Earlier this week, Purchasing Magazine reported the results of ISM\u2019s controversial membership vote regarding whether or not salespeople were allowed to join ISM and attend ISM events. The results were that about 75% of voters voted to allow salespeople to join.<\/p>\n
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I admit to being surprised by the outcome of this vote. Nearly every person I had spoken to was vehemently against allowing salespeople to join. And other professional associations (e.g., the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the American Medical Association, etc.) strictly limit their membership to those in a specific role and exclude salespeople.<\/p>\n
So, with this change, what has ISM become?<\/p>\n
Can it really be considered a true procurement association going forward?<\/p>\n
Can ISM now be considered more of a \u201cchamber of commerce\u201d \u2013 connecting buyers and sellers \u2013 than a professional association?<\/p>\n
Will it lose the 23% of members who voted against it?<\/p>\n
What proportion of the membership will be comprised of salespeople?<\/p>\n
Will it recruit enough new sales members to offset the loss of procurement members in order to help the organization return to financial health?<\/p>\n
Will ISM change its name (again) to reflect this change in audience? Long-time procurement professionals know that the organization has changed its name multiple times in its history.<\/p>\n
What do you think?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Earlier this week, Purchasing Magazine reported the results of ISM\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":4099,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-procurement"],"yoast_head":"\n