While brainstorming on which NGO to choose, our first thought was to go for an organization that could have a direct impact in our lives as nearly graduated university students. Among the selected ones, we were curious about discovering more of what GYIAD was doing, as a Turkish association that works with young people in the field of business.
What is more, we were able to quickly arrange for an interview, which was not the case with the other organizations we tried to get in touch with. This further strengthened the validity of our choice, as we believe one of a NGO’s most important pillars is availability and ease of access.
History and objectives
GYIAD is an association established in 1986. Their main purpose is bringing solutions to the needs of Turkish young leaders and businessmen. They do so by organizing activities to build relationships and create collaborations among members as well as by developing projects with the aim of solving sectoral problems. GYIAD also gives support to innovative and creative entrepreneurial projects of young managers. It is a fast growing non-governmental organization willing to increase the social, political and financial influence of young executives between 25 and 45 years old.
Their vision is “to make our association the most powerful and recognized NGO of its field in Turkey”.
Their mission is “to bring Young Businessmen and Executives together and to prepare a platform which would contribute to Turkey’s economic, social and political life by creating new collaborations around shared objectives”.
As an organization, they set 4 main objectives as guidelines of their work, which are:
a)to improve commercial and industrial development in Turkey by consulting, when necessary, the institutions involved (the Union of Chambers for example);
b)to keep pace with the developments in the business world, enabling the spreading of business experiences, opinions and ideas;
c)to contribute to the growth of young businessmen by developing their leadership qualities and social responsibilities as well as promoting a spirit of solidarity;
d)to ensure their contribution to the cultural, social and economic development of the society as a whole.
What about the membership?
GYIAD is looking for young business owners or executive managers between 25 and 45. However, we believe that the association should not forget that today’s university students will be tomorrow’s successful businessmen; therefore, they should plant the seeds before they become prosperous.
As of today, the association is known nationally for hosting conferences and events in partnership with other NGOs. The members are successful in terms of professional career. The selection procedure is really long and made of several steps so potential members have to be very motivated and willing to be part of GYIAD as well as good in what they do.
Funding
When we first researched on GYIAD, we thought that it was so well-established that it was like a company, but their revenue model is quite uncertain and dependent. They have three source of funding: monthly membership fees, donations and sponsorships. Starting from the last, sponsorships don’t actually provide them with cash; they just pay for the expenses. The amount of money collected from monthly membership fees is very low; they depend on the donations that are up to the member’s conscious. So, we can clearly see that even though they make annual budgets and plans, they are fated to be ineffective and inaccurate.
Organizational structure
One of GYIAD’s greatest strengths is its effective organizational structure. They are small in number but they say they work efficiently even though they don’t measure their performance. What we found quite interesting is that they assign co-presidents, which is a new term for us. These co-presidents work together. Over the years, they have seen a lot of delays on operations since their members in committees also have separate professional lives. So they have come up with this new position. Now, if one president is busy or away, GYIAD still runs successfully. Also, since they have a very strict application process, the volunteers of these committees are quite successful which gives a competitive advantage to the association.
Below are the organizational charts of GYIAD:
Components of GYIAD
Committees Executed by Members
Professional Team
@manu_scogna10
While brainstorming on which NGO to choose, our first thought was to go for an organization that could have a direct impact in our lives as nearly graduated university students. Among the selected ones, we were curious about discovering more of what GYIAD was doing, as a Turkish association that works with young people in the field of business.
