Problem DE

[Stosh]

  I had one DE that came on board and viewed herself as God's gift to the Scouting program.  I never said Aye, Yes or No to her, but worked really hard on my "THE LOOK".  It must have worked because after she left she did come back and they had some gathering that she attended.  I didn't need to use THE LOOK anymore and did my normal hang out, goof off and relax for the event mode.  She told me she was totally blown away by my "change".  She said that when she was DE she was terrified of me.  I asked her if I had ever threatened her.  She said no.  How about say something inappropriate?  No.  What was it then.  She said it was the way I just looked at her.    Dang I got talent!  It worked.  She never considered asking me to do anything on the district level!

[Stosh]

Darn it! I must be doing something wrong!

 

Have you read the book THE PETER PRINCIPLE?  Go back over the chapter on "Creative Incompetence".   It really does work.

[SSScout]

Once upon a time at a camporee, I was caught under a dining fly with a new DE during a torrential downpour.  In the ensuing conversation, I found out he was assigned to a neighboring District, but owing to our present lack of DE in our own, he was assigned to "cover" ours.   I asked him if he could come to a Committee meeting of a new, struggling Unit to "meet the troops" and "wave the flag"  for us. After he heard the location and sponsoring org, he responded that " Oh, I have people to do that. I'll tell them to visit."  (end of discussion). His "people" , it turned out , were the other Commissioners I worked with, so they told me later, when he called and TOLD them to go visit this "problem" unit (not merely troubled, as I had said).

He  was not a DE in about six months.  

[Eagle94-A1]

SSScout's story reminds me of  2 new DEs in my council growing up. We had 3 brand new, straight out of college DEs who were told by the SE that they needed to go through the OA Ordeal. They show up, and go through the Pre-Ordeal ceremony. When they found out what was expected of them, 2 said the heck with it and left. The third one underwent the Ordeal.  Monday morning all three were called into the SE's office. The new Arrowman was congratulated, given some OA related item from the and left. The other two were immediately fired.

[Col. Flagg]

SSScout's story reminds me of  2 new DEs in my council growing up. We had 3 brand new, straight out of college DEs who were told by the SE that they needed to go through the OA Ordeal.

Well, maybe if the OA insisted on the camping requirement being met for district and council staff they wouldn't have that problem. I mean, it *is* supposed to encourage continued participation in Scouting and camping. Waive the camping and you simply have guys who work for your company. They might not even exhibit the Oath and Law.

[David CO]

I didn't know that people were being forced to join OA.   

[Stosh]

Might be more an issue of training and knowing the job, rather than being forced to join OA.  Pretty hard to promote certain parts of the program when one knows nothing about it.

[David CO]

I could see having a new DE observe the process, just so he knows what it is all about.  Forcing him to join is entirely different.

 

I am a little surprised that OA would go along with a "shotgun wedding" sort of thing. 

Edited March 6, 2017 by David CO

[Eagle94-A1]

I could see having a new DE observe the process, just so he knows what it is all about.  Forcing him to join is entirely different.

 

I am a little surprised that OA would go along with a "shotgun wedding" sort of thing. 

 

Part of a DE's responsibilities is being the chapter staff advisor. That's why if a pro is not an Arrowman already, they are exempt from the camping requirement, and are automatically eligible. Grant you, most DEs are so busy that unless they are the lodge staff advisor, they do not do much with the OA. But they are a few exceptions. Going to an Ordeal and preparing the ceremony area in the mud and rain, as well as helping coach the team, broke the ice with the volunteers in my district back in the day.

 

I know there have been some changes to the inductions process, i.e. SMs can get a waiver for the camping requirement, but as far as I know district and council level volunteers must have it still. My district only had one person who met the requirement, and he's going in a few weeks.

[Col. Flagg]

 

I know there have been some changes to the inductions process, i.e. SMs can get a waiver for the camping requirement, but as far as I know district and council level volunteers must have it still. My district only had one person who met the requirement, and he's going in a few weeks.

 

Really? What's the point in that? This is the guy that is supposed to be the primary example of the program.

 

If there's any more evidence needed that OA has become a mere shadow of itself one need look no further. How sad.

[Chisos]

 

I know there have been some changes to the inductions process, i.e. SMs can get a waiver for the camping requirement, but as far as I know district and council level volunteers must have it still. My district only had one person who met the requirement, and he's going in a few weeks.

 

I had not seen that anywhere (SM waiver for the camping requirement), but the waiver they do get is to not "count" against a unit's adult nominee limit (i.e, 1 adult per 3 scouts).

[JosephMD]

I had not seen that anywhere (SM waiver for the camping requirement), but the waiver they do get is to not "count" against a unit's adult nominee limit (i.e, 1 adult per 3 scouts).

 

This.  If you think about it, most SMs will exceed the camping nights every year almost by default.  I suppose there are SMs that don't camp with their unit or units that don't camp, but something tells me they aren't all that interested in a brotherhood of honor campers (if we are honoring tradition). 

[Ridgerunner]

OK so let me go through thse to respond..

CR-yes I'm the Chrater Rep and was asked to be the eCharter rep by this org since I'm already one for a sister organization as well as the IH there. 
Yes, only an IH can appoint the Charter Rep, but the sketchy thing here is that it involves a career move unit which was started before any Charter was obtained, then walked away from by the professional staff. 

 

Blackballed form district and council. 
Yes, I know it actually sounds like a pretty sweet deal with the level of beingvoluntold most leaders getinto. But the issue here is that we have around a 50% turnover rate each year in leadership from military moves, and the few local/permanent resident volunteers arethe only ones that are here long enough to keep things running on a year to year basis with consistency. 

The "let em fail and they'll learn" theory is great, we actually did it as a group before when we had some far worse staff who began blacklisting some of the elder volunteers. The problem was that the professionals were only temporary, didn't care, and just let things fail which only resulted in hurting our kids in the process. 
No one cares about yet another pointless knot patch or some throw away award councilgives out to someone who helped them get their bonus orpromotion, this is solely about ensuring the program runs for our kids (which is the whole core of why parents really volunteer anyway).

 

[Col. Flagg]

The "let em fail and they'll learn" theory is great, we actually did it as a group before when we had some far worse staff who began blacklisting some of the elder volunteers. The problem was that the professionals were only temporary, didn't care, and just let things fail which only resulted in hurting our kids in the process. 

 

If units know how to manage themselves then district becomes irrelevant. If district wants to black ball me from the training committee, great. Nothing keeps me from offering my training to Pack and Troop leaders to help their units. So all you need to do is "end run" the district. They'll be gone in a short period anyway.

[qwazse]

Well, your are in a no-man's land. From your district's perspective ...

 

Who is the head of that organization? Right now, no man.

Who in the organization has the signed copy of the charter? Right now, no man.

 

So, you'll remained deadlocked until the person in charge of that organization makes a call to council HQ and says, "I am the IH for CO of unit ###. We would like to see our charter and assure that it identifies the volunteers whom we approved to run the program, starting with Mr. Runner as our COR -- with thanks to the professionals who got us started last year. We'll take it from here."

 

Turnover does make it hard, but you need those couple of year-in year-out volunteers to go the extra mile, and the IH needs to believe in them. Because of membership churn, you and those one or two other people need to assure council that you'll see to it that new adult volunteers are brought on every year.

 

Otherwise, you will remain at loggerheads with an overtaxed professional staff who see you all as fly-by-nighters.

 

Keep that in mind when you make that call to the SE.