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Ecsite held e-voting using Polys platform

The NPO from Belgium held its first online voting at the annual general meeting.
Ecsite, the European network of more than 350 organizations, including science centers, museums, research bodies, festivals, universities, planetariums, as well as foundations and learned societies.

Lucie Steigleder
Administrative and Communications Assistant
at Ecsite
"It was a big step and a great challenge for our association to go from paper ballots to digital voting for our AGM. With the use of Polys, we were able to make a smooth transition and will now never go back to paper voting."
PROBLEM

The time-consuming process of voting preparing

Voting is an essential part of NPOs and allows every members' opinion to be heard. However, NPOs often find organizing a vote problematic as it is difficult to prepare the required documents or find personnel to manage the process. Whilst e-voting addresses these issues, it cannot assure security and transparency of the process, which are critical when dealing with sensitive topics such as budgeting or selecting a governing body.
SOLUTION

Online Voting at the Annual General Meeting

At the event, they had to decide on six topics: approval of activity report for 2018, a financial report for 2018, budget for 2019, membership fees for 2020, the election of the President and election of the board of trustees. To streamline the process, the organization held voting on online platform Polys. Ecsite members had to log in with a QR code printed on their badges and vote on Polys.me using either their personal device or public computers available at the polling station.
RESULT

Six votes were held, the results announced instantly

In total, 230 members cast their votes. The results were announced immediately after the voting was completed. It saved Ecsite a lot of time during the event and avoided a potentially stressful situation. Previously, the organization had traditionally run elections by undertaking votes through paper ballots, which required at least five team members to count. Other questions were addressed by a show of hands.