SteadyState for alumni associations
Governance software for alumni associations
An alumni association board hands itself to new officers every two or three years. SteadyState keeps the motions, votes, and follow-up actions on a locked record the next board inherits, inside the Microsoft 365 your association already runs.
A typical association in SteadyState
A Board of Directors of about two dozen volunteers on staggered three-year terms, led by a President, President-Elect, Secretary, and Treasurer, with the Executive Committee meeting monthly and standing committees – Governance and Nominating, Finance and Audit, Awards and Recognition, Chapters and Programs – meeting in between. Over a year that board approves the budget, adopts bylaws amendments, approves the slate for the annual meeting election, approves award selections, and charters new chapters. SteadyState records each of those as a vote on a locked record with the follow-ups attached.
A year of decisions
6 decisions, oldest first| ID | Decision | State | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| DEC-2026-002 | Approve the FY operating budget | Approved | 14 Jan |
| DEC-2026-005 | Approve the slate of directors for election at the annual meeting | Approved | 11 Feb |
| DEC-2026-009 | Amend the bylaws to add a vice president for engagement | Approved | 11 Mar |
| DEC-2026-012 | Select the distinguished alumni award recipient | Approved | 8 Apr |
| DEC-2026-016 | Charter a new regional alumni chapter | Approved | 13 May |
| DEC-2026-019 | Approve a $50,000 scholarship fund allocation | Submitted | 10 Jun |
The problems this solves
Institutional memory leaves with the officers
Directors serve two- or three-year terms, minutes scatter across personal drives and old email accounts, and each incoming board starts by reconstructing what the last one decided. SteadyState keeps the register in the association's own Microsoft 365 environment, where the next board inherits it.
Action items die between quarterly meetings
What the board agreed in April needs an owner in October. Every follow-up action carries an owner and a due date, and overdue items surface on the home dashboard.
Some votes deserve a permanent record
Bylaws amendments, budget approvals, and chapter charters should not be editable after the fact. Approved decisions lock, and changes happen as amendments that are voted and recorded like the original.
How it fits
- Built for volunteer boards
- Directors vote in the app, from a board meeting or between them. A vote only counts for members who are eligible to cast it, and the result is recorded the moment the vote closes.
- Your engagement platform stays
- The directory, events, and giving keep running where they run today. SteadyState is the board's decision record.
- Committees included
- Nominating, finance, and events committees each work in their own workspace, and their recommendations move to the board as drafted decisions.
What it costs
A board of two dozen directors plus the staff who support it is about 30 seats – $600 a month at the public rate of $20 per user per month, with a 10-seat minimum. Each seated user also needs Power Apps licensing from Microsoft, about $5 per user per month. Seats are for the people who draft, vote, and own actions – the wider alumni body doesn't use SteadyState and needs no license. The full math is on the pricing page.
Questions boards ask
- How do we keep board records when officers change?
- The register lives in the association's Microsoft 365 environment, not in an officer's personal account. A transition changes who signs in, and the record stays where it is.
- Does SteadyState replace our alumni engagement platform?
- No. Engagement platforms run directories, events, and giving. SteadyState records what the board decides.
- Do all our alumni need licenses?
- No. Only seated participants – directors, officers, and staff who prepare items – need seats or licenses. The wider alumni body never touches the app.
- What happens to board records when a volunteer board member's term ends?
- The seat frees up for their successor, the votes they cast stay attributed to them by name on the locked records, and their access ends with their account.
- How long should our alumni association keep board meeting minutes?
- Most associations keep them permanently. SteadyState records live in your own environment, so your retention policy applies to them like any other record you hold.
- Our IT runs through the university – can we still use SteadyState?
- Yes, with that IT team's sign-off. SteadyState installs into whichever Microsoft 365 tenant the association uses – its own, or the university's. An association without Microsoft 365 is not a fit today.
- Is SteadyState a Boardable or BoardEffect alternative?
- For the decision record, yes. Board portals distribute documents and archive minutes; SteadyState records the vote itself and locks the approved decision. Some boards run both. The Boardable comparison has the detail.
See it before you decide
The demo walks a decision from draft to locked record, including what happens when someone tries to change it after approval. It takes a few minutes and runs in your browser.