Our Chapter holds monthly membership meetings 10 months out of the year - September through June. June has historically been our awards banquet. I'm all about giving awards & recognizing important contributions to the chapter, but these sorts of banquets tend to be real snoozers. To that end, the June meeting typically is the poorest attended of them all. Lately, we've had a normal program in June, but attendance still lags. Last year, fully 1/2 of the awards I had to give were to people NOT in attendance!
All that to say, the chapter by-laws require the board to meet monthly, regardless of the schedule of the membership meetings. This means, the board MUST meet in July and August on its own. Typically, the summer meetings have been used to plan the coming year. If memory serves, when Bill Grabowski & Liz Stone were president, the board met more than twice across the summer. This is what I'm thinking of doing. Technically, I guess I'm not president until July 1, but I think we can sneak a planning meeting in ahead of then.
The burning question - what is the agenda for these meetings? Based on previous posts, I need to meet with most committee chairs ahead of then & I probably need to meet with my 2 VP's ahead of that. But then what?
I suspect the first board meeting will be to show my master plan. What is my master plan other than let's get more members, get more members to attend the meetings and then get more members active in committees and management of the chapter. A piece of the plan is how to better utilize the VP's to assist in chapter business. Another piece is the National Convention next summer & preparing for that. But what else?
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
Thursday, March 09, 2006
The Hand You're Dealt 2
Spoke to the current Chapter President yesterday about the nominations process. Typically, we do not have more than 1 person run for a vacant office or board position. When I ran for reelection to the board after my first term, we almost had 4 people for 3 spots, but 1 guy dropped out. If memory serves, that guy is now our Chapter president.
I have volunteered to run for President, the 1st VP has volunteered to remain 1st VP and the Secretary & Treasurer have done the same. According to the Prez, we have 3 board members whose terms are up. 1 of them has volunteered to serve as 2nd VP. 1 of the others is serving out the last months of my term as I stepped up to 2nd VP & is indifferent about remaining on the board or not. He's House Chair & is remaining in that capacity. The 3rd is our Membership Chair & is very active. The Prez feels like we need some new blood on the Board. I agree, but hate to see the Membership Chair rotate off the Board. The Prez believes he has 3 new board members lined up & some other folks he's ready to ask to take a more active role in Chapter management & leadership. The wild card is we have 1 remaining board director who rarely attends meetings or really does anything with the chapter. This person is very well liked by all, including me, but has some things working against him/her. (I don't want to give too much info here) This person has small children at home, lives probably 45 miles away from Baltimore, and has a very demanding travel schedule with work. The Prez has not decided if we should ask this person to resign or not. I can't decide either. The Prez wants to ensure we have a fighting chance at a quorum each month & with this person, we know we will almost always be 1 person short.
All that to say, I think I've found my solution to what does the 2nd VP do to help the Chapter. To recap, the 1st VP will be charged with membership recruitment, retention, etc. The guy whose stepping up to 2nd VP is currently the Programs Chair. He may or may not want to continue with that, I need to ask him at the meeting tonight. However, I think the key to growing not only members but meeting attendees lies in the programs & general tenor of the monthly meetings. I think the 2nd VP should work closely with the Programs & House committees to make sure all runs smoothly with the meetings, new members are recognized, visitors are introduced & the meetings are fun, informative & well attended. With a 1-2 tandem of hard hitting membership recruitment & retention working closely with making our meetings better, it should be a winning combination. Throw in the wild card of hosting the National Convention in 2007, & it should be a good year!
I have volunteered to run for President, the 1st VP has volunteered to remain 1st VP and the Secretary & Treasurer have done the same. According to the Prez, we have 3 board members whose terms are up. 1 of them has volunteered to serve as 2nd VP. 1 of the others is serving out the last months of my term as I stepped up to 2nd VP & is indifferent about remaining on the board or not. He's House Chair & is remaining in that capacity. The 3rd is our Membership Chair & is very active. The Prez feels like we need some new blood on the Board. I agree, but hate to see the Membership Chair rotate off the Board. The Prez believes he has 3 new board members lined up & some other folks he's ready to ask to take a more active role in Chapter management & leadership. The wild card is we have 1 remaining board director who rarely attends meetings or really does anything with the chapter. This person is very well liked by all, including me, but has some things working against him/her. (I don't want to give too much info here) This person has small children at home, lives probably 45 miles away from Baltimore, and has a very demanding travel schedule with work. The Prez has not decided if we should ask this person to resign or not. I can't decide either. The Prez wants to ensure we have a fighting chance at a quorum each month & with this person, we know we will almost always be 1 person short.
All that to say, I think I've found my solution to what does the 2nd VP do to help the Chapter. To recap, the 1st VP will be charged with membership recruitment, retention, etc. The guy whose stepping up to 2nd VP is currently the Programs Chair. He may or may not want to continue with that, I need to ask him at the meeting tonight. However, I think the key to growing not only members but meeting attendees lies in the programs & general tenor of the monthly meetings. I think the 2nd VP should work closely with the Programs & House committees to make sure all runs smoothly with the meetings, new members are recognized, visitors are introduced & the meetings are fun, informative & well attended. With a 1-2 tandem of hard hitting membership recruitment & retention working closely with making our meetings better, it should be a winning combination. Throw in the wild card of hosting the National Convention in 2007, & it should be a good year!
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Technical Committee
By all accounts, or at least my memory, I am the last Technical Committee Chair the Baltimore Chapter had. That was FY 2003. I declined to continue in FY 04 because of work, home, coaching pressures & felt the Chapter needed someone who could dedicate more time to the effort.
Had a conversation last night with one of the Board members who helps us do a number of thankless tasks. The conversation centered around what the Technical Committee should do. We both came up somewhat empty. How can I ask someone to be Technical Chair without having an idea of what they are supposed to do?
Back in the day, the Technical committee wrote technical papers on construction issues that the Institute would then publish. The Institute discontinued publishing some years ago. According to a cursory review of the Institute's Administrative References, the Institute Technical Committee is charged with handling MasterFormat, Section Format, Page Format, Uniformat, etc. What is a chapter committee to do?
Had a conversation last night with one of the Board members who helps us do a number of thankless tasks. The conversation centered around what the Technical Committee should do. We both came up somewhat empty. How can I ask someone to be Technical Chair without having an idea of what they are supposed to do?
Back in the day, the Technical committee wrote technical papers on construction issues that the Institute would then publish. The Institute discontinued publishing some years ago. According to a cursory review of the Institute's Administrative References, the Institute Technical Committee is charged with handling MasterFormat, Section Format, Page Format, Uniformat, etc. What is a chapter committee to do?
Thursday, March 02, 2006
How do we get the Old Guard back?
We've lost some of the Old Guard chapter members due to our change in meeting location. We met for years in the Brooklyn neighborhood south of Baltimore. I liked the venue because its my kind of dump - small neighborhood bar, great food (usually fried seafood or red meat & potatoes) & cheap drinks. REALLY cheap drinks - $2.25 beers & $2.50 mixed drinks. It is not a terribly professional venue, however, and much of the Board decided it was time to move. That was sometime prior to my activity at the Board level in 2001. It took us a couple years, but finally made the move full time in August 2004. We now meet at the Admiral Fell Inn in the Fells Point neighborhood next to downtown.
Its been a mixed blessing - we have some new members & some members who will attend in Fells Point, but not Brooklyn. However, there are a number (less than 10) members who still go to Brooklyn on the 2nd Thursday of the month. Most are not a tremendous loss, but some are. Their feelings are hurt because of the move. Some feel the Board cheated them somehow. Some feel we didn't give them a chance to voice their opinions. Whatever, . . .
The question is - how to we get these people back in the fold? Or, do we need them back in the fold? I almost wrote "want them back" but I think we do want them back, but do we need them?
Its been a mixed blessing - we have some new members & some members who will attend in Fells Point, but not Brooklyn. However, there are a number (less than 10) members who still go to Brooklyn on the 2nd Thursday of the month. Most are not a tremendous loss, but some are. Their feelings are hurt because of the move. Some feel the Board cheated them somehow. Some feel we didn't give them a chance to voice their opinions. Whatever, . . .
The question is - how to we get these people back in the fold? Or, do we need them back in the fold? I almost wrote "want them back" but I think we do want them back, but do we need them?
What is a web site?
At a committee meeting last night, we began discussing the web site briefly. I've been troubled lately by the duplication of information on the Chapter site & the "dead" links or links that go to pages that say "More information coming soon." I think part of this is due to the detachment of the past web master from Chapter business. For example, in either 2000 & 2001 or somewhere there abouts, the Chapter had a fall series of 2 hour seminars called Avoiding Material & Design Failures (AMDF). These were GREAT seminars with continuing ed credits. We did it 2 falls in a row & have not done it sense. Yet, in 2006, there is a link to a page for AMDF on the web site. This sort of thing drives me crazy.
My wife periodically sends out e-mails to her alumni about alumni business. Lately, she's been experimenting with the electronic newsletter format. The same format used by AIA Maryland. I RARELY visit Baltimore AIA or AIA Maryland's web sites, but I always read the electronic newsletter from AIA Maryland.
Lately, we've been sending out the Constellation newsletter in pdf format. We also post it to the web site. I like this format & the newsletter editor is "electronicizing" it by adding hot links for people's e-mail. Should we do more?
When set out to re-design the web site, what should be on it?
`General meeting information - times, dates, locations
`Specific meeting information - speaker, topics, etc
`Constellation newsletter - current & back issues
`Coming events? LOS, Rebuilding Together, Baltimore, AIA stuff
`Listing of officers & committee chairs
`Links to Institute & Region web sites
That's kind of a basic set of information. Do we need to reprint the President's Message that comes in the Constellation? Do we need to reprint the board meeting minutes that appear in the Constellation? Am I missing anything vital?
My wife periodically sends out e-mails to her alumni about alumni business. Lately, she's been experimenting with the electronic newsletter format. The same format used by AIA Maryland. I RARELY visit Baltimore AIA or AIA Maryland's web sites, but I always read the electronic newsletter from AIA Maryland.
Lately, we've been sending out the Constellation newsletter in pdf format. We also post it to the web site. I like this format & the newsletter editor is "electronicizing" it by adding hot links for people's e-mail. Should we do more?
When set out to re-design the web site, what should be on it?
`General meeting information - times, dates, locations
`Specific meeting information - speaker, topics, etc
`Constellation newsletter - current & back issues
`Coming events? LOS, Rebuilding Together, Baltimore, AIA stuff
`Listing of officers & committee chairs
`Links to Institute & Region web sites
That's kind of a basic set of information. Do we need to reprint the President's Message that comes in the Constellation? Do we need to reprint the board meeting minutes that appear in the Constellation? Am I missing anything vital?
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