Open vs Closed clubs

I touched on the Open vs. Closed groups topic in "Finding the right members for your IPC,” and I want to expand on my thoughts in this post. In that post, I describe the basic differences between the two modes, and my argument why IPCs should remain closed. This post also supposes that at some time during the life of your IPC, there might be a call to loosen up membership requirements and open it up to the public. Here, I strengthen my argument to the contrary and provide some logic to present members to advocate for an open group.

The truth about open groups

In "Finding the right members for your IPC,” I describe the difference between closed and open groups like this: “Open groups allow anyone to join, and closed groups makes an allowance for an organizer or moderator to ask the potential members questions before allowing them in.” Collecting as many members as possible is alluring for many groups. I admit with my gaming group, at one time there seemed to be a certain cache and clout for sporting large numbers of members. But with big numbers come big headaches; problem members, lurkers, scope creep and bloat.

Problem members

Problem members are the biggest problem that face an open group. This is part of the reason why most groups become closed groups in the first place. In my experience, problem members express themselves in some notable ways: 1) they tend to be awkward socially and express this awkwardness in either aggressive or inappropriate ways, 2) they attempt to force their vision of the group on everyone else, or 3) they’re outwardly antagonistic with club leadership or certain members who did not provoke such treatment. Although you need to treat problem members carefully, you also need to show them the door as quickly as possible. If not, these members will quickly erode your confidence and the you member’s enthusiasm. In future posts, I’ll address how to deal with problem members.

In a closed group, these members are filtered out for the most part. Sure, you’ll get the person who puts up a good front to get in the group, but these people are rare and can be dealt with through the by-laws.

Lurkers

I mentioned lurkers in “Attendance - what should you expect from your IPC members?,” but I’ll expound on this more here. Lurkers are not inherently bad, and in online groups kind of acceptable. Lurkers want information, but they’re not the types to share or participate. As I said in my post, lurkers tend to be takers, but not givers. They do not help the group to grow and evolve, instead they watch, and even then, very occasionally. In an IPC, lurkers are deadwood. If you’ve run an online group, lurkers are the largest sector of membership. In my gaming group, lurkers comprised upward of 60-75% of the membership. For an IPC, this would spell disaster.

Lurkers are still an issue in closed groups, but not the extent of an open group. But they do make more of an impact in a closed group where members are filtered on their willingness to participate in the club’s activities. This where you need to add in by-laws that establish minimum attendance to mitigate members who want to lurk.

Scope Creep

As I mentioned in the problem members section, one of the issues mentioned was forcing an alternate vision of the group on members. This is the extreme version. The other version is a softer, gentler turn when folks come in that aren’t quite sold on the club’s mission, but who aren’t problem members. They want to expand into things not within the club’s scope, but that some club members have an interest in. My gaming group didn’t have an issue with this, but I’ve heard the problem from other club organizers.

For example, there might be a case where some of the Atlantic Philatelist Club members are interested in knitting. They want to schedule events that include that activity because they know some members who share the same interest. Allowing this will cause scope creep, because other members will want to want to add their own outside interests. This has a couple of simple solutions; a gentle but firm No, and offer alternative out-of-club solutions.

Bloat

Membership bloat is related to lurking. Some people walk away from the club without quitting, which causes deadwood. No controls on member intake will allow bloat to happen. Again, this an issue in open groups that cause the group to appear larger and more active than it is. This can be considered deceptive by potential members who are expecting a vibrant club.  This is something that a closed group can remedy from the beginning by careful editing of inactive or non-compliant membership.

Conclusion

While an open club allows the public to come and join, and closed group also helps to assure a level of quality that is usually lacking in an open group. I recommend not falling into the trap of opening your group for anyone to join. You owe it to members to put a check on member quality.

Attendance - what should you expect from your IPC members?

When people join a club, it’s reasonable to assume that they want to participate in activities that the club presents, become better informed about the club’s topic, and to meet people with the same interests. But, in the online world, it’s easy to join a group and walk away from it or watch it from a distance, becoming a ‘lurker.’ In the context of group membership though, lurkers are takers, not givers. They’re not interested in contributing to the group and helping it evolve. They very occasionally watch it from the virtual sidelines. If you’re new to an online group, lurking is usually acceptable at first, because it’s assumed that you’re catching up with the group’s conversations. However, it also comes with the promise that as a good member, they’ll start posting intelligent and insightful questions or comments in ongoing threads to encourage more conversation and idea-sharing.

But in a face-to-face club such as an IPC, the lurker’s role is more than just passively observing from the sidelines. They’re a factor that can be fatal to its success. Lurkers contribute to membership bloat. Bloat represents inflated membership numbers.  Bloat deceives new participants into thinking that the group more active than it really is. It fools the group managers into thinking if they do something novel, they can get those members to participate. The truth is:  they’re deadwood, and they’re not going to show up, no matter what you do.

What do you reasonably expect from members to participate in the club? How do you encourage participation?

Reasonable expectations

Assuming you are defining the minimum membership guidelines for your IPC (refer to “Finding the right members for your IPC”), start with reflecting on the purpose of your IPC (refer to “Why create an informal private club”). Invariably, part of the reason for your IPC is to encourage people with the same interest to associate. It’s reasonable to expect members to get out and associate. If a member isn’t participating, they’re not contributing to the club.

Granted, you don’t know folk’s schedules, so thinking that members are going to go to every club function is unreasonable. As an IPC leader, you offer opportunities. Every member should have the opportunity to join an activity. So, what is a reasonable attendance rate? I personally have considered using a 25% marker. If I’m offering 32 events during the year, I think it’s reasonable to ask members to attend at least eight of those events. This way, if some programming is not interesting, members can fall back on other suitable activities within the club, and not be in danger of running afoul of the club’s guidelines.

Set up the expectation that members don’t have to attend all events, but that they can pick and choose what they want to attend. Use empathy and be alert. There might be good reason that a member cannot hit the minimum number of events (new parenthood for instance). On the other hand, the problem may not be the members, but with what you’re offering. Both of these scenarios need you to use judgment on how to proceed.

Encouraging participation

You should consider a variety of events that are suitable for your IPC. When you’re first starting out, pick out at least three different event types. I suggest starting out with a casual meet (refer to “Adding aCasual Meet to your IPC”), and branching out from there, guiding on the needs of your IPC. If you’re finding that people are not enthused about what you’re offering, be open to member suggestions, and be very willing to act on them if they are reasonable. Also, surveys are great to see where your member’s interests are now. Be cautious that you use surveys sparingly, maybe no more than once every other month, and no more than ten questions. Also, if you act on someone’s idea, it gives them a sense of ownership in the club.

Being an enthusiastic leader and event host also helps. People thrive off excitement and a positive atmosphere, so set yourself up for success. Talk to people, make introductions, and be part of the event. Don’t nervously buzz around like a busy body, or overly structure your event. Allow for some organic flow and progression around your event. This helps to make your events memorable, and sets up the desire for repeat attendance.

Conclusion

Be reasonable with your members. You’ll need to create some structure and set expectations, but keep the bar low enough to where participation is fun and not an overbearing hassle. Use good judgement if members run into participation obstacles, or if your events are not as appealing as they should be.

Adding online activities to your IPC

The question of taking your IPC online with a chat, messaging, or web meeting application might come up at some point. While online activities might save time and effort, they’re not always the best solution for every activity. Bear in mind, most established clubs are based on social interaction. You go to personally meet people who you want to associate with. The club pre-screens people to make it easier for you to associate. Our fictional Atlantic Philatelist Club will make sure that all members have a certain amount of knowledge about stamps and postal history, while my HP Lovecraft literary and gaming club will insure that members are knowledgeable about Lovecraft’s works. This leads to the question, when is it appropriate for activities to be hosted online, like a chat, messaging, or web meeting application?

I’ve always looked at online activities as a filler of sorts, especially when your IPC is growing and developing more programming. Workshops and educational presentations come to mind, maybe as a follow-up to a live presentation. You can be very creative with what you put online, but I would caution that this shouldn’t eclipse your in-person activities. In-person activities are your IPC’s main purpose, which is to allow people to connect personally. This is very apparent with professional and social IPCs, where personal contact is the primary purpose. Other types of IPCs would benefit on various levels by keeping the membership engaged between in-person events. Also, committee meetings can be made easier by scheduling them online, or at least using them to fill-in in case members cannot meet in-person.

Whatever you decide, consider carefully how you’re going to integrate online activities in your IPC, or why you’re not considering them at all. Above all, using online connections should be looked on as a tool that benefits your IPC, but not as a crutch. Whether you deploy that tool is strictly up to you. My next post will cover what application to use, if you go this route.

Book review: The Project 50 (Reinventing Work)

I’ve almost made it a hobby to read career improvement and self-help books, and I’ve found some of Tom Peter’s ‘50’ books to be some of  the most useful. Although they look like they’re written and laid out by someone who was dropping massive quantities of speed, the ‘50’ series of books are packed with some good information. Although written 1999, most of the information presented in the books is still good. For creating and managing IPCs, The Project 50 (Reinventing Work) is the most pertinent of the series.

The Project 50 is a book of 50 action items to take when developing, selling, implementing and finally exiting your project. Or as Peter’s puts it, your ‘WOW!’ projects. Although I get the impression this book is directed at IT professionals, most of the information can be ported to conceptualizing and creating an IPC. Your ‘WOW’ project is the IPC that you’re creating.  The information that he writes about, particularly with creating, selling and exiting the project relates to IPCs for the most part. The implementation section probably isn’t as useful for IPC purposes, but is worth a read through anyway.

Conclusion
If you can get over the layout and high-energy writing, Project 50 is an inexpensive ideas book for getting your IPC moving forward. I recommend reading it through for IPC and career ideas. As of this post, Amazon has it in stock for around $5-6 US dollars.

My IPC Journal - The HP Lovecraft IPC Concept and Approaches

In “My IPC Journal - Statement of Intent for a new IPC” post last week, I decided to go all in and create an IPC. This one has been on my mind for the past couple years, but I’ve never acted on it until now. In that post, I outline some issues to think through as a first step. Also, on the heels of that post, I wrote “Writing a statement of intent for your IPC.” This post was about writing a formal statement of intent. To start off my IPC journey, I’ll use the list in “Writing a statement of intent for your IPC” and begin fleshing out my IPC. I’ll also discuss the rationale used to come that solution.

Overall reason for starting the IPC

Here I want to make sure what I’m thinking about has relevance, and it’s not some lark. My first step is to articulate the description and reason for my IPC.  Since this is a local HP Lovercraft, or more aptly ‘Lovercraftian,’ fan club, my proposed description and reason goes like this:

The proposed HP Lovecraft literary and gaming club will engage in social activities that promote and explore Lovecraftian themes in literature, movies, radio, and gaming. The club will provide a comfortable place for aficionados to discuss and exchange ideas, as well as engage in a wide array of activities. The club will also help promote a higher understanding or Lovecraft’s work, as well as the derivative works based on his writings.

At this point, if you’re starting any IPC, you may want to do some ‘market research.’ This research could range from the very informal, i.e. drop the idea to some friends and check interest, to very formal, i.e. identify interested people and conduct a survey and interviews.  My research has been very informal.

Also, by no means are you trapped by this description you’ve written. Although I’m dubbing in ‘HP Lovecraft literary and gaming club,’ as a starting name, this descriptive title will eventually change to fit the final goals of the club, and probably be a lot more creative.

IPC goals

When I wrote my proposed description and reason, I also included the club’s goals. You can do this, or keep the two separated. Either way is acceptable. If you’re looking at forming a more in-depth club, like a professional or charity -related club, you may want to keep your club’s reason/description and goals distinct. When you create goals, I recommend using bullet points. So, if I created separate goals for my Lovecraft IPC, they could look like this:

• Creates opportunities for social activities that promote and explore Lovecraftian themes in literature, movies, radio, and gaming
• Provides a comfortable place for aficionados to discuss and exchange ideas
• Engages in a wide array of activities

Again, you’re not trapped by this list and you can add to them at any time.

Anticipated Activities

This can be another bulleted list. Never shy away from these type of lists, and use them wherever appropriate. Think of the main activities you’ll be hosting (or recommend hosting). Think of this as a starter list. As your IPC grows, you want to make sure there’s room for other member’s ideas. For the HPL literary and gaming club here’s my starting list of activities:

• Discussion group about a Lovecraftian theme.
• Movie or Radio night
• Monthly casual meets for new members
• Arkham Horror board gaming night (or day)
• Call of Cthulhu (or other RPG) tabletop roleplaying night
• Short story reading and social night

Activity and organizational road map

This one will put your planning skills to the test, but I recommend making it as simple as possible at first. Using the activities mentioned in Anticipated Activities, organize a month for your group. I don’t recommend doing a full year of the present calendar year just yet. You’re only establishing the activities at a high level. This is how I define my starting activities for a typical month and special events:

Every month

• Week 1: Casual Meet
• Week 2: Discussion group/Story Reading/Movie night
• Week 4: Game night

Quarterly

• Week 3: Social night

I’m not putting in too much detail right now, and this will change as members join and events are shifted for maximum effect. Also, not too much to allow for member input and growth. Additionally, this is what I can personally handle right now.

The organizational aspect should also be simple, since you don’t know who or how many are joining. You’ll want to anticipate an organizational meeting six to nine months from the start of your IPC. For the first year you can schedule a general meeting open to all members. Here, you’ll outline your vision of any steering boards or any other member organizations.

• Six months from official start - Week 3 – Organizational meeting

Ideal members

This one is tricky. You want to attract people who are deeply interested in what you’re offering, but at the same time you’re not going overboard in describing the perfect member. Nobody is going to be perfect. Instead, you want to define the minimum attributes that would make a member to your IPC. With the HPL literary and gaming club I want to attract members with these minimum attributes:

• Has read at least three of Lovecraft’s defining works, including:

1. The Call of Cthulhu
2. The Dunwich Horror
3. At the Mountains of Madness
4. The Colour Out of Space
5. The Dreams in the Witch House

• Has read works related to HP Lovecraft’s writings.
• Can commit to attending four club events or activities during the year.

My goal here is to make sure members know the literary works and are willing to commit attending club functions, but not so detailed as to eliminate perfectly fine potential members. The member description can be refined as needed.

Conclusion

I’m assuming everyone will have a different approach to their own clubs, and everything described in this post can be adjusted as needed. You’ll probably want to revisit this information when the club is just accepting members to see if certain aspects aren’t clear to you or potential members.

Writing a statement of intent for your IPC

This post comes on the heels of yesterday's post "My IPC Journal - Statement of Intent for a new IPC." This had me thinking about writing actual statements of intent. Why would I want to write one? And if I figured that out, what would go into it?

Why write a statement of intent
One of the best ways to quiz your way through some problems is to write it down. An IPC statement of intent is just that - your attempt to logically look at your idea. If you can articulate it, you can act on it. Also, if what you've written makes sense, you can move on to other steps, like defining your membership and IPC strategy. I suggest writing it down, and leaving it for a couple days. Then pick it up and re-read it. If still makes sense, go on to the next steps. But, if there are gaps in your logic, deconstruct it and rewrite it. Then wait a couple of days, and revisit. If you cannot articulate the idea, then you need to think about viable it is in the first place.

What goes into a statement of intent
A statement of intent is your initial vision and starting ideas for your IPC. It's a working plan or vision that you're starting out with. This will be part of the foundation that you'll use to develop your IPC's strategy. (Refer to "Creating a strategy for your IPC") Here's a list of topic's you'll probably want to cover:

• Overall reason for starting the IPC
• IPC goals
• Anticipated activities
• Activity and organizational road map for the first year
• Description of your ideal member (Refer to "Finding the right members for your IPC")

All this will be subject to change, but the goal is to get this information down where you (and eventually others) can see and edit it.

My IPC Journal - Statement of Intent for a new IPC

I've decided to do it. Since I've been writing about IPCs for nearly three months, it's high time for me to put words into action. I intend on designing and journaling a new IPC concept that I've had knocking in my brain for a while. My wife and I already have a social IPC that is growing (refer to "Our first Salon" for additional details), but we want to keep most of the details to ourselves since privacy is part of what we offer to the membership. The IPC I have in mind will be more open, and hopefully instructive to you. I'll discuss my approach, as well as any successes or failures I encounter.

As I mentioned in "The Beginning," my experience with group formation includes creating and organizing a local role play gaming group that now has around 1400 members. Also, I'm a huge fan of the writings of HP Lovecraft and related writers. My core concept is to create a local IPC of 'Lovecraftian' gamers and literary fans. There's a lot of possibility with this group, plus a sizable fan base to choose from.

Starting from the beginning, I need to figure out the following issues before my move to the next step of creating my new IPC:

• The basic reasons for creating my IPC in the first place (Refer to "Why create an informal private club?")
• Type of members I want to attract ("Finding the right members for your IPC")
• How I'm going to recruit those members ("Basic ideas for recruiting members to your IPC")
• The IPC's focus ("What should be the focus of my informal private club (or IPC)?")

Next week, I'll explain my rationale relating to each of these initial steps, and report on my progress. Also, I'll provide any amendments and additions to previous posts.

Basics of IPC Leadership

© Can Stock Photo / DGLimages

Creating an IPC is one thing, leading it is something entirely different. Taking up the mantle of leader isn't a job for just anyone, but it isn't a talent, either. It's a combination of skills and action that makes a leader. You need to cultivate these skills in order to bring your IPC to a place where it can leave and breathe on its own. What skills do you need in order to be an effective IPC manager?

Interpersonal Skills and Vision
Relating and communicating with your members are the skills to have if you manage an IPC. You've got to be a clear communicator and a great listener. But, the greatest skill to have is to be able to ask questions, of yourself and of your membership. A club is about doing things together, and great clubs are responsive to the needs of its members. Many times you'll need to suss out the information you need. Questions are a good way of getting people to speak about their experiences with the club and what their ideas are in regards to activities and planning. Good leadership isn't about forcing people to see your vision; good leadership is about incorporating other's ideas coherently and meaningfully into your vision. These are the course corrections you'll make while moving toward your own vision.

Flexibility
As I mentioned above, good leadership is about incorporating other's ideas coherently into your vision. You need to be flexible in the way you see your vision coming together. To me, long range plans rarely work out exactly the way you planned them. Instead, you need know where you're going, but be flexible about how you get there. Things may not pan out in your overall plan, so you need to plan for changes. If you absolutely hold on to a plan of your devising, chances are very high you will eventually fail. On the other hand, you have to be open to change or risk feeling that your IPC is tainted because it didn't follow your plans exactly.

Organizing
While the club is growing, you need to guide members into areas that will enable growth. Finding volunteers to host events, or club members to serve on committees is a large part of what you'll be doing. Good leadership skills makes this task easier. You'll be serving as head to a lot of meetings until the club has a functioning governance structure. You'll be doing most of the pulling, but it'll be worth it as you see the club grow. So you need to have in mind what the club should look like as a independently governing structure. Refer to "Organizing your IPC Membership" for more information about club organization,

Letting go
Eventually, you'll need to step down so others can shine. The ship you call your IPC is sailing in the direction you set. Good leadership also involves knowing when to let go. This is not to say you can't serve on committees or host events, but it is saying that you're not a control freak dictator, either. This can be a difficult things to do, but as a leader, it's also your job to cultivate other leaders so you can let go. People have the desire to refine and make better, and allowing new leadership in the mix will help the club grow in ways you didn't ever
expect.

Book review: The Club Woman's Handybook of Programs and Club Management

The Club Woman's Handybook of Programs and Club Management by Kate Louise Roberts is an broad compendium of useful information, but not exactly as the title suggests.

The Handybook was written in 1914 as a guide for women who wanted to create and manage local women's clubs. These clubs seemed to be very salon-like in how they operated, and the programs they offered. The book itself gives little practical how-to advice on how to run a club,  rather it's more a suggestion book and glossary of terms. The books is roughly divvied up into two parts, programs and parliamentary procedure. The programming portion throws out ideas for the club to discuss. These topics range from domestic affairs to history to current affairs to feminism.  The goal of the club was to elevate women's awareness. If the programming section is any indication, they were positively ambitious. I speculate an ulterior motive for the clubs and the book were created to prepare women for the suffrage movements that had been gaining traction at the time.

In our more modern times, and in the context of the IPC, the Handybook has become another kind of resource. While most of the club information the book is dated or very basic, the programs portion of the book gives you loads of  ideas for salons, and points to even different types of IPCs that you can choose to develop. The subject matter is still relevant in many instances, although I will give a word of warning that it tens to touch lightly on certain now controversial topics like eugenics. Otherwise, the Club Woman's Handybook is a worthy resource for IPC managers.

Setting up the programming for your IPC

Once you have your IPC up and running with a handful of events planned and completed, you’ll want to put more meaning or organization behind what the IPC is offering its members. If you’re wanting to be creative, coming up with the club’s event offerings is one of the most creative opportunities you can enjoy. This is also an opportunity to steer the IPC in a meaningful direction. As with any club activity or action, creating the club’s programming should be performed by the club’s steering committee. If the club is large enough to support it, a separate Activity or Programs committee could also be created to handle creating and managing club programming.

If you’re the only one creating the programming, you’ll need to have a calendar on hand. At this point I’ll tell you not to over-commit yourself. If you don’t have assistance, you need to figure out how much you can do and still have a quality product. If you want to expand your offerings, you’ll need to ask for help. As a note, never ‘volun-tell’ people what to do. This is a sure way of turning off your members, and killing your credibility. Instead, tell people about what you’d like to plan and talk it up. Always be open to feedback. Also, empathize that they have a stake in this and you’d like their ideas. With any luck, you may find your IPC’s future steering committee!

Your programming should fit in with your club’s strategy (refer to the “Creating a strategy for your IPC’ post). The events need to be designed to accomplish the club’s overall strategic goals. Creative use of events can be designed to help with this. Also, realize that some events we’ve covered so far in this blog may not be appropriate for your IPC. While a supper club would be great for social or professional IPCs, it’s probably not appropriate for a hobby or certain accountability IPCs. If you’re at a loss, casual meets are always good starting events. Even then, you’ll need to begin formulating events that propel your IPC in the desired direction.

As an example, let’s say you’ve just formed the Midtown Coders Bloc IPC. Your club’s strategy is to network local professional programmers, and to keep folks up-to-date with trends in the industry. You can establish a monthly casual meet to allow your members to just mingle and talk, and speaks to your networking strategy. Also, a member knows someone that is a jobs recruiter, and they’re willing to give a bi-monthly talk about local programming opportunities in exchange for a chance to meet and speak with IPC members. Another member loves hands-on programming, and is more than willing to host a quarterly discussion (we’ll talk about this add-on later) on certain programming topics. Both the recruiter and programming lover speak to the trends portion of your IPC strategy. This serves as your basic IPC programming. From there, the sky is the limit, if you have enough energy and volunteers to go around.

Organizing your IPC Membership

If you’ve recruited several members into your IPC, you might want to start asking for volunteers, or organizing boards, committees and the such to help run the club. I can tell you, without a doubt, this is a hard task. In my experience, most folks want to participate in club functions, and then leave it at that. A small committed handful will volunteer to do more. It’s your task as the IPC organizer to think of ways that members can volunteer in a meaningful way.  It’s up to you to find the committed handful, and expand them into couple hands full.

Before you ask for help, know what you’re asking for first. It’s easy to get caught up in the operations of the club to see what can be done. But if you don’t have an idea of what you want help with, or want folks to do, you’ll confuse and scare away potential volunteers. If you’re running a monthly Salon or Casual Meet that has a good turn-out and very little moderation, those might be events you can turn over to a volunteer. You may even consider designing a volunteer board for sign-ups. This can be managed many ways. One way I’ve seen is to suggest an event and estimate the volunteers needed. Then tentatively post the date for the event with the stipulation that it needs the list volunteer spots to be filled before it becomes a scheduled event.

In running any group, a committee of the right people can go far to help the club grow. Volunteers can do things, but committees provide extra brain power. Please don’t confuse these committees with PTA, civic club, or other organization committees that are droll and boring, because they must operate under tight rules and regulations.  On the other hand, IPC committee is a brain trust that has an overriding interest in keeping the club’s programming fresh and vital. While the committee must conform to club by-laws, these shouldn’t be so constricting as to limit creativity.

 Since your IPC members have been interviewed or recommended, you already have a base of the ‘right’ people. When you have enough people, let’s say ten or more, consider forming a steering committee. This committee can serve as the brains of the IPC. You’ll need to serve as leader for a few meetings, but at some point, you may want to have the committee elect a new head on a yearly basis. This way, the IPC can function independently of one person. Eventually, the committee should be elected by the club’s membership with by-laws in place to guide the election process. I recommend keeping the committee small, no more than seven members for a larger IPC, and no more than 5 for a small (less than ten) to medium (11-50) -sized IPCs.

Don’t be one of those organizers that goes about organizing alone. You’ll burn out very quickly. Also, realize you’ll need to let got and allow the membership to make the IPC a living organization that doesn’t depend on you to keep it moving forward..

Designing Member Guidelines

Last week, I posted “When Should You Consider By-Laws?”, which covered when to begin writing actual rules that your members (and you too!) follow in matters of the IPC. In this post, I’ll introduce the ‘lite’ version of by-laws, 'Guidelines.'

In short, guidelines are suggested standards that you want members to follow in dealing with the club and other members. Unlike by-laws, guidelines are not hard and fast rules, but a guide to follow at the request of the club. Also, unlike by-laws, they’re not enforceable. They can stand alone, or work in tandem with by-laws, becoming in enforceable in the context of the IPC. In those two instances, one is to assist your members when there are no by-laws, and the other are areas where solid by-laws are not needed, but some guidance is needed and can be referred to via the by-laws.

In “When Should You Consider By-Laws?”, I suggest waiting until your IPC is large enough to need by-laws that are written and enforced. This is not to say that you shouldn’t create some basic guidelines to define the expectations of the club and its members. If you have a social club, some common-sense behavior and etiquette guidelines can be established. By the way, for more information on behavior and etiquette, refer to the “A Matter of Manners” post. Guidelines can go above and beyond behavior and etiquette. In “Finding the right members for your IPC,” I introduced the fictional Atlantic Philatelist Club. This club is all about postage stamps, so guidelines would involve meeting attendance, or expectations of presentations or meetings that members host. I haven’t of stamp collectors getting too far out of hand, so behavior and etiquette guidelines would be less than that of a socially-oriented club. These guidelines will help inform the base of any by-laws your club decides on.

Once you have by-laws on paper, you may have some areas that don’t need to be covered by-laws, you may be waiting to see by-laws might be necessary in the future, or there is an area where the situation might be too dynamic to have by-laws. Let’s say that the Atlantic Philatelist Club has established in the by-laws each member must host one meeting a year to remain in good standing with the club. While this is a solid by-law, it might point to guidelines on the minimum standards for a meeting, which don’t need to be covered in the by-laws. With those guidelines, you might also stipulate that the meeting organizer must be in attendance. It’s not a problem now, but if the situation arises consistently, then that stipulation might be promoted to a by-law in the future. In another instance, you may have guidelines that discourage bringing stamp collections to certain meetings, but you also see that this guideline may need to be bypassed for special occasions. 

While I suggested waiting on establishing by-laws, guidelines can be established close to the start of an IPC. However, I also recommend getting member suggestions and feedback, if not shared ownership of the club’s guidelines.

Finding the right members for your IPC

© Can Stock Photo / ajt

In “Basic ideas for recruiting members to your IPC,” I mentioned some ideas about finding and recruiting members, but didn’t explore the core of the matter, defining the qualities you’re looking for in potential members.

Open vs Closed Groups

If you're familiar with Meetup.com or some Facebook groups, you'll notice that you can either join immediately, or there is a small screening process before you can join. This is the elementary difference between open and closed groups. Open groups allow anyone to join, and closed groups makes an allowance for an organizer or moderator to ask the potential members questions before allowing them in.  Even with such a basic gateway for membership, you need some basic criteria to make a judgement. In one of the Facebook groups I moderate, we look to see if folks are 'real,' or they’re someone using Facebook to spam messages into our group. We look for things like locality, some posting history, or any other hook that tells us that this person is real. These are simple criteria put in place to mitigate an issue.

An IPC is a closed type of group. It goes much further in screening potential members than what I described above. An argument can be made that the clear majority of Meetup and Facebook groups are open, even if they screen potential members. This is to say the default screening processes are very limited and not thorough. To screen thoroughly, you need a well-developed concept of what you expect out of your membership.

Who is the ideal member for your IPC?

The first task you have in considering your membership is a checklist of broad traits folks need to have to get anything out of your IPC. The most important trait that should be on the top of the list is interest in IPC’s focus! From this point, take care to be reasonable about your expectations. You want to design your checklist in such a way as to identify folks who will be interested in the subject, be active with the group, and will get along with other members.  At the same time, you’re not looking for clones. What are the absolute requirements for joining the IPC? What are desirable traits?

Write a small paragraph about who you’re looking for as far as a member. An example for a Philatelist (stamp collector/historian) IPC might look like this:

“A member of the Atlantic Philatelist Club would be a stamp collector or somebody who has performed some work relating to philately, be it books, magazine or blog articles, or fine photography. Members must be able to attend at least half of the club’s meetings or functions, and be willing to share their knowledge of stamps with other club members.”

Pull out your membership criteria from the description. The starting checklist for a stamp collector’s 

IPC might look like this:

• Has at least one curated collection of stamps, properly stored. (Requirement)
• Can commit to attending six monthly meetings a year. (Requirement)
• Must be 21 years of age or older (Requirement)
• Can host at least one monthly meeting. (Desirable)
• Has a membership to a national philatelist society. (Desirable)
• Is willing to design and teach at least one workshop a year. (Desirable)

You can go deeper, but I would suggest not going more than ten criteria. Even then, if they conform to the required criteria, how many of the desired criteria do they need to hit to be considered for membership?  You should consider the goals of the IPC.

Don't expect perfection

Once you develop your checklist, you need to understand that very few people are going to meet every criterion you’ve established. However, you need to decide how many of the criteria is acceptable for membership, or what combination is acceptable. Of course, the requirements are the definite entry points, but you need to decide how many desirable criteria they need to adhere to be acceptable for membership. Do not expect anyone to be the ‘perfect fit.’ Look at this a goal to aspire to, rather than an absolute.

Live up to your own ideals

In creating membership criterion, you are required to live up to the standards that you’ve established. If you do not live up to the membership criteria you’ve established, both you and the IPC will lose credibility. Although you’re putting in the work – and good work it is – at the core of it, you’re another member. So be realistic with other folks.

When should you consider by-laws?

When you conceptualize your IPC, you’ll also want to think about establishing rules for membership. This means thinking through the kinds of members the IPC will attract, expected behavior, and how the IPC is to be managed. Doing this will give you the basis for creating by-laws. To be clear on what I mean, Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a by-law this way: “a rule adopted by an organization chiefly for the government of its members and the regulation of its affairs.” We’ll use this definition for this article, and any subsequent articles going forward. This post will discuss when you should begin capturing and codifying your by-laws.

© Can Stock Photo / valzan

I’ll start by saying this, let your IPC grow before formulating solid by-laws. You can think about what you’d like to suggest, but creating by-laws should be a group effort. Allow the group to grow, and then see what by-laws are needed. Considerable time can be wasted trying to anticipate how members are going to act, or how well the IPC's activities will conform to its focus. 

Never be a tyrant. Although you’re the one laying the foundations of the IPC, there will be a time where you’ll step down (I’ll also discuss this later), so the by-laws need to a product of the membership, equally binding to everyone. When you have grown enough to establish a steering board or board of directors, is when you need to start creating by-laws. This way, the membership is fairly represented when the by-laws are created, and amended in the future. Even if you and your membership do not form a steering committee or board of directors, you may want to eventually form a temporary committee to write the by-laws, and convene the committee every so often to amend them.

The only exception you may want to consider is when money becomes part of the business of running the group. Even when taking up donations, you may want to establish rules for how the money is to be spent and accounting. I always recommend complete transparency where money is concerned, and your by-laws should reflect this. Also, even if you feel you must establish by-laws for spending and accounting, you can revisit these rules and amend them to expand on other areas of club affairs when your IPC grows enough to support them.

A consideration at this point are Federal, State/Province and local laws regarding clubs, especially when your IPC begins to collect money. There might be laws regarding reporting intake, so it would be a sensible idea to know what those laws are. Even if you’re a small operation now, getting to know the law will benefit you when the IPC grows.

Approach your IPC by-laws thoughtfully, and encourage your membership in helping you formulate them. But first, give your IPC time to grow and develop its needs before you make any rule a firm written commitment.

The Charity and Accountability - more IPC focus areas

© Can Stock Photo / pressmaster

In my post "What should be the focus of my informal private club (or IPC)?," I define four basic focuses of an informal private club; Social, Professional, Field and Hobby. As a result my continuing research, I'll add a couple more focus areas, Charity and Accountability. Unlike the basic four, I would term the follow two a little bit more advanced because of what you need to consider in order to manage them.

Charity
This is an outstanding focus for an IPC, and done correctly, would be very popular. A charity IPC would take aspects of most of the basic IPC types, possibly adding field work or fund raising as activities within the IPC, along with discussions and socials that keep everyone interested and focused on the goals of the IPC's charity work. Charity could also be used as a 'plug-in' activity, like I've written about Salons, but to be truly effective, probably the best expression for charity work in an IPC is a free-standing group. It's probably advisable to associate with a larger association to establish or expand credibility.

If a charity focused IPC is going to do fund raising, it's going to take in money. This means accounting and bookkeeping. If you decide to take in money, everything needs to be absolutely correct, transparent, and in line with county, state/province and Federal laws. Do your homework ahead of time; research as much as possible and ask questions. This advice would be good for any IPC taking in money, either as membership dues or as simple donations. People rightly want to know where their cash is going. Also, it's always a good idea to be absolutely clear about where the money is going and keeping the books open for inspection by the membership. I'll discuss membership dues and money handling in later posts.

Accountability
I encountered the Accountability social organization in the Fast Company Magazine under the article "What You Need To Know To Create An Accountability Group That Works." Basically, an accountability group helps people stay focused on tasks they want to accomplish by reporting their progress to other folks. This is how businesses like Weight Watchers work. With WW, you join follow the plan and do a scheduled weigh-in, report your progress and receive encouragement to keep going. This would be a unique focus for an IPC, which can focus on anything that is task oriented. The Fast Company article threw out health, novel writing, professional uses as examples, but accountability can take many, many forms. Unlike other IPCs, you need to be very aware of the events and activities to present. You'd not want to have dinner parties if the goal of your IPC is help members stay fit and trim, unless the dinner party was about health food, or how to eat better.

An Accountability IPC would have some unique considerations, tact being foremost. Telling someone that they need to do better can be a difficult thing, if you want to empathetic also. You'll need to mentor people about how to be firm, but not rude or overbearing. Consider how the accountability will be handled in the design of your IPC.

Both of these IPCs speak to a higher purpose, and even though they would require some additional work, they could be most worthwhile IPCs you could create.

Creating a strategy for your IPC

© Can Stock Photo / ivelinradkov

It's not enough to simply create an IPC, but what do you want from it? This applies for any type of IPC defined in the 'What should be the focus of my informal private club (or IPC)?' post. For instance, if you've created a professional club, then what is the core mission? Is it to simply be a mixer for like-minded professionals, or is there something deeper to consider? A club should strive to elevate its membership in some way. Networking can be one way, but there's plenty of networking organizations out there. What more can your club do, or advocate? Is there a aspect of ethics you want to accentuate? This could lead to different types of events past socials, such as guest lectures or round tables.

Although I used a professional club as an example, most other club types can also dig deeper, be more focused and exclusive. Hobbyists can focus on a niche such as HO-scale trains rather than model trains in general, Rose gardening rather than flower gardening, and the same for any hobby. Social clubs can focus on food and drink, or an activity such as dancing (which can also port over to a hobby); clubs devoted to a field can narrow themselves down to a specific topic field. Studying the Civil War? You can go as specific as the war in the Appalachians. Studying the civil rights movement? Try looking at the issues per state. There's many ways to split the subject.

If you have a focus, then what is your club's overall strategy? How are you going to elevate your own members' awareness and knowledge, and by what means? What is the club going to offer past gatherings of folks? If you had a schedule, what would you plan to make the club a worthwhile investment of time for the membership and yourself? I suggest start thinking broadly, but narrowing your focus to find a comfortable niche. Also think in terms of 'offering', rather than terms of 'teaching.' What folks want to learn is up to them, and forcing a topic on them will cause some rebellion. Variety within the focus is good. You may look at asking for volunteers, and share the work. Also, I suggest living by the 'Stone soup' story, and have everyone contribute something.

By the end of the year, what opportunities will you have given your membership?

Book Review: Saturday Salon: Bringing Conversation and Community Back Into Our Lives

If you want a comprehensive how-to on conducting a Salon, Saturday Salon is a great resource. Although written in 2010, it's still fresh for the most pat, and conveys everything you need to know about starting up a Salon. The author, Valerie Davisson, draws from her own experiences to give you everything you need to know about planning and executing a top-notch Salon experience. She also includes a chapter about pot-luck recipes, and a list of topics or as she labels the chapter, "The Topic Well" if you need further guidance on hosting your Salon. Saturday Salon's subject matter is well rounded and the book is an easy read.

Within the framework of an IPC, the information in this book is mostly relevant with some minor tweaking. Ms. Davisson seems to define her Salons as very informal affairs, almost with an air of a coffeehouse conversation group. Even so, Saturday Salon is an indispensable reference for planning your next Salon.

More resources:
You can find Saturday Salon: Bringing Conversation and Community Back Into Our Lives on Amazon.
Valerie Davisson also has a website, The Saturday Salon.

Managing your informal private club

© Can Stock Photo / webking

With the good times comes the work behind the scenes. Once you've established your IPC, then you need to manage things on the other side. Create a member list, learn to plan ahead, and do the administrative tasks that ensure a smooth-running IPC. If this sounds daunting or busy, it really isn't. If you take steps to automate your tasks, then you can cut your busy time to a negligible level.

Member list
You'll want to maintain a list of your members, with emails and addresses. Even if you invite people through social media, I strongly suggest keeping a list of members with emails and street addresses. This way, you can send physical invites or thank yous using snail mail. Also, if you have a failure with your social media, you have a backup file to use. Additionally, you can track member attendance to events, if that is a concern for your club.

Planning ahead
Planning ahead is a habit you'll want to refine as your IPC grows and you diversify your club's offerings. You should plan your major events in the year, and smaller ones every three to six months. Avoid springing events on your members with less than three weeks notice. Some folks need time to add events to the calendar, and if you consistently create quick-turn around events, you'll risk turning off the members who cannot plan on short notice.

Consider using a free online calendar application like Google calendar. If you do this, I recommend keeping it completely separate from your private calendars.

Administrative tasks
These tasks include maintaining the club's calendar, communication with members, and setting up for events. Other tasks can include member surveys and maintaining the club's social media. Never make the job bigger than it really needs to be. If you can automate tasks, like with an electronic mailing list and templates, do so, but leave the creative aspects of the IPC for yourself.

I'll write about this in-depth at a later date, but what I've listed above are the very basics in administering your IPC.