Sage News and Discussion

We would like to know if there is value for members if (notice ""if"") 90 Minds could broker a relationship that allows members with less than five consultants to attend ITA conferences by paying the attendance fee only (90 Minds would absorb any ITA membership fee). Can you please respond to the following survey so we can better assess this situation? (non-responses will be assumed as no or little value):

Clarification on 5 employees - this is likely to be interpreted as 5 FTE (full time employee) across your entire company including home offices. So if you are with a CPA firm that has 100 CPAS but only 3 consultants - expect that the computation is that you have 103 employees. Similarly if you are a branch office of a larger VAR and you only have 3 in your branch but the home office has 100 - expect that the computation is that you have 103 FTE.

Thanks for clarifying that point. Also if people want to let others know how they voted, please comment.

I voted yes, I have less than 5 employees and would love to take advantage of this opportunity. Thanks to @WayneSchulz and @ShawnSlavin for working on this!

(Re Therese's response) But not you, @PeterWolf... (LOL LOL LOL)

Well all I did was put the poll out there ... @WayneSchulz and @ShawnSlavin have done all the work around starting the conversation and moving the negotiations forward so I second @ThereseLogeais 's thanks!

What is the significance of the number 5? At one point the number was 10. Is this being defined by ITA? Also when I state I have more than 5, that is the Consulting Group only. I would hope they would not want to count the total firm of over 130, because the CPA's have nothing to do with technology.

Sorry, I didn't read all the comments, and Wayne clarified this.

So, if I understand this, the only way in which I could attend is to be a full member of ITA with its standard fees. Or, perhaps I need to pursue more vigorously the LLC spinoff I've been looking at.

OK, I'll be serious now - can anyone who has been, tell me what sort of stuff is covered at an ITA conference?

Here's a prior thread with good comments. https://90minds-com.socialcast.com/messages/17910086

Here's the agenda from the upcoming meeting. The ITA is definitely NOT product specific. You will not get ANY product related training. It's more business/marketing and forward thinking type stuff. As well as a lot of networking opportunity. https://www.italliance.com/temp/ClientImages/ITA/01dfeeb7-eaa4-4224-9493-4cd7fa2dd7b3.pdf @JohnHoyt The ITA came back to us and suggested they were more comfortable with 5 FTE. I know this is because they don't want to create a backdoor way for people who might be regular member candidates to avoid paying dues. I'm fairly certain they will total all the head count. They do have a large number of CPA firm members who I think collaborate around IT leadership type items.

Thanks, @ThereseLogeais !

My thanks also to @WayneSchulz and @ShawnSlavin for evaluating this opportunity. While the less than FTE does seem limiting, the fact that they are even having the conversation with us is very positive. The big question that we are trying to answer is whether there is enough benefit for the group to proceed ahead. You vote is very important to us.

I'm abstaining from voting in the poll for the same reason I abstained in the ITA Board vote to admit 90 Minds. As a member of both, I have a clear conflict of interest. However, please know that I am the Board sponsor of the nomination. The reason for the size limitation is to prevent devaluing existing members. When CS3 became a member of the ITA, we paid the full fee and continue to pay the annual assessment. We are a firm of 10 employees and 12 FTE's. I and other members of the ITA Board look upon the 90 Minds relationship as giving smaller firms a way to participate with out the entry fee. I think of it as a junior member at a Country Club. (Please note, those are my words and not that of any other Board member so don't hang me out to dry on the analogy.) If you are part of a 103 person firm even though your consulting group is 3 people, your organization can absorb the membership MUCH more easily than I can mine. As such, we should stand equal at the table. If you a 1 to 5 person group, it's a disproportionately bigger burden and quite frankly, you probably wouldn't be a candidate to join ITA because of the financial barrier. My hope in facilitating this arrangement up is to help as many as I can while not diluting the ITA value proposition to other firms. My hope is that ITA participation helps you grow to a size where your firm out grows the 90 Minds arrangement and you join ITA directly.

Is there a schedule of where/when future meetings will be after the one in December? Is $900 the fee we would pay per conference?

Yes you pay about $900 (or whatever the fee is) per conference. The only thing as a 90 Minds member you would not have to worry about the initial first year dues of $4,000 per firm or the recurring annual dues presently $750 per member firm.

This year's is $950 as of today but you would have to qualify for the under 5 FTE requirement, including affiliates, I believe.

DSD is already a member of ITA - so anyone who is with DSD would not have to go this route - simply register through DSD.

We are interested, but not for this year.

Bumping this. Please vote, everyone.

Bringing this to the top again. For those of you with less than five employees but don't know enough about ITA, @ShawnSlavin expanded on it in this post: https://90minds-com.socialcast.com/messages/17910086 Or you can visit their website: https://www.italliance.com/eweb/startpage.aspx 90 Minds is looking to assist with the necessary membership requirement but we need to know how many of you might be interested. TIA!