05/03/2020
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CIMSPA welcomes focus groups in efforts to enhance membership benefits 

Positive outcomes as CIMSPA host focus groups to guide future improvement to member benefits.

On Friday 21 February 2020, CIMSPA welcomed two focus groups to our office at SportPark, Loughborough. The welcome marks one of many steps CIMSPA is taking to ensure our membership offering is providing value to all sector professionals currently in or interested in CIMSPA membership.

Building from the initial findings formed from a member survey CIMSPA invited members to share their thoughts on CIMSPA membership benefits. Welcoming a total of eight members, CIMSPA engaged one group that was formed of members of up to two years and a second group of members with over three years of membership. Both groups provided valuable feedback and insight into the perspective of our members that will further direct and influence the future of membership benefits.

Both focus groups reinforced our previous framework for membership benefits. These priorities can be broken into four areas:

  • Be ahead: All of our members are keen to enhance their career prospects, further their professional development and gain recognition for their commitment.
  • Be connected: Grow members network with other members, industry professionals and attend events.
  • Be rewarded: Saving money and time on products and services that will benefit members professionally and personally. Long-standing members should be rewarded for their commitment.
  • Be the difference: Contribute to the sector through participation in boards and committee roles and more.

The ideas generated spanned from greater personalisation, to career support and guidance ideas, to enhancing the connection opportunities and much more. Moving forward CIMSPA hopes to use these findings to explore new benefit options that will meet the needs of our members.

Initial findings found that almost all members would pick professional benefits as their most important priority, but some members aged 55+ felt these needed improvement. Other members picked Product or Personal benefits to improve.Over the coming months the wider findings from the research process will be formalised and shared with our members.

Commenting on the process, Phill Wright, Business Transformation Manager, said:

“It was fantastic to welcome members to the office and have the opportunity to listen first hand to their views on the organisation. We had some great feedback that will inform the next phase in the process - a member wider survey that we will be running in March. By engaging with members in this important process we can ensure that the benefits we offer are reflective of their needs and desires of our valued members. We plan to use this insight to provide confidence that the service and benefits we offer is valued by all CIMSPA members.”

In Spring, CIMSPA will be launching a second member survey. This will be designed to test and back up what we have learnt so far and give us the confidence to run what we currently understand.

CIMSPA will also be holding a live partnership webinar that will showcase the opportunity benefits provided to partners, to share insight of what our membership and the sector workforce are wanting, and to talk about the membership application process.

Want to be involved?

To be part of the next survey and access the live webinar be sure to follow our Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin Pages.