As we look at the roadmap ahead, one thing that’s clear is we’ve got to make some changes. One of those involves the amount of public content vs. member content we create. For example, the member community has asked for weekly roundups of Slack conversations. There are a lot of great insights every day, but if you don’t log in for a while it’s rough to try and see what you missed. So a weekly summary makes a lot of sense.
But… a weekly newsletter, a weekly slack roundup, and a monthly member email are gonna be a lot to receive. Evolving the newsletter to include member-only info feels like the solution. Of course, thousands of you reading this each week aren’t members so we don’t wanna abandon you.
Read on to learn about other changes we’re considering and please weigh in with your thoughts.
Changes from a deep focus on members
While we have a lot of support, the core Bureau team is myself and Lori Averitt. When more membership money started coming in I thought maybe we should grow the team so we can do more. But once we had the results from the Better Bureau Survey I realized I was looking at it wrong. We need to focus our time on what gives Bureau members the most value vs. figuring out how to keep doing all the things at a bigger scale. So here is some of what we’re rethinking.
The Bureau Newsletter
There’s a lot of emails that fly around when you’re in the Bureau Community. And that’s because there’s a lot to share. With a top member request being more focused content, using the newsletter to make that happen feels like a smart move. And that means multiple versions of each newsletter. One focused on shop owners, and another for design leaders and one for folks in operations. Could a public version make the cut? I hate taking something away that people have come to appreciate, so maybe? In other words, ugh!
The Bureau Podcast
If you listen to the podcast you know it’s an excuse for me to have fun and toss around a topic with one of my best friends. But honestly, the numbers have dropped dramatically during the pandemic and it’s a significant amount of work each week. So I hit pause on it last May. I think the podcast will come back, but we have to find a new focus that is valuable for Bureau members. Topics like leadership, health and wellness, and recruiting/retention make sense across the board. Will we have guests? We probably should so we can get more of the expert advice the community is asking for. Stay tuned, The Bureau Briefing will return.
Bureau Events
This is a tough one. We’ve been asked for more webinars and Q&A sessions vs. monthly member calls. The feedback is "I love hanging out with my peers but when we all have the same problem and none of us have the answer it's not very helpful." The good news is webinars across different segments of the community are easy to put together and plan. Plus they're available to access when you're ready. And online workshops as well. It feels like we're in a great spot with where to take online events.
The demand for in-person events has dropped dramatically. And in complete transparency, I don't mind one little bit. If you've ever managed an in-person event you know there is a lot of risk involved. What I hate is it puts me at odds with the people I'm trying to help. I never want to hustle tickets like a sideshow barker because I'm worried we're going to lose big money. I want to always be on the side of creating great experiences for members, and in-person events can disrupt that for weeks. But I'm definitely not shutting them down. Far from it.
I'm confident they will come back. When they do we'll have to figure out how we handle the variety of topics that the community wants. One idea I'm fond of right now is a Bureau Gathering where everyone is invited and we have one or two programmed sessions each day focusing on overarching topics like leadership or motivation. But we also include the old BarCamp model of attendee-generated content. If you wanna speak, sign up. If you wanna listen, show up. If you want mimosas by the pool or yoga on the beach, you got it. Basically, you choose your own adventure.
What do you think?
If you're a member, or alumnus or simply someone who loves the content that comes out of the community, please let is know what you think about what we shared. We're wide open for input.