Blog: Wes’s thoughts, articles, and insights

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My most recent posts

Improvement is never linear

By Wes Trochlil | June 10, 2026

Improvement is never linear One of the many lessons one learns over a lifetime is that improvement, regardless of what you’re trying to improve, is never linear. That is, you’ll always have days where you’re better, and days where you don’t improve, or maybe even fall back. And so it is with data management. Even if you […]

Don’t forget to take a “before” picture!

By Wes Trochlil | June 3, 2026

Don’t forget to take a “before” picture! Whenever I start on a big home clean up or renovation project, I like to take a “before” picture, so that I can see the progress that was made when the project is complete. (Ironically, even though I’m the son of an award-winning amateur photographer, I often forget […]

Are you being penny wise and pound foolish?

By Wes Trochlil | May 27, 2026

Are you being penny wise and pound foolish? Two quick customer service stories to illustrate a point: First story: I’ve used the same email provider for more than 20 years. But for technical reasons, recently I needed to switch providers, so I canceled my service with them a few weeks in advance of my renewal. […]

AMS Products are getting better – and what that means for you

By Wes Trochlil | May 20, 2026

AMS Products are getting better – and what that means for you I’ve been working in and with AMS products for 36 years (27 years of consulting, nine years as an association staffer). And I can say with great confidence that the systems available today are much better than they were 36 years ago! (Shocking, I know.) But […]

Using AI beyond content generation

By Wes Trochlil | May 13, 2026

Using AI beyond content generation Recent surveys by ASAE and others suggest nearly 90% of associations are using AI for some type of content generation (e.g., creating blog posts, newsletter articles, “canned” responses to inquiries, etc.). That is great, but when it comes to data management, there are so many more opportunities for leveraging AI. Here are some ideas […]

Older Posts

There's still time to participate

May 19, 2015

There’s still time to participate in my industry-first benchmarking study of association data management practices. You can participate here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/EDMBMSURVEY

New Article Posted – Using SMART Objectives to Manage Your Database

May 6, 2015

According to Wikipedia, the SMART mnemonic was developed by George T. Doran in 1981. I was first exposed to it […]

Be careful with phased implementations

April 30, 2015

A phased implementation is one where, at go-live, only certain critical functionality is available to staff and customers. For example, […]

Whether you know or it or not, you already have a data governance policy in place

April 29, 2015

In August at the ASAE Annual Meeting, I’ll be presenting a session on Data Governance along with Deb Hangar, ASAE’s […]

Do you have a "sandbox" environment?

April 24, 2015

When we were kids, the sandbox was the place you could play, and build things, and knock them down and […]

"The board never knows how hard we work."

April 23, 2015

When I work with my clients on their data management issues (especially when choosing a new AMS), I’ll ask them […]

It's the member's "story"

April 21, 2015

When I work with clients on their data management systems, one of the most common requests I get is that […]

Don't miss this important educational event

April 20, 2015

For senior leaders of learning (associations that market and sell continuing education and professional development), you won’t want to miss […]

Profound data analytics may be in the most mundane places

April 17, 2015

At Personifest earlier this week I got to hear Rick Smolan speak on the Human Face of Big Data. Among […]

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