President’s Blog: Skating on Thin Ice

Skating on Thin Ice

<Blink>, well, goodbye 2018, hello 2019!! Is it seriously 2019 already? Happy New Year to all! As I sit here typing this, I cannot help but think of how things have changed in my life over the course of one year.  Whether it be ordinary changes, like watching my children grow and mature for another year, or major changes like a big career move, my life has changed over the course of the past year. 

Every new year seems to start off with everyone wanting to change something. Whether it be to shave some holiday weight or quit smoking, most people like to come up with some sort of New Year’s Resolution.  New beginnings for a new year.  My goals are pretty simple. I would like to lose some weight. Every time I bend over, I get this pain in my sides. My wife tells me it is my “fat rolls” pinching when I bend over. Apparently this happens when you’re pregnant. I mean, I knew I had a big belly, but wow! Needless to say, I am now motivated to lose those fat rolls.   The same can hold true for companies or organizations.  Each year usually marks the beginning of a new budget.  Fresh new money to spend to give your owners some big ROI.  Every company usually scrambles to get everything right at year end to hopefully start the new year with a clean slate with new goals, expectations and finances.  The same holds true for us at the Apartment Association. Especially true for us this New Year. 

 We, as an Association, have for some time now been skating the thin of ice of the Apartment Guide pond.  Our lifeline of income as an Association has been the ice, but we have ventured to far out on the ice without a safety rope and have finally fell through the thinning ice. Right now we are able to stay afloat and are able to hold ourselves above water through some reserve money. However, our time is limited to be in the cold Apartment Guide pond, so we need to get some rescue plans in the works immediately. 

I am officially putting a 911 call out to the entire Association. We have 12 board members, and 3 full time staff that are going to be put to the true test this year. I truly believe, however, that it will take a rope much larger than what 15 people can pull on to get us out of this pond. I feel every last one of us that is involved in the Association, has to get a hand on this rope and pull us out. I will be encouraging all to brainstorm, all to share ideas, all to come up with plans on how we can survive in the water until we can get pulled up to some more stable ice and begin to search for a pond with some thick ice to sustain us long-term. At this point there is literally, no such thing as a bad idea.  I feel the more minds that are working on this, the chances of getting out of this pond increase substantially.  We have been skating this pond for quite some time now, and we have known that the ice has been thinning. We have not adequately prepared for falling in, but now that we have, we are now planning a reactive rescue instead of a proactive plan of finding a new pond with financially thicker ice.

Hopefully this analogy I have been using has given you a quick snapshot of what we will be putting our major focus on for this New Year.  I really did not want my first article as president to be a gloomy one, but in all seriousness, the chances of getting pulled out of that pond get smaller with each passing month that we do not have a rescue plan. 

I would like to try and end on a positive note. From the standpoint of the Association itself, we do have a big year that we hope will continue to show everyone why this Association is so important to our local industry. We are going to have a stellar awards banquet that will definitely be a break from the norm with new categories and new agenda’s. Our education program will continue to provide us with designation and certification classes, and some great classes/seminars that all facets of property staff can enjoy and find useful. Look for some new committees, or other ways to try and get more involved in our Association.  We have some great new members to the Board of Directors that I am confident will bring some great new perspective and ideas to this Association. 

I do wish you all a Happy New Year! I hope all your personal and professional expectations for the New Year ring true. Please feel free to reach out to me at any time to discuss anything.  My email is dbecker@goldoller.com.  Thank you, and see you all soon! 

~ Dave Becker, 2019 AAFW-NEI President