Last week I was invited to Barcelona to a great WA event: Practitioner Web Analytics 2008. This event gathered most of the Spanish Web Analytics professionals around a 3 days event. It was a great success based on the feed-back published already in some blogs (Javier & Gemma). For me it was a very special occasion as I’m Spaniard and this was the first opportunity I had to address live a Spanish audience in Spanish ;-)

But my attendance had also a hidden agenda. I attended this event also as WAA’s Co-chair of the International Committee and my will was to try to unite the efforts of the Association in Spain. As you might know in Spain there is a national WA association (AEAW) that is not related to the WAA. I strongly believe as I have commented following the EUWAA discussion (Eric, Jim) that the WAA should be united in diversity (act local, think global). We can have regional or local chapters or sister organizations but as our Industry is not mature enough, thus we need to join efforts and don’t split ourselves.

Following this approach, I had some discussions prior to my trip to Barcelona in order to asses what could be done. In San Francisco I had some good chats with Sergio Maldonado one of the founding members of the AEAW and he was willing to explore ways to join efforts between our two associations. He also made clear that from his point of view ‘Spain was different’ and needed thus a local approach to succeed (mainly related to language usage as many Spaniards unfortunately are not fluent enough in English).

In San Francisco I also spoke with Neil Mason, Director of the International Committee regarding the AEAW and as I’m Spaniard he asked me to see what could be done (thanks for the hot potato Neil ;-))

I already spoke about the subsidiarity principle in a comment on Eric’s blog; today I wanted to speak about a Spanish political concept: the Autonomous Communities (Comunidades Autónomas). When Spain reinstated the democracy back in the 70’s, the new Constitution adopted a new concept to allow the Spanish diversity of regions: the Autonomous Community. These regional entities have received a set of competencies and can at will negotiate the transfer of new competencies. This allow the different regions to be autonomous but doesn’t imply that all regions need to be at the same level of autonomy. I believe that this could be interesting in the objective of exploring new structures for the WAA International presence and activities.

In Barcelona I had a very productive meeting with Sergio Maldonado where together we tried to find a compromise that would allow the AEAW and the WAA to unite efforts. I won’t explain the whole conversation but let me share the agreement that was found; Before let me just disclaim that this idea still needs to be presented, fine tunned and approved by the boards of both organizations.

  • The AEAW would become a associated member of the WAA and would thus be highly linked.
  • The Members of the AEWA would become members de facto of the WAA (regarding membership fees, we would find a transition period before aligning it as the Spanish association’s membership is 50€ against the 200$ of the WAA). Members of the WAA based in Spain would also be members of the AEAW.
  • Branding and marketing should be aligned in order to create the perception of a ‘single brand’
  • Some activities will be undertaken and decided locally (eg. local events and partnerships with local organizations) while others will remain at the global level of the WAA (eg. Standards)
  • The Spanish Association would need the approval of the WAA regarding certain decisions. This would allow to warranty that the activities are aligned. We have thus to find a flexible way of applying this rule to avoid immobilizing the association. My idea would be to allow the International Committee to coordinate this (subsidiarity) and not bring it to the WAA board level.
  • The WAA would help the Association to increase the awareness of WA in the Spanish market. FYI there are some discussions within the AEAW to include Portugal and rename the Association ‘Ibérica’ instead of ‘Española’.
  • Regarding memberships, in order to allow the local association to receive some direct founding a new membership will be created called something like ‘Amigos de la WAA Spain’. These sponsoring members would provide local financing and would be in exchange advertised on the events and activities undertaken locally. This will allow the organization to coordinate activities as the Conversion Thursdays that Pere and Jordi have been organizing these past months with great success (up to 70 attendees).
  • Having a local organization allows to have a special treatment and avoid for example paying VAT when organizing events and buying ’things’.

As you can see not everything has been already sorted out but I believe that this is a great beginning. As in Spain there’s already a structure, I believe that it could be interesting to explore further and see how certain autonomy works out and if successful present it as a case to the other countries were the WAA is most active.

So what do you think? Don’t hesitate to share your thoughts or add your ideas to this.

Cheers,

René

P.S. CU soon again in Barcelona

Original Comments

Comment 1

Author: Stephen Budd Date: June 9, 2008 Text: Hi René

I’ve posted this in a modified form over on Eric’s blog and thought I might hijack your recent post as well…!

I think one of the messages that came following the recent London emetrics summit was that we need more research to be done on the European issues and that we need volunteers (beyond the usual few!) in Europe to help with this.

Well…some of your European WAA member readers might be interested in learning that there will be an inception conference call for the WAA Research Committee European sub-committee taking place on Wednesday 11th June 2008 at 1400 hrs (Iceland)/1500 hrs (UK, Ireland, and Portugal)/1600 hrs (Western Europe).

Despite the group’s dull title, its purpose is to establish a WAA research structure with a European focus. While I am sure some of the current issues could well be the immediate focus, we also looking to make this something that will serve us in the future on a range of issues. I’ll stress that the purpose of the committee is not to argue strategy but provide data to enable evidence based decisions to inform that strategy.

The emphasis of the committee is on contributing and so I’m really interested in hearing from people that want to become actively involved in finding out the answers and give us the firm base of evidence to help take our industry forward in Europe.

For more details or the conference call number for your country, contact Stephen Budd at [email protected]

Comment 2

Author: Gemma Date: June 9, 2008 Text: Hi René:

So nice to meet you at Barcelona. I was thrilled about being there with you all.

Let’s establish a WAA structure in Spain, I’m sure with your support and our passion it will work!!!

I think, as Stephen says, if we do something in Spain (starting in Conversion Thursday in Barna, Madrid…) to spread the word, we’ll get enough volunteers to do something important here.

Kind regards and thanks for everything

Comment 3

Author: Javier Godoy Date: June 9, 2008 Text: Thank you so much for your mention. As you told me: this is going to be what we want it to be

see you!

Comment 4

Author: René Dechamps Otamendi Date: June 10, 2008 Text: @Stephen, Great initiative, please let us know how it went. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to attend the conf call as I’ll be travelling at that time.

@Gemma, It was nice meeting you and for the moment I think that I can say (based on what I’ve seen) that you are the most advanced practitioner in Spain, continue the great work you’re doing at Bankinter and see you soon in a Conversion Thursday in Madrid.

@Javier, It was my pleasure, and please consider volunteering in one of the Committees ;-)