Minnesota Institute of Public Health

There is a lot to be said for joining organizations and groups that are relevant to one's work or one's life. The networking, information sharing, support and continuous learning have great value. It's also often more fun than not.

In our work setting with time being among the most precious resources we have for ourselves and our colleagues, we necessarily must be sage about how we find appropriate balance. We can limit ourselves by two extremes - being such a joiner and meeter that we fail to actually get work done, OR, working in such isolation that we miss those valuable experiences that being part of a professional or social organization offer.

I've had staff that needed to be directed to meet and greet colleagues in their field in order to stay current and stay in touch, and represent MIPH. I've also had to rein in colleagues who thought if sending one person to a conference was good, sending six people to the same conference was six times as good. As usual, the truth is somewhere in the middle. Time is a precious resource, and even more so for a nonprofit.

Technology permits us to join without always being there, to read the journals, participate in webinars,  stagger our times in person versus a virtual presence. It can be done. Again, balance.

Some organizations make us conspicuous by our NOT joining, by NOT being present. Some people also just love to fill up their calendars and call it busy. Always, it seems to me, there needs to be a series of questions we need to ask, focusing on the value of the experience, and value in comparison to what or where else one could or should be.

Groucho Marx had the best, most humorous quote about joining. He was once invited to join a Hollywood elite club of some kind and responded with a pithy written note that "I refuse to join any organization that would accept me as a member!". Hard to reply to that.

How do you and your colleagues gauge the value and the priority of joining organizations?

- JJ