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Real Life Examples

What is the history of your group?
The group was started by another Seattle SHRM member in the 1990s.

What geographical location or sub-sector do you serve?
The group members are primarily from the Seattle/Puget Sound area. The majority of group members are in the human services sector, although we have had arts/education and for-profit people attend on occasion. 

How many people are currently in the group? 
There are currently 112 members on the directory. We have 6-20 members attend the monthly meetings.

How do you determine who can join?
The group membership is unlimited! Anyone interested is welcome and you do not need to specifically be interested in nonprofit HR. The monthly meeting topics are suggestions by the group members and then I also throw in my own suggestions if we do not have 12 topics submitted. Our group members’ organizations range from very small (less than 10 employees) to very large organizations (more than several thousand).  Members attend the monthly meetings or participate in the email discussions depending on the topic and time availability. There is not an established commitment requirement. We love people to attend when it works for them.

What is the governing structure of your group?
There is very little structure other than showing respect towards others' questions or comments. I do facilitate the monthly meetings and do attempt to keep the conversation on task and topic-related. However, some of our best meetings have been of the truly roundtable nature. 

What resources do you offer to the people in your network? 
Information sharing is probably the best resource to this group. Many email conversations and requests have provided amazing support to members. We often share policies, forms, experiences, and training ideas or resources. Job descriptions are also very popular. I do discourage the sharing of salary to avoid the issue of salary-fixing.

Are your events or meetings ever open to the public?
Our meetings are always open to anyone that wants to attend.

How often do you get together?
We meet monthly. Email conversations occur all the time.

How are events or meetings structured?
Each meeting has a predetermined topic. The meeting starts out with general announcements, an introduction of the guest speaker if we have one, followed by questions to the speaker, and then (if time permits) general group discussion about challenges we are currently facing.

Do people in your group pay dues? If so, how do you take care of collecting/organizing/accounting for the budget?
This SIG is part of the Seattle SHRM Chapter. Attendees do NOT have to be members of Seattle SHRM or pay a fee to attend the meeting. This is something that I have worked out with the Seattle SHRM Board based upon the limited financial resources of many nonprofits. 

If you have presenters, how do you determine what topics and who can present? 
The topics are typically determined by the group members and then I solicit the group for potential speakers. I will then contact the speakers and see if they are interested. We are not able to financially compensate any of the speakers, but I do permit them to give a very brief introduction of who they are and what service they provide. I highly discourage the “sales pitch” because of the limited resources of most nonprofits. However I do try to promote speakers when others ask for resources. More recently speakers have contacted me to ask about the possibility of presenting to the group. This is very different than a few years ago when I was struggling to find speakers. On occasion a topic will be suggested by a speaker calling me.

What advice would you give to groups in other cities that were seeking to start a similar group?
Determine the needs of the group and try to meet these needs. The group may start out with a particular mission but will most likely change over time. Be flexible to change the focus of the meetings as time goes on. Be mindful that often nonprofit HR professionals have ‘fallen’ into HR and assumed the responsibilities by default. This is certainly not always the case, but many people that have attended our meetings do so because they need to learn about HR. Constantly emphasize that information shared is NOT legal advice and legal counsel should be consulted when appropriately. Do not encourage members to rely on information shared as always being the best practice. Many of us have learned from our own mistakes as well as the mistakes of others. Be sure to find out if your own agency allows you to share agency documents before doing so. Members should not violate their agency confidentiality policy in an attempt to help others. 

Are you willing to provide contact information?
Absolutely!
Contact: Moselle Horiuchi
Phone: 253-372-3600
Email: mhoriuchi (at) chckc.org