Executives aren’t always expert tweeters and bloggers. But in podcasting, they likely have a natural fit. When it comes to messaging, sometimes we’re slow to get the message. Associations stress out a fair bit about their content strategy—a term I don’t exactly love, because it applies a lot of gravitas to what was once more simply called “communications.” But many meeting hours get filled discussing appropriate channels, proper tone, timing, and so forth. One level, I get it: Budgets and time are limited, members and stakeholders can be easily confused about what your association is up to on a good day, so a little extra effort toward clarity can help.

But on another level, I wonder if some associations have absorbed the lessons about communications we’ve learned in the past decade or so. I think about this in the context of my feature story on association podcasting in the latest issue of Associations Now. While speaking with the three associations that are trying their hand at the form, I had flashbacks twice over. The first one was to circa 2005, when blogging had become a real-deal phenomenon, and associations and corporations were wringing their hands over whether their leadership should get involved. Five years later, and they were having the same concerns over using social media.

Today many association staffs are likely having the same labored communications talks—sorry, “content-strategy blue-sky f2f sessions”—about whether a podcast might be worth their effort. And the answer is the same as it’s ever been: Anything that introduces an audience to your leaders and experts about what your association is passionate about is a good thing.

Consider the case of This Week in Microbiology, the most well-established and largest of the three I wrote about. The podcast was originally the passion project of a microbiologist, Dr. Vincent Racaniello, who later caught the attention of the American Society for Microbiology, which now helps produce and distribute TWiM and other related podcasts. The podcast is professionally recorded, and Racaniello is an avuncular host; I’ve enjoyed listening to the show even though microbes don’t rank high on my list of interests. But good production values just provide some shapeliness to what’s the truly important part of the show: experts in the field chatting about what’s new and relevant to their work.

“We have a couple of working microbiologists discussing a paper,” Racaniello told me. “It’s really a conversation. It’s like you sat down over coffee or lunch in your department and you say, ‘Hey, did you see that paper?’ You talk about it for a half hour. That’s what we’re doing. Everybody’s chipping in. You don’t have to actually slog through the methods and the results. You don’t have to look at all the figures.”

That casual style, rooted in expertise, is what’s given the podcast a broad audience, and one that’s inspirational to people who are not in your industry. Listeners, Racaniello says, “write all the time and say, ‘Your show has made me want to be a microbiologist. How do I do this? What do I do next?’” Because your mission statement likely involves something about promoting the value of your industry, ASM’s lesson is a valuable one for a lot of associations.

Well, “valuable” in a broad sense—ASM has attracted advertising revenue through its podcasts, but the dollar figures are modest, and most associations don’t have the same luck. But there, too, I’m having flashbacks to the days of tedious conversations about the “ROI of social media” and skeptics huffing that if all that blogging and tweeting wasn’t going to make money, it wasn’t worth doing. 

Eventually, we’ve learned (more or less) that the value of all of these tools is in building bases of advocates who may invest in your efforts down the line—becoming a member, attending a meeting—but who won’t do any of those things if they don’t know who you are. Chris Condayan, a producer at ASM, put it straightforwardly to me: “If you’re trying to build a loyal committed audience, I don’t think there’s another medium that really does it quite as well as podcasting does,” he says. “They’ll listen to an episode and if they don’t like it, they’ll go away. If they like it, they’ll continue to listen and they get quite attached. We have serious fans out there.”

There’s one minor but important difference between podcasting and blogging and social media, though, at least when it comes to leaders. I never really thought it was particularly important for CEOs to blog and tweet. It’s not a bad idea, but not every CEO is a natural writer, especially in terms of the peculiarity of those forms, so their efforts could be a potentially negative thing if the posts looked overly manicured and, well, effortful. But podcasting is talking, and leaders know talking; the popularity of podcasting speaks to people’s interest in hearing experts speak in their own voice, and executives speaking at once off-the-cuff and authoritatively about your work can mean a lot in terms of a listener’s perspective on an organization. Better still, it can connect you to audiences outside of the bubble of the industry, and provide opportunities that more mainstream radio outlets may consider your work too niche for.

Podcasts aren’t magic bullets in terms of engagement and revenue. But they’re here as much as magazines and Facebook posts are. The content-strategy on this is simple: Get out there and start talking. What has your association done in terms of podcasting? Share your experiences in the comments.

This article was originally sourced from Associations Now and written by Mark Athitakis.

Professor Brad Jackson, the former Head of the School of Government at Victoria University of Wellington, is clear on the benefits of bringing an international conference to New Zealand: “It helps our students, both young and old, if you bring the world to them, instead of them having to go to the world.” Along with co-organiser Professor Miriam Lips, who is an IRPSM Board member, Jackson was instrumental in attracting the XXIII Annual Conference of the International Research Society for Public Management (IRSPM) to Wellington in 2019.

The event is expected to welcome 500-plus delegates from across the world to share the best research and practice in public management. “It is costly for students to attend conferences internationally,” Jackson notes. “It’s useful for our PhD researchers to present to, and meet the best researchers in the world here, it helps lift their game. A conference like this is also very helpful in terms of raising the profile of the university. This is an area we excel in. In the last QS World University Rankings, Victoria was 50th in the world for social policy and administration.” Jackson is hopeful the event will not only attract academics working within public management research, but practitioners and those working in public service to discuss new approaches to public management.

“New Zealand has been seen as a leader in public management innovation, so this is also an opportunity to showcase the work being done in our public sector. That not only raises the prestige of the field here, but when these delegates return to their countries it also raises indirectly the profile of public management in New Zealand through the rest of the world.”

He adds: “The ability to attract 500-odd delegates from around the world not only brings the economic benefits from what they spend in hotels and restaurants; but, longer term, these are the kind of people that we want to attract to New Zealand either to work and/or to study. Their positive experience here brings the potential for people to come work with us on research projects and to bring research money into the country. It benefits us on many levels.” Jackson initially made the pitch to host the event to the IRSPM member responsible for planning conferences in a taxicab travelling between the Birmingham hotel and the University of Birmingham campus during the 2015 event. “They said they would be very keen to see a bid from New Zealand.”

A joint effort from the Victoria University of Wellington, Business Events Wellington and Tourism New Zealand, via its Conference Assistance Programme, helped seal the deal and bring the event to New Zealand for the first time. “You’ve got to pass the intellectual test, that it would be a good conference, well-run, but also showcase something distinctive about the place of learning, and the fact that the host city and country is an appealing place to spend time afterwards. That’s where Tourism New Zealand really helped, creating a compelling bid document that not only sold the conference but New Zealand and Wellington,” Jackson says.

“The board was stunned at the quality of the bid document, how well thought-through and visually engaging it was. Feedback in the past showed delegates were not keen on getting in buses and travelling a long way between hotels and venues. So we really pitched Wellington as a walking conference, incorporating a proximity map. Victoria University campus, where a lot of the meetings will be held, is central, close to The Beehive, hotels and the major agencies for specific interests, such as the Ministry of Social Development, or Foreign Affairs. You’d be hard pushed to find that concentration of government anywhere else in the world. Larger plenary sessions will be held at the TSB Bank Arena and Shed 6, which are only a five or six-minute walk away, depending if Wellington’s breeze is behind is you.”

Jackson adds: “New Zealand’s biggest vulnerability was air travel, due to the costs being hard to justify for international academics, as well as environmental and time concerns. We put a strong feature on that within the bid. Information from Air New Zealand showed how central New Zealand is compared to delegates’ imaginations, and how connected. Plus, scheduling the event for Easter 2019 offered delegates the chance to bring their families and experience Wellington and New Zealand. We included a lot of collateral on how they could spend a week or two exploring while they’re here.” The Conference Assistance Programme also helped with key logistics, including funding a PCO to prepare an event budget to go with the proposal, and funding travel to attend the IRSPM event in Hong Kong in April to present the bid. “What really impressed is the level of commitment to the conference. We’re very grateful to Tourism New Zealand.”

Jackson says the organising committee is now looking at using Wellington in a creative way to create the setting for events. A key feature will be a banquet at the parliament buildings involving senior public officials and, hopefully, the Prime Minister or Deputy Prime Minister. “Colleagues from around the world are always surprised and impressed by the level of engagement the school has with practitioners and government, that access and ability to talk to key decision makers. New Zealand’s egalitarian approach, and the fact everyone knows everyone, is very appealing.”

If you would like to find out more about Tourism New Zealand, please visit www.businessevents.newzealand.com

Can you tell us a bit about Veterinary Association of New Zealand and the goals they strive to achieve?

The NZVA signed off an ambitious future-proofed strategy in the middle of 2016 which is designed to have the profession as valued as it is trusted, playing a much bigger role in society than it currently plays. http://c.ymcdn.com/sites/www.nzva.org.nz/resource/resmgr/docs/other_resources/Our_strategy_visual.PDF

Centred on a core binding idea - the wellbeing of animals, humans and our environment is inseparable – the strategy provides a framework for focused activity against three big outcomes that will have the profession positively accelerating society’s views on the way we treat animals. Our world is changing rapidly and there are some significant challenges. New Zealand has a national veterinary workforce profession grounded in ethics and science with an appreciation for values that drive society’s decisions, that can play a lead role in helping balance and enhance wellbeing of not just animals, but the people who care for and influence the way we treat animals and our shared environment.

What are the New Zealand Veterinary Association most successful membership strategies to increase engagement and membership retention?

The moment we turned our minds away from ourselves – ‘if only people could see things from our perspective everything will be fine’ to becoming curiously engaged in the outside world – ‘what is it that others are struggling with and how can we help?” .

1. The development of a 2030 strategy built off all the concerns, hope, and dreams the profession has, that will deliver results and align a profession that is diverse and sometimes at odds with itself.
   

   
   

2. Focused activity, engagement, education and integrated communications to underpin all this.
   

   
   

What do you personally feel has been the biggest challenge that the New Zealand Veterinary Association has overcome in your time with the organisation?

Fear of change, fear of what our members might do or say if we led change. We began the journey of overcoming this by developing an ambitious strategy and then backing ourselves to start to make some courageous calls. The announcement in 2015 of the NZVA’s 2030 Antimicrobial Statement http://amr.nzva.org.nz/home was the first example. Other major projects have also commenced in line with our vision for the profession’s future.

How does the future look for the New Zealand New Zealand Veterinary Association

Very positive with more challenges and so opportunities ahead; the profession is pretty much repositioned and we’re now reviewing our Association structure and funding models to ensure they are both future-proofed.

What would you say to someone starting out in the not-for-profit with a view to become a future leader?

Not for profit Associations have some unique challenges at the governance table given our organisations are all (or in the main) governed by people who ‘belong’ to the Association – insiders.

These people bring passion and knowledge which is important. They also bring unconscious bias which can slow the pace of change that society is driving, not us, or worse keep us in the grip of maintaining the status quo. Until outsiders are invited in to test our ways of working and thinking, and are sitting around our board tables, we’ll continue to work in a way that is reactive, to multiple issues, attempting to do more and more to prove ourselves worthy to constituents who will always wonder what on earth we do anyway.

We invited an outsider in. It wasn’t without challenge . We are now beginning to enjoy the rewards with a profession that is outwardly focused, with increasing opportunities to make a difference, supported by a national association that is slowly learning to do a lot, lot less much better. I remember speaking to an AuSAE audience a year or two ago and ended by saying:

Is the role of the CEO of a not for profit Professional Association to save our members from themselves? I believe it is.

Julie Hood Chief Executive Officer 

New Zealand Veterinary Association

Five association professionals offer tips on attracting and retaining top talent. Not to be a Scrooge, but here’s some potentially distressing news: Three-out-of-10 employees will likely leave your association within the next two years. That’s what global advisory Willis Towers Watson found in two major studies this year. “Given today’s shifting workplace and how technology is disrupting jobs and labor markets, the need for employers to successfully attract and retain the best employees has never been greater,” said Laura Sejen, managing director of talent and rewards at Willis Towers Watson, in a press release.

But how do you do it? I asked some association professionals for their ideas, and here’s what they had to say.

Mission-minded recruits. At the American Association for the Advancement of Science, HR professionals work hard to ensure that their candidates and new hires understand and are enthusiastic about AAAS’ mission and values—and can tie their position and talents back to both. “Human resources attracts wonderful dedicated talented individuals to AAAS by creative and innovate outreach, candidate engagement, taking a very personal approach to talent acquisition, and working in a true partnership with management to help find the best candidate for the position and AAAS,” said HR Director Patricia Sias. Then, once they begin their employment, Sias said AAAS makes sure its HR team is approachable and offers a competitive benefits package. “Human resources has a transparent working environment and are committed to encouraging feedback from our staff, engaging our staff, and providing comprehensive and competitive salaries and benefits,” she said.

Positive culture. After numerous focus groups and internal research this year, the American Nurses Association has implemented a culture shift. “We wanted employees [and job candidates] to feel valued and excited to be a part of our organization, one that empowers everyone to contribute to desired outcomes,” said ANA’s VP of HR Denise Clark. To that end, ANA created new values for the organization, which include excellence, joy, creativity, respect, trust, collaboration, and empowerment. And from these values, the association created five areas of focus:

• foster collaboration
  
• create a positive work environment
  
• promote employee development
  
• ensure autonomy and accountability
  
• achieve operational excellence
  

Moving forward, ANA’s staff will also be evaluated on these values. “It’s one thing to say, ‘We have these values,’” Clark says. “But it’s another thing to put them on the performance appraisals.” Although the culture shift is new, Clark and others at ANA are encouraged by the changes they’re already seeing in collaboration and positivity.

Competitive salaries. According to the Society for Human Resource Management, recruitment and retention of staff depends on a number of elements, but salary is one of the most important. “The most obvious strength we have is the consistent feedback that we receive praising our competitive compensation and generous benefits opportunities,” said Bettina Deynes, VP of HR at SHRM.

But workplace perks go beyond pay and benefits at SHRM. It also offers dozens of annual employee appreciation and recognition events, a strengthened succession-planning process that has produced a significant increase in advancement potential, a clear and effective performance-management system that actively supports employee success, and a comprehensive and compelling diversity and inclusion program that is designed to produce measurable results. “For recruiting purposes, we make every effort to communicate these advantages to prospective employees,” she says. “For retention, we work hard at practicing them constantly.”

Career development. The American Chemical Society makes professional development a priority. “Over the past few years ACS has invested in the onward career development of its staff,” says Scott J. Oliphant, director of human resources. “This includes setting the expectation that managers will develop their teams and supporting those endeavors but, ultimately, you have to empower everyone in the workforce to take control of his or her own career development.” To encourage this, ACS has planned and created tools that allow people to understand what is required for success in any given job or at any level in the organization. “Couple that with training programs or experiential learning opportunities, and you’ve got a pretty powerful story to tell new recruits,” he says.

Remote opportunities. The American Immigration Lawyers Association instituted a change in its remote-working policy because some top-performing employees asked for it. Theresa Waters, AILA’s senior director of HR and administration, says that these employees weren’t unhappy in the workplace or looking for a career change. Rather, they had experienced a life change—aging parents, marriage, relocation of a spouse—that necessitated a move. “As an organization, we didn’t want to lose talent that we had nurtured and groomed,” Waters said. “And [the staff members] were equally committed to the organization and members that we serve.” So, instead of losing them, they allowed these individuals to move away but still keep their jobs. “There was a commitment from both the staff members and the organization to make this work alternative successful,” she said. “For us, this meant moving beyond fear, being open to a new, broader way of thinking, removing personal biases, and leading with the intention of making such arrangement a success for all.” Just some thoughts to mull over as you’re putting your HR-related New Year’s resolutions together.

How does your association think about talent acquisition and retention? Please leave us your comments below.

This article was originally sourced from Associations Now and written by Emily Bratcher. 

Does your organisation support the work of volunteer committees, along with the extensive administrative workload associated with ongoing committee administration? AMA Queensland is the peak medical representative body that walks beside all doctors in Queensland throughout their medical careers, providing assured support and guidance. Nationally, the Australian Medical Association represents over 30,000 doctors, ranging from doctors in training, through to public and private practitioners.

Did you know that AMA Queensland also offers professional administration, event management and bookkeeping services to a variety of commercial and not-for-profit organisations? So why not partner with one of Australia’s most trusted not-for-profit organisations to handle the day-to-day management needs of your committee and relieve you of the burden of administration.

AMA Queensland can provide your organisation with cost-effective professional support through:

• Meeting coordination – organising your meeting dates, venues, agendas, minutes, reports, and implementing committee tasks and projects.
  

• Member engagement – handling member queries, renewals, production of newsletters, website updates along with database management.
  

• Conferences and event management – coordinating all venue logistics, programs, sponsor engagement, marketing and promotional material, travel, and budgets.
  

• Bookkeeping – maintaining your finances, reporting, BAS compliance and audit obligations for your committee.
  

• Day to day liaison – managing seamless communication with your committee, board members, external parties and other key stakeholders.
  

For further information on how AMA Queensland can support your administration needs, please contact Jennifer Burgess or Sonia Wright, Business Support Service Coordinators on (07) 3872 2222 or bss@amaq.com.au.

Electricity now comprises the lowest proportion of New Zealanders’ household budgets since the statistics were first recorded, says the Electricity Retailers Association of New Zealand (ERANZ). The 2015/16 Household Expenditure Survey, released on 2 December, shows electricity now comprises just 2.9 per cent, or $37.90, of the average weekly household expenditure of $1299.90.

That compares with 3.6 per cent, or $40.10, in 2012/13 (average weekly expenditure $1110.10) – a decrease of 5.6%. ERANZ Chief Executive Jenny Cameron says many people will likely be surprised by some of the numbers, particularly the proportion of the average electricity spend and how it compares with other household spending. “Considering how important electricity is in our everyday lives, the fact that we spend on average less than 3 per cent of our incomes demonstrates the value that is being provided by the sector. “Spending the equivalent of 26% of a weekly grocery shop on it – equal to adding five loaves of bread and four 2-litre bottles of milk to the grocery trolley, or having two flat whites each day at work – seems like a pretty good deal.

“The fact is that New Zealand electricity prices are also very reasonable by world standards - around the middle of the 30 OECD industrialised countries (12th highest).”

ERANZ analysis of the survey, which is undertaken every three years by Statistics NZ, shows the average weekly spend on electricity remains well below the spend on many other household items. That includes the weekly spend on petrol at $42.30 (down 13 per cent from $48.80), groceries, fruit & veg, and meat, poultry & fish $144.10 (up 9.6 per cent from $131.40), and restaurant/ready-to-eat food $89.30 (up 10 per cent from $81.10).

In 2015/16, on average, New Zealand households spent 17.3 per cent of their income on housing costs, which includes mortgage and rental costs. In the year to 30 June 2016, about 31 per cent of households spent one-quarter or more of their total income on housing costs. Over that same period, net expenditure of all household spending was up 17 per cent. While electricity’s proportion of the household budget dropped to 3.6 per cent, total spending on house and household utilities sector, of which electricity is a part, jumped by 22.6 per cent. Electricity’s proportion of that spend dropped from 14.8 per cent to 11.4 per cent.

Electricity remained by far the biggest proportion of the average household energy bill, its $37.90 spend comparing with gas $2.90, solid fuels $1.10, liquid fuel 10c, and other domestic fuels $5.10. “Our market is the most competitive in the world in terms of choice of retailer, range of service, and ease to change between power providers. There is strong evidence that retailers are helping customers to manage their power usage via technology and value-based products and services offering customers more choice and control. Retailers will not only continue to offer competitive prices but also services most valued by customers”, said Ms Cameron.

“We have also seen through this year’s independent AMR Corporate Reputation Index that four of our energy retailers were voted by customers as in the top 20 most trusted brands in New Zealand – another positive signal that our energy companies have a clear focus on serving their customers’ needs.” Go to the Household Expenditure Survey details here.

About the Household Expenditure Survey

The Household Expenditure Survey (HES) is conducted every three years and collects information on household expenditure and income, material well-being, as well as a wide range of demographic information. A shorter version of the survey, HES (Income), is collected in the two years between the full HES.

This press release was originally sourced from Scoop. 

The Addiction Practitioners’ Association of Aotearoa New Zealand (dapaanz) says the latest Arrestee Drug Use Monitor (NZ-ADUM) paints a stark picture of just how New Zealand’s approach to drug use needs to change, and the price we will keep paying if it doesn't. The 2010-2015 NZ-ADUM was released by Police in late November. It monitors levels of alcohol and other drug use, and related criminal offending among police detainees in Whangarei, Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. It says 85 percent of detainees in 2015 said at least one problem had resulted from their substance use including charges for assault, theft and/or wilful damage – as well as car accidents, job losses and overdoses.

Of particular concern to dapaanz is the reported “surge” in meth use, with those attributing their crime to meth having risen by as much as 29 percent since 2012 in some regions. The proportion who felt dependent on meth has increased from 22 percent in 2011 to 34 percent in 2015. Dapaanz Executive Director Sue Paton said, “There will always be people who commit crimes regardless, but we can see from this report that if we removed addiction from the equation, crime figures would be much lower and drug-related harm to New Zealanders would be dramatically reduced.

“However, we are poorly equipped to deal with the problem. Far too many of those wanting help with their addiction don't get it or are too scared to come forward. We also have very little available for early intervention which would identify people with developing problems early so they could get help before their problems escalate to offending. “We also have to remember that these figures are already more than a year old. The real and current story could be even worse.”

NZ-ADUM 2015 says 37 percent of police detainees “felt they had a problem” with alcohol or other drugs. However, 29 percent said they had wanted help to reduce their use but did not receive it. Among the most common reasons for this were not knowing where to go, social pressure to keep using and fear of what might happen if they put their hand up. Ms Paton said this shows New Zealand’s attitudes towards drug use are not changing quickly enough and that a high level of harmful “stigma” around addiction remains.

“A person with addiction primarily has a health problem and we need to deal with it as such. If people are too fearful of the legal consequences of seeking help they will keep on using and their slide into crime will become almost inevitable. “Other countries realising this, such as Holland and Portugal, are seeing substantial declines in addiction and resulting crime because people are getting into treatment and then back into society. It’s time for addiction treatment to stop being Health’s poor cousin, which has left our services struggling to meet demands. The money invested in improving treatment availability would be paid back manyfold in terms of reduced social costs, and in very little time.”

Dapaanz is the member association representing the professional interests of people working in the addiction treatment sector and has more than 1600 members. Funded by New Zealand Police, NZ-ADUM is intended to inform strategic decision making and policy direction concerning drug use among the arrestee population, such as the provision of drug treatment services and early intervention among at risk groups.

The report is available at the New Zealand Police website: http://www.police.govt.nz/about-us/publication/new-zealand-arrestee-drug-use-monitoring-nz-adum-report-2010-2015

This media release was originally sourced from Scoop.

As New Zealanders prepare to go on their summer holidays the New Zealand Bankers’ Association cautions people to watch out for financial crime. “At this busy time it can be easy to let our guard down. While we’re getting ready for the holidays, the fraudsters are hard at work. They love this time of year and will take advantage of people who are getting Christmas shopping done and catching up with friends and family,” says New Zealand Bankers’ Association CEO Karen Scott-Howman. Individuals and businesses both have a role to play in keeping their money safe.

The New Zealand Police supported NZBA’s call for fraud awareness. Detective Senior Sergeant Iain Chapman of the Auckland Police Financial Crime Unit says, “I encourage people be vigilant when completing online transactions. If you are being asked to send or handle money online, by someone you have never met, there is a high likelihood you are being scammed. “Stop and question. Use simple internet searches to confirm validity. Type the company name followed by ‘scam’. Chances are, if they are suspect, someone would have posted about it.

“Police encourage you to talk about cyber fraud and security with your friends and family.” There are all sorts of financial crime we can be alert to. Here are a few useful tips on how to avoid being scammed:

Card safety:

• Guard your card. Treat it like cash. Make sure you know where your card is at all times.
• Protect your PIN. Never tell anyone your PINs or passwords – not even the Police, bank staff, friends or family.
• Cover up. When entering your PIN number at ATMs and payment terminals, shield the PIN pad with your other hand. Criminals may ‘skim’ your card details by attaching a device to the card reader, and then ‘shoulder surf’ or use hidden cameras to record your PIN.

When shopping and banking online:

• Logon to internet banking by typing in your bank’s full web address. Do not use links that appear to take you to your bank’s website.
• Check you have a secure connection, which is shown by a padlock symbol somewhere on the page, and that the website address starts with ‘https://’. The ‘s’ stands for ‘secure’.
• Shop with trusted retailers. Before you provide personal information make sure they will protect that information.

Scott-Howman also cautioned people to be alert to so-called ‘phishing’ scams:

“Online scammers use a range of ways to trick people into handing over personal information, usually by phone or email. Once they have that information, such as your account number, log-in details, or password, they can access your identity and your money.”

How to avoid phishing scams:

• Don’t share your bank account login details, cards, PINS or passwords with anyone – not in person, online, over the phone, or in emails or texts.
• Don't give out personal information over the phone unless you initiated the call and you are sure that the number you called is genuine.
• Don’t reply to, click on any links, or open any files in spam emails or text messages. Don’t call any numbers in spam emails or text messages.
• Spam emails are often disguised to look legitimate. If it doesn’t seem right, take care and double check first before handing over personal information. It’s always a good idea to check the email address against one you know to be legitimate.

If you think you’ve been the victim of fraud, contact your bank as soon as possible. Scott-Howman further warned businesses to be beware fake payments fraud: “As we rush towards end of year deadlines, it’s worth businesses making sure they have the proper systems and checks in place to make sure their payments are going to the right place.”

Payments fraud may involve fake invoices that look legitimate but include a fraudulent bank account number for payment. These scams may also involve fake email addresses for people who would usually authorise payments.

This media release was originally sourced from Scoop. 

Mark Ward has been appointed as the new chief executive of the New Zealand Veterinary Association (NZVA). NZVA president Dr Caroline Robertson says Ward’s extensive leadership and business experience in the New Zealand food and agricultural sectors during the past 20 years will be highly valuable as the NZVA builds on its new strategic direction.“His executive roles have included CEO of NZ Crop & Food Research, general manager of the Riddet Institute, general manager of Food & Animal Health at AgResearch, and international marketing in the dairy industry in South Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe,” Dr Robertson says.

Ward’s current role as director of business engagement, Te Puna Whakatipu, at Massey University, involves developing and implementing strategies in the primary industries and related sectors, including research and education. He led the establishment of the national partnership FoodHQ, New Zealand’s gateway to food innovation, and is its foundation programme director. “The NZVA Board is confident that Mark’s strong track record in management, innovation, and leadership, and his personal qualities, will be of great benefit to the association and the veterinary profession in New Zealand,” Dr Robertson says. “He is committed to a unified profession, partnering with the right organisations and achieving its full purpose. It is an exciting time to be coming on board and Mark is ready to meet the challenges and opportunities ahead.”

Mark takes up the role as NZVA chief executive from February 1, 2017. Dr Robertson paid tribute to outgoing chief executive Julie Hood, who led the association for almost 10 years. “Under Julie’s leadership, the NZVA has undergone fundamental changes that will help to ensure that New Zealand’s respected veterinary profession continues to have strong support and representation in a rapidly changing world.”

This article was originally sourced from Rural News.

Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before! What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. What if Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!” And there it was, an epiphany! A personal tipping point for that little old Grinchy.

Christmas, of course, means quite different things, for each different person holds quite different strings. For me it’s a time to spend time with the clan. At the beach, in the pool, in the sun … get a tan. Celebrate them, cherish them, spoil them with love. Give them some presents, but mostly a hug. Especially my daughters, sons, nephews and nieces. I can’t help but love, loving them to pieces.

And it’s not just about one day of the year. A whole festive season that is filled with such cheer. I’ll recharge and reflect on the year that has been. I’ll peak into the future, and come out super keen. No New Year’s resolutions for me, I’ll have a good think about what I’ll achieve. And I share those thoughts with my trusted advisors – my wife and family and other insiders.

My family extends to the workers at work, A team of wonderful, amazing and talented folk … And to all of the members of AuSAE out there, Merry Christmas one and all – may it be filled with good cheer.

Brendon Ward - Chief Executive Officer

Australasian Society of Association Executives