Annual Event and Election of officers

[Trollhole]

So elections are getting close. As most of you know that means it's annual meeting time and time for a new change of officers. So what does this all mean? Means I need you to start thinking about stepping up and helping run UC. I think David and I will both agree it's time to pass the torch on.


Up for elections.

President: Basically run the show. Working with all other officers making sure that all the bases are covered. A good president should be willing to listen to it's members needs.



Vice President: Assist the President in doing all the above. Fill in when the President is not available and to make club decisions pending approval from the president.



Secretary: Will be responsible for making sure the President and Vice President have not forgotten anything , sending out new member packets, tracking member dues dates, selling and maintaining merchandise.



Treasurer: As most of you know this is the money person. Mary Hardin has done a great job of keeping us in line and the money flowing. I'm pretty sure most of us will agree that this position is a given.



Land Management Officer: This person will work with state and local officials as well as other local clubs to help keep our trails open and preserved. This person will also work with the Events Officer to make sure we are where we should be and legally on the right trail.



Safety Officer: Someone who is willing to help make sure we stay safe while going on rides and has a good understanding of recovery.



Events Officer: Responsible for scheduling our events and making sure everyone is informed and included. This is not a position to be taken lightly. To me this person plays the most important role in our club. But done right it can be a very rewarding position.



BOD Delegate for TLCA: Willing to sit in on monthly conferences with all TLCA chapters and officers. Work with the TLCA to help promote our club as well as provide a vital link between UC members and TLCA. Help promote the benefits of being a TLCA member. Give UC feedback to issues going on within TLCA.



We are also adding two officers this year. Considering we have a new sub chapter LowCountry Cruisers.
These will be:


LowCountry President: Runs the LC show. Schedules the events and works with UC to help promote the club.



LowCountry Vice President: Backs up the Pres with all duties.



Confusing? Yes but I think this group has done a great job in getting another chapter together and deserve to have a title that fits the bill. LC officers will have the same power as any other officer except that they can be overridden by the Pres and VP. Also in the event that the LC Pres and the VP Pres don't agree the UC Pres will have the vote to break the tie.

David H and David D we are gonna need to make some changes to our by-laws by the Annual. Could you help?


All of these positions are very important and help make UC what it is today. We have some very hard working officers who currently done a great job in running the show. Now it's your turn to help.

Date is still up in the air. Clemson plays every weekend in Sept. I'm leaning more to wards Sept 20th since they are playing a crappy team. So if anyone has any issues with that date please chime in.

Location is a given. David H can you check with Aunt Sues and make sure Sept 20th is okay with them.

Also we might do a run up to our new honey hole and camp Sat night.



Life as I know it will end during the annual and I will be passing the torch on to someone else to run the ship. When I joined this club 4 years ago I would have never thought I would be in the roles that I have been these past two years. These roles have taught me a lot of things that will be useful in other roles of my life especially my job. I never considered myself a leader. I used to have issues speaking in public. All those things have gone away. I have learned patience and how to better interact with other people. I have learned what is important and what is not. I have learned so many things while being an officer in UC. All of which will help me later on in life. So in that I ask for you to think about if you want to be a leader and learn and grow to better yourself in life or be a follower.

All nominations need to be e-mailed to me marshall@828rugs.com

You can nominate yourself or anyone you think you would like to see take a position. After OMT I will get with all the nominees and ask if they would like to run. Then elections will be held starting the 1st of Sept.

[Gundy]

You forgot...AAH co-ordinator.

[Trollhole]

Originally Posted by Gundy

You forgot...AAH co-ordinator.

That is a lifetime job.

[Gundy]

I checked with Eric and Sept 20th is penciled in for the date.

[Trollhole]

Thank you David. I have been meaning to call you about that.

[Turkeypen]

Trollhole said: "Date is still up in the air. Clemson plays every weekend in Sept. I'm leaning more towards Sept 20th since they are playing a crappy team. "

Being a UNC Alum and former RA for the Heel's football team, I took personal offense with that comment, until I realized we don't play Clemson this year!!!!!

All of what Marshall has said is so very true about the club and the officer positions. He failed to mention, though, that it is one of the smoothest and most cohesive organizations I have ever had the pleasure to be involved in. This is completely due to Marshall and the efforts of the past officers. Because of all that, I have found the role of prez this year to be mainly that of a "yes" man. My main considerations have been whether what we do is appropriate, whether it is within budget, and whether there are people who are willing to "make it so." It has always been just that.

I have taken a way-back seat this year, mainly because of the issues with Tellico. That case ended up assigned to my judge, and we had to take the extraordinary step of "recusing" our office due to my involvement with the club. Thus, my low profile . . . . I am very sure the next prez will be more of the front-person for the club than me, and that is how it should be.

It's all good.

David D., lame duck

[Trollhole]

Date is Sept 20th starting at 10am.

Schedule it to hand out and gather and sign up for the horse shoe comp.

Around 11:30 we will make our way over to Aunt Sue's and eat lunch. Around 12:30-1pm we will start the meeting. We will spend about 30min talking business. After that we will have the drawings. Raffle tickets will be $1.










We need some more nominations. No one has yet stepped up to the plate for Events officer. Considering I'm chairing GSMTR next year this should be a cakewalk for someone. Come on send in your nominations. You can nominate yourself or someone else for a position.

[BMThiker]

Originally Posted by Trollhole

We need some more nominations. No one has yet stepped up to the plate for Events officer. Considering I'm chairing GSMTR next year this should be a cakewalk for someone. Come on send in your nominations. You can nominate yourself or someone else for a position.

What if Events was shared by two individuals that either rotated events or worked together. Or have one of the other officers split duty time with the Events Officer?

After OTMT, I can attest to the amount of work it takes to pull this off. I was always checking my PMs, forum posts and email.

[Carp]

I am not trying to volunteer for the position as I think my wife might kill me, but I was thinking the same thing, an events committee instead, so each person could concentrate on one event. Speaking of which, how many events need coordinating? 1 a month, or just the big ones (OTMT, MLK, PPR, etc.)

[Trollhole]

Originally Posted by Carp

I am not trying to volunteer for the position as I think my wife might kill me, but I was thinking the same thing, an events committee instead, so each person could concentrate on one event. Speaking of which, how many events need coordinating? 1 a month, or just the big ones (OTMT, MLK, PPR, etc.)

I think you could split up events and have someone volunteer to do each event. The Pres and VP would just need to plan ahead to make that happen.

Problem I have run into in the past is someone volunteering to do it and then not understanding the goals I has set for the event and then just dropping out and left me holding the bag. With one person doing it all the time that never happened because they understood what was required. Pres. and VP run the show and have to make the hard decisions. Whoever runs the event needs to understand that. Take next years GSMTR. I'll be chairing it. That being said if the Pres or V.P want something different then that is what I will do.

There has be a chain of command. Otherwise it just falls apart.

[BMThiker]

Understandable. So the Events officer can still recruit help for whatever event is upcoming.

[Trollhole]

Originally Posted by BMThiker

Understandable. So the Events officer can still recruit help for whatever event is upcoming.

That or the VP and Pres can if no one assumes the role. BUt I would think with 160 members there would be someone who could step up and at least manage the role even if it was farmed out to members.

What I don't think members understand and a lot of it is my fault. I've taken just about everything up several notches with the club. Events don't have to be that way. In fact I think some members will be relieved I'm not going to handle them. I know I am. I'm ready to finally sit back after 3 years of being an officer and enjoy being one of the guys. That being said I put a lot into this club, I hoping some members will be willing to step up so I can enjoy it like they have. Not that I didn't like what I did.

Plus now I get to focus on GSMTR 100%.

lol

[VTCruiser]

1) I think we need to revisit the officer structure. With a club this size, some positions like events officer are just no longer suitable for one person to handle, and others such as secretary are just too vague. Also, there are some tasks, such as sponsorship and merchandise, that just don't really fit into the traditional structure. So instead of:

• President
• Marshall
• Secretary
• Treasurer
• and Marshall

Maybe we should have more "global" positions such as:

• President
• VP
• Treasurer
• Membership Officer
• PR/Sponsorship Officer
• Merchandise Officer
• Logistics Officer
• ...and Marshall

This way every event would require input from all these roles and the responsibility will no longer fall on just one or two people.

For example:
For a given event, the Merchandise officer is in charge of event t-shirts and stickers, the PR officer in charge of event sponsorship and raffle donations, the membership officer in charge of registration, and the logistics officer in charge of scouting and booking locations and services. In addition we can appoint a rotating "chair" to each event but that role is purely to coordinate the efforts of those involved and make sure nothing is overlooked.

(note: saftey, BOD deligate, land use etc. can all stay)

2) We need to document a detailed job description for each position so people know EXACTLY what they are getting into. Maybe this already exists, but i know I've never seen it.

Just my $.02..or whatever it's worth.

[Gundy]

One of the things that makes UC work is a limited BOD size.
3 people are about the limit to making executive decisions
work. The odd number prevents ties too.
Officers have always solicited the widest range of member input possible
but in the end.....BOD makes the calls.
I like Ghen's suggestion about more people handling the tasks but would suggest the BOD
stay at Prez,VP and Treasurer.
On the other hand I vote we keep Marshall doing as much as possible.
LOL...I remember the frightened little puppy we "drafted" into leadership.
He's a Big Dog now. Kudos to the brilliant minds who recruited Marshall.
Best damn officer UC has EVER had.

[BMThiker]

I have to agree with Troll & Gundy that we can't let the BOD become a huge committee. If the role of Events Officer needs to be one person, who can recruit help from other officers and members, then that makes the most sense. OTMT was a group effort that I had to stay on top of. It worked well, but with more advance planning (we did all of that in 2 months) it will go a heck of a lot smoother next time. We were putting things into place at the last minute that made things easy, such as the web registration page that Gehn did. We had two other members design and order the t-shirts (Carp & 89s rule). Troll took in the registration emails from PayPal and forwarded them to me. If we had set up the work flow a little bit sooner and received volunteer help a bit sooner this would have been a cake walk. Next year's officer will benefit from this knowledge.

[CruisinTiger]

Hind site is always 20/20!

[VTCruiser]

The BOD in charge of making decisions can remain small, the top two or three positions. The purpose behind breaking up the responsibilities and adding some new positions goes beyond just helping out with events. The idea of having these new positions is to break up the responsibilities of the comprehensive club operations to more specialized rolls.

One concern that inspired this suggestion is with regard to club sponsorship, partially because the website has a lot to do with it. Currently, the sponsorship structure is not very well defined. We have discussed various sponsorship packages, but they were never really implemented which makes it very difficult for me to determine how much advertising space is appropriate. I think we really and dedicated position for handling the sponsorship affairs of the whole club, not just the individual events. It would also provide a single point of contact for our commercial sponsors which will make it easier for them, and easier for us to develop a relationship with them.

Similarly, there should be one person in charge of all merchandise, including BOTH general club merchandise, and event merchandise. There should be one person that handles all membership affairs including both the official member roster, and event registration. Since location and service logistics are largely event specific, these responsibilities can fall under the rotating event chair.

The hierarchy could look something like this:

BOD (makes the decisions):

• President
• VP
• Treasurer

"Support Staff" (Second Tier)

• Membership Officer
• Sponsorship Officer
• Merchandise Officer
• Event Planning Chair (rotating/volunteer)
• Safety Officer
• Land Use Officer
• TLCA Deligate

[k9crazy]

Don't we have (or aren't we supposed to have) bylaws as a TLCA chapter? Sorry to bring that up, but if we are going to be an INC or have insurance, we are going to have to have those. And they would stipulate the BOD responsibilities, term, positions, etc.

[Trollhole]

We do. I'm trying to get David H to go through them and make the changes.

[eventhough]

Originally Posted by Trollhole

We do. I'm trying to get David H to go through them and make the changes.

I've started going through the By-Laws but David H is a much better sucker, I mean volunteer!

[Gundy]

Originally Posted by eventhough

I've started going through the By-Laws but David H is a much better sucker, I mean volunteer!

Speaking of them there by-laws. They came out as hieroglyphics when you sent them to me
via e-mail.
The originals are lost on my old 'puter crash MANY moons ago.
Since their original adoption there have been some voted changes.
One that comes to mind is originally the officers served 1 year terms,
then upped to 2 year terms and then back to 1. The 2 year deal was
a sucker punch to keep me on till we passed TLCA muster.
I note it went back to 1 when others took the jobs.
Officer duties are noted in the laws as I vaguely remember them.
Changing the by-laws requires procedures to be followed.
Notice and member votes if I recall correctly.
Usually we found the annual meeting was a great vehicle for such changes.
Snail mail me a set to: P.O.Box 412 Pickens, S.C. 29671
Or, drop 'em by when you bring Gundy's recovery gear back.
Cigars on me this time.
We used to keep minutes of meetings. Those would be nice if they still exist
so as to make the by-laws up to date.
I tried to make the meetings a little more formal and in line with accepted practice
for such things but damn, it's just a club and I'm not going to be the
school marm bit*hing about procedures.
Anyway, if I get, I'll have them gussied up and shined for the next meeting
for an adoption vote. Hehe...right after we approve the last minutes, cover old business
and discuss them as new business after proper notice.
We need this done before we go to the lawyer.