I was recently promoted to Executive Director here at Association Headquarters. Reaching this milestone in my career has encouraged me to reflect back at when I started here and how I got to this point.
I started as a membership coordinator in the spring of 2005 with no intention of making association management my career (sorry Bob!). When I graduated college, I assumed I would use my degree, combine it with my years of training and my passion for figure skating, and coach children to be the best athletes they could be. I always loved the idea of having a career that would allow me to make an impact on a person.
My original reason for taking my first position here at AH was because I needed a steady income to pay back some hefty student loans and, well, for health insurance. I did not intend for my new job to turn into a career, but being a former athlete means never settling and always pushing forward to the next level. So, like a beginner athlete learns the basic moves and concepts of a sport, it’s obvious now that I spent my first few years here learning at a basic level what association management was.
After working at AH for a couple of years, I eventually moved into the director of membership position, then into the assistant executive director role. I started to learn a higher level of management and skills to better meet my member’s and client’s needs. When an athlete moves from the beginner level into the novice, more time is devoted to training, developing one’s own style, and starting to learn the more complicated skills required. In much the same way, I took this time to take my professional development to a higher level and started to attend continuing education activities through MASAE and ASAE. I researched other ways I could enhance my knowledge, which led me to set a goal for myself to sit for the Certified Association Executive exam.
I am now the newest, and currently the youngest, executive director here at AH. I feel like the rookie who just made it to the big leagues. I know I have a lot to learn, but I have a good foundation to jump from. It’s a far way off from where I thought I would be at this point my career; I thought I would be standing in an ice rink at 5:30 in the morning teaching a student how to land their first axel. But, I still get to do what I always wanted to — make a positive impact on people and reach their potential. Through my position, I can develop and implement various programs that may teach a member a new technique that will help them save a patient down the road. This is one example of the many ways that associations not only offer so much to their members, but to society.
I’m happy that I have been able to take the skills I learned from being an athlete — hard work, committment, and never settling (yes, even in an individual sport I learned about teamwork) — and apply them to my current career. I’ve met people and have friends that aren’t doing what they love or dreamed about and aren’t entirely happy. I consider myself lucky that while I’m not doing what I originally dreamed, I still get to come to work and get to do what makes me happy, which is to make a positive impact on people.
*TC Field-Bobroski is a former professional figure skater/coach turned association professional. She has worked at AH for over 6 years and was recently promoted to Executive Director for the International Pediatric Transplant Association.
