Rechartering “on-time”

[de4bsa]

"Hawk Mountain a not very large council, serving the area around Reading PA, has not had a dropped unit in a very long time.

The Council is fortunate in having an outstanding Council Commissioner,Darnall Daley.

They say the reason for their success is in part due to the fact that once a year a meeting like the one outlined as the 45 day meeting is held. All CO heads, the DE,UC and unit leaders are at the meeting.

It works for them!! "

 

That is a very impressive feat. Again, I say God bless 'em! That council is definitely the exception and not the rule. I'd wonder if being a small council helps in being able to have all those meetings. Not a lot of units, not a lot of ground to cover, couldn't hurt.

 

If I would've had all those meetings when I first began I would've laid the groundwork for something that could've possibly been good for the program in my district. Unfortunately, the time I would've spent in those meetings and training C.O.'s and Executive Officers in what their role is would've taken me away from having an immediate impact on making my numbers. So, I probably would've laid the groundwork but wouldn't have been around to reap the rewards b/c I would've been fired for not making my numbers.

 

See, in the scouting profession the less time you spend in any one place the better. My problem is I've now been the DE in the same district for 6 years. It's hard to be consistently successful in the same position serving the same territory that long. The shortcuts I took early in my tenure to make numbers are now coming back to haunt me. Now, again, I'm not saying there aren't exceptions to the rule. I'm sure someone will post back with something like, "We had the same DE for 15 years and made Quality District every year, etc." Hey, I've got no problem saying that DE is simply a better professional than I am.

 

IMO, the premise for a professional scouter is "Make your numbers and move on." Go to a different district, or council, or get a promotion to a different job. The DE who got a promotion w/out having any Commissioners is a perfect example. He moved on before that could come back to haunt him. My SE got to his position doing largely the same thing. He had success in short stints at many different stops. The success was always impressive enough for him to keep getting promoted. Unfortunately, he's now been the SE in our council for 9 years. His career has stalled b/c our Council has fallen on hard times. Just like always, he was very successful the first 4 years at our Council. However, for different reasons he didn't move on after those 4 years. He had to stick around and the last 4 years have been terrible.

 

Well, I kind of went on a rant and got off topic. Any DE making all those charter meetings has to be thinking long term. Long term in one position in scouting usually doesn't work out very well.

[Hunt]

I have to say that I don't fully understand the point of the annual rechartering process. What does it accomplish beside updating the roster and collecting annual fees? If, as I suspect, 95% of CO signatures are strictly pro forma, and people aren't really meeting with commissioners, or setting up rechartering teams, etc., etc., why not simplify the process?

[Eamonn]

Done right!!

Rechartering offers a great opportunity for everyone to see where we are, where we are going and what needs to be done to get there.

Many of the complaints, moans and groans that get posted in the forum, might be lessened if the process was followed.

As de4bsa has posted many of our Chartered Partners don't seem to know that they are Partners. Why? Because no one has taken the time to tell or explain it to them.

When they don't know, is it any wonder that they don't provide the support we might want and need?

As I grow older and retirement creeps up on me, I'm taking a more active intrest in my savings.

Three or four times a year I meet with my financial Advisor and my accountant to see how I'm doing.

Of course I know how much money I'm putting aside every month.

If all I wanted was the amount? A few minutes with my pay stubs and check books would tell me.

But I want more information.

I need to know where my money is and how it is doing.

After some of these meetings we decide that nothing needs to be done, but at times we change things a little.

Rechartering should be the time when we all put our cards on the table and make sure that the lines of communication are all open and working.

 

It seems to me!! That we spend far too much time recruiting and trying to find new ways of bringing in revenue and members. When the answer is staring us in the face.

One meeting with everyone in attendance will save units, improve the number of trained leaders, maybe remove some dead-wood? Do more for PR and community relations than just about anything.

Sadly when it becomes just about "updating the roster and collecting annual fees?" which is important!! We miss a golden opportunity.

When I was District Chairman, I insisted that our DE did meet with all of the executive officers. I'll admit we never managed to get all of the units to hold the Renewal Meetings. I wish we had!!

Over the ten years I was a member of the Key 3 we made Quality District, seven times.

We used to go into September and school sign up night looking for a couple of hundred Cub Scouts and spent the rest of the year bullying and enticing Cub Scouters to recruit more Cub Scouts, with a last minute dash in late December.

Life was so much better when we held School Sign up night and came away knowing that we had met the goal.

Pam our DE at the time mentioned that Staff Meeting's were a lot more bearable, when she could sit there knowing that the rantings and ravings of the FD, weren't meant for her.

While other DE's were rushing around in the snow to pick up one or two youth applications, she was doing her Christmas shopping!!

Ea.

 

[Beavah]

The "district has no commissioners", yet the DE gets a promotion? What am I missing here?

 

Yah, you're missin' the fact that the DE evaluation process has nothin' to do with unit service, or really any service. As DE4 describes, it's really mostly a matter of whether you accidentally live in an area with growing youth demographics, or can "take shortcuts" to "grow" numbers then get out of Dodge.

 

A truly dysfunctional corporate culture for a membership service organization. And it costs us in terms of keepin' quality DE's and SE's.

 

 

[oldsm]

We don't even get recharter packets anymore. It's almost all on-line. Our DE or the Council registrar provides each unit with an online access code and we take it from there.

 

In my troop my CC and I do the whole thing. We sit down at my computer (he doesn't have one), and review the names that Council has on our charter. We make changes to address, phone numbers, etc., do the Boys Life thing, drop members who have left, etc. He has already contacted all of the adults based on his own records, and I know all of the boys' status. The boys are paid for out of troop funds; the adults have to fork over their $10, which the CC has already collected.

 

When done, we print out the "recharter packet" and sign it. He takes it to our IH for his signature (easily done), and gets a check from the troop treasurer.

 

The CC and the IH see each other every week (teh CO is a church and the CC is a member), and I usually run into the IH once a month. So the IH knows what we're doing; he is always supportive and glad we're there. Signatures are never a problem for us.

 

The CC takes the signed printout and the check to the District "Recharter Party" to turn them in. We usually get our new membership cards about 2 months later. (I fail to see why it take so long, since everything is online and the cards are printed locally.) I think it will be only another couple of years before we can just send everything in to Council and avoid the turn-in party.

 

The whole process takes me and the CC about 3 hours, about 3/4 or which is spent listening to him reminisce about who used to be in the troop back in the day. We make sure we're on time because it's the right thing to do.