HLAA Convention Annual Business Meeting - Part Two

This is part two of two parts.

Here's Part One

HLAA is the nation's voice for people with hearing loss.

HLAA will be adding an Advocacy Center module to the website later this year. Members will be able to personalize it, so it best serves them. For example, they'll be able to register their areas of interest and receive automated emails concerning those topics.

The Walk4Hearing has raised $750,000 in the past 13 months. The event consultant had never worked with such a small organization to do a walk, but HLAA went ahead anyway. It was a large risk for National and for the locals that sponsored walks. HLAA budgeted $125,000 to do the walk, the biggest risk they had ever taken. As you know, it has been an outstanding success! One of Terry's favorite sayings is, "If you don't make mistakes, you're not working on hard enough problems - and that's a mistake." HLAA has made mistakes in developing the Walk4Hearing program. The web signups are one example.

The Walk4Hearing does two other important things. It gets everyone out and talking to everyone they know about hearing loss and HLAA, and that's something people have never done before. So it's a great public awareness campaign, and it has also provided a huge confidence boost for so many people. The other great thing is that it has provided a much need infusion of cash to many local chapters. They now have money for CART, scholarships to send people to conventions, assistive listening systems, or whatever they decide they'd like to spend it on.

HLAA is using the Internet to inform, educate, and inspire. Last month the website had 19,000 unique visitors. That's up by 5000 from January! And four thousand of those 19,000 made multiple visits. The eNews goes out to about seven thousand people, so HLAA is connecting with most of its members every two weeks.

The HLAA magazine has about a three-month lead time, so the Internet is crucial for providing timely information. The magazine tends to focus on technology and on people and the strategies they use to communicate. HLAA really likes having pictures of bright, happy people on the cover of the magazine,

The budget has been flat for about ten years. Realizing that inflation is about three or four percent a year, that really represents a 30% to 40% reduction in resources in the past ten years. But the 2007 budget is a growth budget; it's up double digits over the 2006 budget, and Terry believes this is the start of strong and sustained growth trend. He expects 2007 to be a difficult year, because the organization will be doing even more with the same staff. They plan to add resources in 2008 to support an increased budget.

Terry believes that the two most important things that pull people together are shared vision and shared values. People who have that can disagree on methods and details and still continue to work together towards the shared vision. HLAA has recently produced a Strategy Management Document, and Terry is very proud of it. The document lays out where HLAA is going and invites those who agree with that vision to join them.

Hearing loss is currently not an issue of national concern, and much of what many people think they know about hearing loss is wrong. And as successful as HLAA has been, they still reach only one of every 3000 people with hearing loss. Part of the HLAA vision is an enlightened society whose members understand hearing loss. Another part is a society in which everyone with hearing loss has access to the help they need.

Q. How many of the website visitors come from outside the United States?

A. I don't have those numbers here, but I think the vast majority are from the US.

C. I think it might be useful to explore a closer relationship with the Veteran's Administration (VA). Many of the soldiers returning from the Mideast have hearing loss, and the VA is reluctant to diagnose that. I think collaboration might be a really good idea.

Q. I do a lot of presentations to various organizations. I've talked to thousands of people about HLA in the past few years, and not one has joined our chapter. How can we change that?

A. That's an excellent question, and something we're all thinking about.

Q. What happened to the notion of "self help"?

A. I think the Internet is the best self-help tool ever invented. We're focusing on growing our web-based tools, and they're all great for self-help. Our chapters and conventions are also wonderful self-help tools.

C. We need to project a younger image. I think we should always have young people on the magazine cover.

Q. I think we need to put together a PowerPoint presentation that demonstrates all the things HLAA has accomplished. It's easy to forget last year's success, but I think this needs to be the focus of presentations we make.

A. That's a great point, and I think it would be a great topic for the Chapters National Committee.

C. Sports are very important to young people, so how about incorporating someone with hearing aids and sports on the magazine cover?

Q. You mentioned that our goal is to grow the organization in the next few years. Can you share those financial goals?

A. I don't want to give numbers, because I don't have them here. But it's safe to say that we are looking for sustained double-digit growth. We get quite a bit of funding from various organizations and we're looking to grow those relationships.

Q. Do you have a personal goal regarding raising money?

A. It's hard for me to separate out those activities. But I'll have a Walk4Hearing team again this year, and I'll be setting that goal soon.

Q. Have you looked at getting contributions from corporations like Microsoft?

A. Yes, we're working hard to expand contributions from organizations outside of the hearing loss world. We do get a donation from Microsoft, and I'll be flying to Seattle next month to meet with Starbucks. We have more organizations involved with the convention than ever before, and they have donated a record amount of money.

C. At the local level we're always interested in getting representatives from various organizations to come in and speak at our meetings. I think we also need to seek opportunities for our people to get out and speak to various organizations within our communities.

Q. Are we working to increase funding from major sponsors?