THE POWER OF.

Just before heading out to San Antonio and ASAE's Strategic Leadership Forum, I downloaded the first chapter of a book from the Internet. Titled The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual (2000, Perseus Books), it perfectly set the stage for the next 2 1/2 days.

TWO-WAY CONVERSATION. The book tells us that things are different now. Very different. After years of post-World War II mass marketing, the Internet now lets the human voice talk back. The human voice has the power to change everything. Like the cult TV show Mystery Science Theater 3000, the Internet gives everyone the ability to talk back to the mass producers. "These networked conversations are enabling powerful new forms of social organization and knowledge exchange to emerge. As a result," the authors claim, "markets are getting smarter, more informed, more organized. Participation in a networked market changes people fundamentally."

Associations quiver at the thought. Will we be usurped? Eaten alive by the Internet? Maybe. Maybe not.

We all know that change is happening at a faster rate than at any other time in human history. We know that technology is the driver behind it all. We know that associations are as much under siege from dot.com mania as almost every other sector of the economy. The questions behind these assertions are vexingly difficult: What do we do about it? How do we ride the tsunami so that we arrive on that far (yet paradoxically near) shore exhilarated, not bruised and beaten?

LOOKING AT THE BIG PICTURE. The Strategic Leadership Forum does not give clear-cut answers to these questions. If anything, it raises several dozen more along the same lines. What it does do remarkably well is give us the time, space, and camaraderie to look at the big picture in a way that helps illuminate even some of the most ambiguous questions hovering in the back of our minds.

I particularly enjoyed the self-managed groups. This came as something of a surprise since I approached the concept with some skepticism. I am no longer skeptical. They work. For example, I chose to participate in a discussion led by Henry Ernstthal, CAE, on how broad bandwidth will bring about nearly unimaginable changes in how information is delivered and received. What if we could participate in small-group discussions or other forums from the comfort of our living room--and the discussions were every bit as real, with all senses engaged? It's not that far away. What if computers as we know them today become miniaturized to the atomic level? IBM has already demonstrated the ability to manipulate atoms into spelling out the corporate logo.

WHAT IF? The Fantastic Voyage is no longer so fantastic any more. As the Internet pipes become bigger and bigger and as the processors become smaller and smaller, we're in for one big convergence. What does that mean for associations? I walked away from the discussion thinking, "So what if associations no longer existed? Would that be such a bad thing?"

That thought stuck with me throughout the Strategic Leadership Forum. I kept thinking of a favorite quote from Albert Einstein: "We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive." Perhaps as association executives we need a substantially new manner of thinking if our associations are to survive. But would it matter if they did not?

BRING ON THE NEW. The last speaker on the last day, Barry Gibbons, former chairman/CEO of Burger King, brought the thought into clarity: "We shouldn't be doing things differently," he said. "We should be doing different things." By doing different things, we morph into a new entity, which may or may not be based on the old association model.

It takes great risk to reconceive the nature and meaning of an association. It takes greater risk to toss out the old and bring on the new. The message throughout was clear: We need to change. Change is good when properly managed. Proper management involves aligning the vast capacity of technology with deeply held human values that are then expressed through the spirit and minds of the people who embody the organization.

This, to me, is what the Strategic Leadership Forum is ultimately all about. Our human voices talking to each other, talking one-on-one, talking in groups, talking. It is about finding our human voice--expressing ourselves and finding expression in others. It is one "Great Conversation" that resonates year round, until, of course, the next Strategic Leadership Forum cycles back to shake up the old order all over again.

Susan Fox, CAE, is executive director, Society of American Archivists, Chicago.