ASP Connections Roundup

"It's a User Group Thing" Not only did the INETA t-shirts have that on the back, but that's what User Group leaders who attended the day long INETA meeting at ASP Connections had to say. INETA invited user group leaders and INETA volunteers from North America and Europe to attend a one day meeting immediately prior ASP Connections, VS.NET Connections and SQL Live in Orlando, FL in late October. The day long meeting and related events gave user group leaders the chance to talk about issues they share and provide input to INETA about how this new association can best serve user groups.

Attendees had a great time meeting other volunteers who put many hours into running successful local user groups. We also enjoyed meeting some of the INETA Speakers Bureau members who were speaking at the conference, and attending conference sessions. Based on feedback, INETA plans to meet semi-annually and use these sessions as a way to help user group leaders take information of value back to their groups on subjects like attracting and retaining volunteers, mentoring students and more.

Getting the Help you need from your user group members

During the INETA sessions a discussion on "Getting the Help you Need" was led by two members of the User Group Relations Committee, Ruth Walther of DotNetUsers and Julie Lerman from VTdotNet. Julie referred to herself as the BEFORE and Ruth as the AFTER, since Julie is still doing 100% of the work and Ruth has committees of people who help run her very large user group.

Here are some highlights from that conversation.

How much of the work do you do?
About 20% of the user group leaders in the room said that they do 95-100% of the work for their user groups. Another 50% do about 75% of their u.g. tasks.

How much time do you spend per week?
This is a hard question to answer, because who would want to stop and add up all of the hours, then admit to them as well. We saw a number of people who said about 2-5 hours, more common was 10-15. We were shocked when one u.g. leader (who manages a number of user groups in a consortium) said 30 hours per week! Egads!

What tasks do you need help on that can be delegated?
Here are some examples that we came up with:
Newsletter, Finding meeting locations, Getting speakers, Handling swag, Refreshments, paper cups, etc., finding people to pay for stuff like pizza

For those of you who DO have members engaged in your organization, how did this come about?
Boston.Net knew that they were growing and needed more structure. The leader of this group had a number of “retreats” where interested people discussed how to better handle  the user group. Gradually, people became more involved and they now have a big executive committee. Bay.Net is so big that they have 2 executive committees. One for strategic planning and the other is a tactical group. The first is a small group with 7 defined roles. The second is an open group with lots of participation. Harrisburg, PA's leaders said he asked for volunteers and this didn't work so he ended up drafting people! We are not sure what tactics he used here, but he said it did the trick! Vermont .Net is working on engaging. Their u.g. leader asks questions of different members about what they are doing, are they using .net yet, etc. during meetings. They also have 2 list server mailing lists. So people in the group are really getting to know each other.

So here were some of the harder questions we asked:
Have you ASKED people to help? Have people offered?
Are you willing to let go of some of your tasks? Especially for those of you who started your user groups – this can be really hard to do!

Let's continue this conversation in the INETA Forums.

To contact INETA: Be sure to check the appropriate tab on the www.ineta.org site to see who is the correct contact for your areas of interest. Forums are open to all, but to post, you must sign in with your User Group's login and password

User Group Specials from your own website!

.NET News to share with your members

The beta version of the .NET Framework 1.1 Software SDK is now online. Try its new features and get up to speed for the rollout of .NET Server 2003.Download .NET Framework 1.1 Beta SDK Today

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Collaborate on .NET projects online
Visit GotDotNet Workspaces, a dynamic online environment where developers can collaborate on .NET projects. http://www.gotdotnet.com/community/workspaces/

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Web Services Conference Discount for members

Bill Evjen, the Executive Director of INETA, will be speaking at the conference, Building a Web Services Foundation. The event is scheduled for December 10-11, 2002, at the Hotel Nikko San Francisco.  As a result of this CNET Networks, TechRepublic and Builder.com are offering INETA User Group members a $200 registration discount for the conference.  

To preview program content go to: http://webservices.cnetnetworksevents.com

Tips for your User Group Meeting: Creating a Community

From Ruth Walther, www.DotNetUsers.org. Popcorn is a game to create community by showing appreciation to serving members and helping people identify each other. It's called popcorn because people are popping up and sitting down around the room as their names are called out to give them some applause. People pop up to thank others in the group for helping them, substituting the word popcorn for the words thank you. Tom says: "Popcorn John Smith for helping me at the Bring Your Own Laptop." When John Smith hears himself mentioned he pops up and receive a brief burst of applause. Then someone else pops up to say: "Popcorn Tim Shakarian for helping set up the X-box game at the Wildcard." "Popcorn Mark Toews for arranging the recruiters to be at the Wildcard." This is a way to start off a meeting with a name and face recognition building activity that is fun and quick.

We would love to hear from you about your techniques for building community in your user group to share in this column. Email Ruth@DotNetUsers.org.

In the Forums (of www.ineta.org)

Help on Creating a Non-Profit This is in User Group Leaders/Open Discussion. UG Leaders are seeking and sharing bylaws, constitutions and mission statements. This thread looks like the beginning of a great resource! We will likely make a section in the repository for people to share these documents with each other.

Tips for your User Group Website

We've been Swagged! Vermont .Net ran a contest to see if user group members knew what swag was and what the actual word meant. Check out some of the hilarious responses at top of www.vtdotnet.org!

Remember: Your UG website is the perfect playground for learning ASP.Net and impressing friends, relatives and your fellow UG members!

From the User Group Relations Committee

About this newsletter

The INETA newsletter is emailed to the contact person of User Groups that are members of INETA. Soon we will enable additional people to receive this as well.

Archived newsletters will soon be available on the INETA website on the Repository page.

Please send news (and pictures) from your user group so we can include it in a future newsletter! Contact us at: ugrelations@ineta.org

We welcome your feedback on this newsletter. Please contact ugrelations@ineta.org.

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