Community Association Management

OK… this topic could cover a huge number of perspectives and I expect to share my thoughts from several of them over time. There is a new California Law SB528, effective November 2007, which addresses posting agendas and board decision making. In this blog, I am specifically talking about working documents and internal communication processes rather than the legal aspects of that law.

One of the reasons that I moved from being a board member to becoming a manager was the amount of time that I spent working with an every rotating series of account managers. I was an Organizational Development Consultant at the time, working from home and trying to balance all those activities that a small, home based consultant has to do: marketing, networking, client meetings, program development and delivery, invoicing, and the normal office tasks of filing, etc. Then, there was volunteering on the board and, eventually, assuming the mantle of President.

Over the span of 2 years, we had 4 different account managers. Given my bias for organizational systems, it made me crazy that we didn’t get manager’s reports before meetings, tasks went months without follow up, new account managers had more questions than answers about the property, and “training” the account manager, I felt, fell to me. In 1987 I offered to resign from the board and manage the association – one I still manage today.

My first task was to organize board communications via the Manager’s Report. True to meeting management principles, I created a format that simply expanded the agenda categories and tracked items within them from month to month until they were completed. I used the same format to transform the Manager’s Report to Minutes, purging extraneous details and recording motions and board direction/decisions. Following is a basic Agenda on the cover of the manager’s report from 2003 – a format that has changed little over time:

7:00 PM Call to Order

7:02 PM Review Manager's Report
1. Board Business
2. Financial
3. Architectural Controls
4. General Business/Violations
5. Landscape & Maintenance
6. New Business

8:00 PM Adjournment

Inside the Manager’s Report, each category (1 – 6) is expanded to reflect the business of the meeting. A simple example of how this might work is that under Board Business, item 1 is always to review and approve the minutes of the prior meeting. Item 2 might be “recruiting new board members”. This item will remain on the Manager’s Report until new members are recruited (including who is responsible for approaching candidates, etc.). It will report on board applications received, transition activities, and election of board positions once new members are elected by the membership. Once all related activities have been completed, the item would be closed and not appear on future reports. (Note: I am specifically not addressing what information would be transferred into the minutes here since the Manager’s Report is a working document and the actual Minutes are a legal document.)

Item 3 under Board Business is usually to review the 90 day calendar. One of the biggest benefits to having an HOA specific management database (www.campro.us) is that instead of reporting on activities within the Manager’s Report, I can now attach a simple report. The reports developed in the database were driven by the items I used to include in the Manager’s Report, so the 90 day calendar includes upcoming meetings and events, contracts coming up for renewal and major scheduled maintenance activities and helps give the board and management a “heads up” on upcoming tasks.

These reports also help the board understand the scope of work completed by management without making the Manager’s Report excessively long. Yes, I know this is self-serving, but one of the problems I think boards have is in truly understanding just how much managers do that goes unacknowledged. One report includes Architectural Approvals (anything outside standard specifications would be on the Manager’s Report). One is Completed Maintenance; one, Outstanding Work Orders. Not only does the board see that you are on top of taking care of the property, they also get to see who does, what, how much it cost and what kinds of maintenance is being done.

A CC&R Activities Report let’s the board see how many letters were generated, how many members complied with requests, and when needed, specific history on a problem unit or issue. This is really helpful when there is a board hearing and a homeowner is trying to tell the board they are the “only one” being picked on about their dog barking, for example. When the manager can cite that 30 letters have been written to owners about dog issues over the last 2 years, these homeowners suddenly lose their steam.

The Manager’s Report is one of the primary methods of communication we have with our Board. I believe the more informed a board is, the more trust develops between board members and the manager. The more detail you can provide, the better the understanding and communication. And yes, it is a balancing act to provide that level of detail without overwhelming your board members.

How do you manage it? Whether your system is a word document, a table, a spreadsheet, or a custom database, or combination, this level of communication can pay big dividends in helping create the sense of an informed and effective team. Next blog, I’ll discuss more on how I use the Manager’s Report to create meeting minutes and continuity between meetings.

I would love to hear your thoughts and feedback. Your questions can also help me direct my blog. We often work in isolation so this is a way we can also share things that work for each of us. Please email me at Gayle@campro.us if you have anything to share.

Gayle J. Hasley,
Community Association Manager
Community Association Homeowner
gayle@campro.us
www.campro.us

Last week, I talked about Manager’s Reports and my process for tracking items for my boards. This week, I wanted to build on that and explain how I use that Manager’s Report to create my meeting minutes. Basically, it is a cut and paste process in Word. I have a folder for each year with all reports and minutes in it. You could, of course, split this into 2 folders within the main year folder but I find it helpful to view the year at one time. The naming convention always starts with the 2 digit year, the document name and the month.

I open both my current report and last month’s minutes. I save the current manager’s report as next month’s Manager’s report. My format is 08_ManRep_06.doc which is then saved as 08_ManRep_07.doc [year/document type/month].

Then I copy the content from 08_ManRep_06.doc and paste it into the 08_Mins_05.doc and save that as 08_Mins_06. Now I have 2 Manager’s Reports and 2 sets of Minutes open. I close both last month’s minutes (used just to capture formatting) and next month’s manager’s report [08_ManRep_07.doc] which I will come back to update at a later time thus eliminating confusion.

I update information in the new minutes document by recording members and guests present, time meeting called to order, and the meeting date. Remember, this information is all there since this it is a copy of last month’s minutes so it takes very little time to update all this. Then I proceed to the change the wording to record the actions taken by the board, purge info only items and any repetitive general information I’ve provided in the report. The goal is to cut down on the length of the minutes while still addressing business discussed, motions and reports and following the Manager’s Report format for consistency.

Called to Order

1. Board Business
2. Financial
3. Architectural Controls
5. General Business/Violations
6. Maintenance and Repairs
7. Landscape
8. New Business

Adjournment

There is a fine line between overstating and simply recording the most basic information. It is important to remember who may be reviewing your minutes since the entire audience could include owners, buyers, realtors, lawyers, etc. Since Roberts Rules of Order provides a basic guideline for managing meetings and recording minutes, their website is a helpful guide. Check out their FAQs at: http://www.robertsrules.com/faq.html#15

Here is what they say about minutes: “Not only is it not necessary to summarize matters discussed at a meeting in the minutes of that meeting, it is improper to do so. Minutes are a record of what was done at a meeting, not a record of what was said.”
Minutes (other than Executive Minutes) should be readily available in a separate minute book. Never keep in the minute book as permanent records. Of course, laws governing associations differ state to state so it is vital that you are aware of the current laws governing your association processes.

I try to immediately go back to the Manager’s Report for my upcoming month, change the dates, update as much information as possible and make my “to do” list. Of course, if there are priority items from the meeting, I’ll complete those before working on minutes but I seldom wait to create my “to do” list. This entire process takes less than 30-45 minutes and is one of the most important tasks I use to stay organized and on top of things.
Next blog, I will talk about communicating with vendors and using technology to help you stay on top of those all important “to do” lists.

I would love to hear your thoughts and feedback. Your questions can also help me direct my blog. We often work in isolation so this is a way we can also share things that work for each of us. Please email me at Gayle@campro.us if you have anything to share.

Gayle J. Hasley,
Community Association Manager
Community Association Homeowner
info@campro.us
www.campro.us

Last week, I talked about Minutes and my process for recording them in a specific and repetitive format for consistency and effectiveness. This week, I want to talk about working with vendors and the technology available to help us help them.

First and foremost in working with my vendors is the relationship. As in all good relationships, this means communication is key to our working together. Every service provider has “hiccups” in service. I know I have had incidents when I missed a deadline or messed up a communication – we are all human. So why do we hold our service providers to any other standard? Of course, we all want to be professional, effective, efficient and exceptional in the service we provide our customers. If you don’t believe that about your vendor, it is time to change.

Many boards and management companies have the policy best described as “in with the new and out with the old.” I subscribe to the policy that everyone wants to do a good job and in 99 cases out of 100, if the vendor isn’t doing a good job, I need to look at myself.

Am I communicating my expectations?
 Do I issue Work Orders and expect a reply?
 Do I follow up on outstanding work orders?
 Do I call my vendor when there is a problem?
 Do I pay them on time?
 Do I accept responsibility when I make a mistake?
 Do I hold them accountable when they do the same?
 Do I take the time to really talk to them when I do call or email?
 Do I appreciate them for the work they do for me and my clients?

I learned the most effective method of communication is the “love sandwich”… and it took some time to learn.

In the past, I would just dash off the email request with no “dressing” nor did “close” well. Here is an example: (wrong) ___________________________________________________________

Katrina,

Can you cut a special check for the disposal company? They are such idiots. I need it tomorrow.

Gayle

Here is the same example using the “love sandwich” method:

Hi Katrina,

Hope your weekend was great! Little Bella must be growing like a weed these days.

The disposal company is having issues in applying payments. I really appreciate your calling them to get this resolved and would like to pick up a special check that I will hand deliver by the end of the week.

I understand the issues are on their end and that you always pay our bills. It must be as frustrating for you as for us. Please call when the check is ready.

Thanks! Gayle
_____________________________________________________________________________

Yes, it takes a little more time to dress up your emails or a few more moments on the phone (where I use the same approach.) When I first started, I would write my email, then have to go back and put the “sandwich” part into it. It took energy to think about really personalizing emails and making them feel good to the recipient. Now it is a habit and it has really helped in all my communications resulting in better relationships, both personal and professional.

The golden rule is “treat others as you would like to be treated.” It builds relationships when you meet your vendors on walk throughs and point out what they are doing right as well as what they are doing wrong. I ALWAYS want to do a better job when my board thanks me and acknowledges how much I mean to them after a meeting – and they do let me know this after every meeting without fail.

It helps to own your own frustration and not take it out on others. When there is a particularly difficult letter to write I will draft it and let my anger come out then put it aside. I’ll go back and laugh at how outrageous I was because I was angry and clean it up. Then, just to make sure that nothing “leaks”, I’ll ask my assistant or a board member to review it and give me feedback before it goes into the mail. If the board or my actions are the subject of the letter, it comes from the board president, not me!

How, you may ask, does “technology” fit into this blog? History is the key! We log all calls and emails into the call log and the work orders are also generated by our management program. Then, when I meet with a vendor, I can take reports of outstanding work orders and a history of emails or calls in a simple report format so I don’t have to struggle to remember details…they are at my fingertips. I’ll take an extra copy of the report for the vendor so we can make notes and those notes are summarized in a follow up email recorded in the database. Without this kind of organization and history, it is a “he said/she said” world.

I would love to hear your thoughts and feedback. Your questions can also help me direct my blog. We often work in isolation so this is a way we can also share things that work for each of us. Please email me at Gayle@campro.us if you have anything to share.

Gayle J. Hasley,
Community Association Manager
Community Association Homeowner
info@campro.us
www.campro.us

Because I was the original developer of what is now CAM*Pro Association Management software, I have been a bit reluctant to just write an article about it, however, the fact that I have a bias toward it has been obvious throughout my articles. Simply put, I couldn’t manage without it.

The topic today is the role of technology in property management. Obviously, CAM*Pro is not the first nor the only software out there that supports association management. There are many more…and more to come, I am sure.

When I was practicing Organization Development in the 80’s, one of my clients was then my association’s management firm. I was amazed to find out they didn’t even have computers, much less a network, templates or standards for tracking work. Our first order of business was to get the business computerized, a complex and expensive process even then. Yet it was a critical investment in the business, just as databases are today. Keeping up with technology is a critical component in the business development model. How much does the investment improve the actual business processes? How does it contribute to that all important “bottom line”? Even though the association’s themselves might be non-profits, the management companies are profit driven. Unfortunately, in my experience, this profit driven perspective has been at the cost of the clients all too often.

When my association management business grew to 9 properties and over 1000 units, I found I had to have some effective way of managing all that data. I operated with 1 assistant for the property management business, with accounting outsourced to a company that specializes in providing services solely to homeowner associations. Over the 18+ years I have been managing, I have come to believe that this model is not all that different than what happens in most association management firms today. The only difference is that the “outsourced” accounting activities are contained within the framework of the same company, yet the functions of accounting and actual property management are so different that most managers don’t reap many benefits from the incredibly complex and expensive accounting software packages that are on the market today.

If you look, nearly every software that purports to be “association property management software” is accounting based. As the bigger companies grew, they added on work orders, then rule violation tracking – these are now “add-on” components to the basic software. Of course, there are some comprehensive software packages out there that offer both fully integrated accounting and management functionality. The key however is that you pay big bucks for them and many of the smaller management companies find themselves priced out of the market.

As a manager who didn’t need accounting functionality, I was left (like many smaller property management companies) to figure out how to meet my needs. Ten years later and more dollars than I care to mention, CAM*Pro is the result. An affordable, access-based software that addresses every action I need it to as a property manager without having to worry about who/what/or when the accounting software changes.

In talking with other companies, I have found that managers use every type of method you can imagine to get the same result. While a majority still rely on paper files (some color coded/unit file based), others have developed their own excel spreadsheets, others use Outlook for to do’s and spreadsheets for work order or rule violation tracking, most use Word and try to figure out a way to organize in that program. Some bigger companies have developed their own proprietary software. Bottom line, we will do anything to try and get a handle on this monster job that is based on managing the details well.

Yet, whether you are a portfolio manager, a large, self-managed CAM, or one of the new breed of “boutique” managers offering more customized, personalized management to a smaller number of clients, the best and most cost effective model is a database. In our litigious minded society, with new laws regarding the scope and access to record keeping, managers MUST have the ability to manage large quantities of data easily and effectively. More importantly, they must be able to ACCESS that data, via workable, definitive reporting systems. Nothing else can do that other than an effectively written database program.

There are so many reasons and benefits to embrace this technology it begs for another article so that will be the topic for my next blog. What software do you use for CAM? What software do you use for the accounting functions. Are they one and the same? If you are happy with your accounting software but looking for something that addresses ALL of the CAM functionality you need, please check out CAM*Pro and compare it to other software on the market. There are more and more options every day to help us improve the services we provide our clients.

I would love to hear your thoughts and feedback. Your questions can also help me direct my blog. We often work in isolation so this is a way we can also share things that work for each of us. Please email me at Gayle@campro.us if you have anything to share.

Gayle J. Hasley,
Community Association Manager
Community Association Homeowner
info@campro.us
www.campro.us

I believe that much of the turnover we have in the association management industry is related to communications and expectations.

Boards have the expectation that management will do what they say they will do, some of which is “visible” and some of which isn’t so much. If the Board really understood just how much Manager’s do, would they be less likely to criticize? I think so. And the reason I think that is for some years I was on the Board and then the Board President for an association comprised of 13 buildings, 116 units, on 7 acres.

What drove me nuts, and finally motivated me to join the management industry, was the simple fact that our association managers didn’t do what they said they would do. If we said “write a letter” at the January meeting, we would come to the February meeting and it wouldn’t be done. If we asked for bids at one meeting, it could take 2 – 3 months to get them. Simple things identified on walk throughs or called into the management company could take weeks to fix or resolve. Most importantly, calls weren’t returned to homeowners and the Board took the flak.

As I came to find out, these problems were (and still are) common industry issues, particularly when an association contracts with a company that assigns properties to their managers in “portfolios”. A portfolio is a collection of properties (varying in size and make up) that could be anywhere from 5 – 14 associations. Some might have monthly meetings, others quarterly or even annually. Some have active committees, some none.

Each time a different portfolio manager was assigned to my association, it was like we were starting at zero. They had no history, no understanding of our community issues, or relationship with the Board. Suddenly, a new person would show up at our meetings and tell us that he/she was our new manager. It was beyond frustrating and I ended up spending more time “training” our new managers than I did managing my own small consulting business.

18 years later, I am still the property manager for this association. Our management policy is that every call gets logged and returned within 24 hours, every homeowner that writes gets a written thank you, and the board is kept apprised of our activities.

Every month the board gets a packet at least 72 hours before the meeting that includes a Manager’s Report, the previous Month’s Minutes, current Financials, copies of correspondence (including copies of ALL letters received from homeowners and the management response if it is not a standard rule violation letter) and Association Reports for activities from our last meeting date (from our CAM*Pro database) that includes the following:
o Owner Occupancy
o 90 Day Calendar which includes scheduled Board Business (such as an
annual meetings, budgets due, etc.), Contracts Expiring or up for renewal,
Scheduled Maintenance (from the reserve study), and outstanding Work
Orders.
o Rules Violation report (both opened and closed)
o Architectural Requests report
o Completed Maintenance report

The result is a board that appreciates the scope of work we do because they get to see it, read about it, and understand it. If there is a problem with a homeowner we can include a call log history on the issue. If there is a problem with rules enforcement, we can include a history on the matter or the homeowner. It helps the board to put things in context.

These tools, and the other reports available from the database help us, as the management and maintenance team, stay on top of things and make sure they get done between meetings. If they aren’t done, there is a reason other than “we just didn’t get to it”.

There are a lot of great managers out there doing super work for their associations. Unfortunately, many of them get overwhelmed and/or burned out simply because they don’t have the tools to do the job they are asked to do.

Software can (but doesn’t have to) be expensive. However as the number of associations needing our service grows, everyone knows that keeping a client (just like keeping a good employee) pays for itself over and over again. The cost of turnover is extremely high and it is our associations, the boards, and our members that pay for it. Information is power! The more we have, and the more we share, the better able our boards and our members are able to appreciate all the great work we do. Be your own best advocate. Make sure your Board knows how hard you work!

If you don’t have the systems in place to do so, spend some time researching the alternatives available. You don’t have to “reinvent the wheel” and the investment in technology and support can help you keep your clients and grow your business.

Gayle J. Hasley
Community Association Manager
Community Association Homeowner
www.campro.us
gayle@campro.us