intent of its first director, Mary Schenck Woolman, who established the job placement office in part "to build up a series of records that shall be of general sociological value." To build up those records meant maintaining ongoing contact with graduates, in some cases for a decade or more after they left.
[How did the school maintain strong bonds with students who attended for just two years, between the ages of about 14 and 17?]
But what mattered most was the result of this effort to maintain contact: a two-way relationship between the school's administrators and its alumnae.
Lukas describes how, 15 years after leaving, alumna Mary Meyer contacted the school to fill a job opening for a seamstress at her own company. The notation on her alumnae record states that she "Called here for girl."
Lukas writes,
...even if the school didn't supply Mary with an employee, the mere fact that she asked them to do so feels like a validation of Manhattan Trade and its mission. "Called here for girl"—it's my favorite entry, my favorite detail, in the entire report card collection.
Mine too.
It represents the mutual understanding between school and graduate, that a brief period as a student gives way to a lifelong identity as an alumna. This provides future opportunities on both sides: a source of employment for students and a source of qualified talent for the alumni employer.
It's as true today as it was in 1921, when Mary Meyer completed her own dressmaking education and entered the workforce as an alumna of Manhattan Trade School for Girls.
Image: Student record from Manhattan Trade School for Girls
