Case study: Medico-Legal Society of Queensland (MLSQ)

Iceberg Events worked with the Medico-Legal Society of Queensland (MLSQ) supporting them with the transition from manual management of their membership (Excel spreadsheets) to using an Association Management System (AMS). The implementation was self-managed relying on the ample online training resources offered by Membes and the simple nature of the system.

What were the original reasons you were looking for an Association Management System (AMS)?

MLSQ didn’t have a central place for all our data – lists existed on Eventbrite and across multiple Excel sheets, so the administrative burden of managing data was high.

MLSQ have anniversary driven memberships so ease of processing renewals for their members was important.

Also, ease of collecting, managing, updating and transparency of data was a key priority for the organisation when looking for a new system.

How has the Membes system been able to address some of the challenges you faced?

Membes AMS has been a game-changer for MLSQ simplifying and automating so many processes that would take up so much of the team’s time. Now, any staff member can jump into the system and pull information relating to a member or track event registrations and more. As their Secretariat, Jodie from Iceberg Events is empowered by having access to the latest and most correct information, instantly.

The renewals process is now seamless with automation removing all the manual burden from staff. It really is a set and forget process. Jodie says, “This is a beautiful thing!”

The website is now modern and easy to use and can be updated as needed. It is clear for Members to be able to access the organisation’s information and login to self-manage their details.

How did you find implementing and learning new technology like this?

There are extensive training materials and video tutorials online to support using the system, and these have been excellent. It took only a couple of months to get the system up and running fully, and now we have everything documented with all our data in one place.

What are some of the change, growth or operational objectives that Members has now helped you achieve?

The system has pushed us to centralise everything and update our processes so that they are now much simpler. By streamlining the system, the MLSQ has much more transparency and insight into the operations and has relieved a huge amount of administration work that was previously needed.

 The integration between Membes and other systems such as Xero and Stripe is really great – it makes invoicing so much easier and doesn’t require much manual work at all. Our P and L is also much easier to read and manage since using Membes.

Reporting has been made so much more manageable with little work required to pull comprehensive information to present to the board. The reporting will certainly be utilised for the future to help forecast and inform new strategies.

With the event management feature, the MLSQ is hoping to increase registrations to their events with easy promotion on the website.

“The platform has created new opportunities to the organisation that they didn’t have before; saving time and money that can be used elsewhere. It’s a very cost-effective system and really does have 99% of what Associations need as a technology solution. If you are managing your Association processes manually, then you have to use the Membes system moving forward!” Jodie Parker, Managing Director, Iceberg Events

Membes features utilised by the Medico-Legal Society of Queensland (MLSQ):

• Membership Management
• Communications
• Finance
• Reporting
• Event Management
• Integrated CMS (website)
• Directory