Blog: Wes’s thoughts, articles, and insights

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My most recent posts

Why bother with a consultant when I have AI?

By Wes Trochlil | October 14, 2026

Why bother with a consultant when I have AI? As AI becomes increasingly powerful, the value of using an AMS selection consultant (and many other types of consultants!) starts to come into question. After all, with very well-constructed prompts and responses, an association could develop a very solid needs analysis and RFP that could be used to […]

Guardrails can be helpful!

By Wes Trochlil | October 7, 2026

Guardrails can be helpful! When selecting a new AMS, I find my clients are often very tempted by custom software or “platform” systems (e.g., built on Salesforce or MS Dynamics) because these systems are infinitely configurable. After all, if I can make the system do anything I want, that’s a good thing, right? Well, maybe. In […]

“If you knew this information, what might you do differently?”

By Wes Trochlil | September 30, 2026

“If you knew this information, what might you do differently?” I had a conversation with a client recently about developing KPIs, reports, and queries from their forthcoming data warehouse. My client said: “We have a ton of requests for KPIs and reports. How do we determine which to focus on first?” My response: “When someone requests a dashboard […]

Showing is not teaching

By Wes Trochlil | September 23, 2026

Showing is not teaching In my experience, when new staff members are taught how to use their AMS (or LMS, CMS, FMS, etc.) they aren’t really taught how to use the system, they are shown how to use it. So what’s the difference? In a nutshell, showing only covers the “how” and “what.” But teaching […]

Data management is improvisation

By Wes Trochlil | September 16, 2026

Data management is improvisation I was listening to a podcast recently featuring TV writer Rob Long. During the podcast he said (I’m paraphrasing) that, in order to be successful, one needs to learn to improvise, because nothing in life ever goes as planned. One of my favorite sayings is, “If you want to make God […]

Older Posts

Be sure to schedule training for shortly AFTER go-live.

October 11, 2016

When my clients implement a new AMS, the implementation plan always includes training for staff, so that they know how to […]

Who ARE you?

October 7, 2016

One of my greater pet peeves is company websites that don’t list any contact information. I see this a lot […]

The data is only good if you use it and manage it

October 6, 2016

So very often in my meetings with clients, there will be discussions around the different data points the organization is collecting. […]

"It's like the family dinner"

October 4, 2016

I often recommend to my clients that they have regular meetings among their heaviest database users, to discuss all the issues related […]

Data management is a process, not an event

September 29, 2016

An event is something that occurs once. A process is something you do continually, over time. It’s that simple. Data […]

More Venture Capital in the AMS Space

September 27, 2016

The latest announcement of venture capital money investing in an AMS company is MemberSuite. As noted here, Revolution Ventures is […]

Are you "enabling" your board?

September 27, 2016

I once met with an association to discuss their data management issues. They were explaining to me that the systems they had […]

New articles posted

September 26, 2016

I’ve posted two new articles on my site: Fewer demos are better than more. Find out why here! What can […]

If you have to choose…

August 29, 2016

Choose customer functionality over staff functionality. Because our websites (customer-facing) and databases (staff-facing) are now intertwined and completely integrated, we may […]

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