Towards a New Inclusiveness and Membership Involvement

Proxy Voting for Alliance Quebec Chapters

Increased Use of Internet Communications and a List Server

A Working Paper for the Alliance Quebec Annual Convention 1998

Christopher C. Goodfellow B.A., M.B.A.

Candidate for the Provincial Board of Alliance Quebec

Purpose:

The purpose of this working paper is to inform and challenge the conventional wisdom of Alliance Quebec members attending this convention and to urge them to consider and adopt new, optimistic, open and inclusive approaches to Alliance governance that will allow Alliance Quebec to grow its membership base with a renewed vigor.

It is also to introduce myself to many of you with whom I hope to work over the coming months as I am seeking a position on the Provincial Board of Directors. We are all aware our Alliance is experiencing a dramatic change this year in the level of public interest. It is not simply the election of a new President that is stimulating this renewed interest but also a reflection of the social evolution taking place in Quebec in response to the many threats to our wonderful life here. People wish to be involved.

Whoever wins the election knows that changes are in order. AQ must evolve with the times. If indeed AQ is an organization now of 3,500-4,000 paid up members that is all well and good but AQ will only carry the torch of true legitimacy as the voice for minorities in Quebec if it can establish itself as the premier lobby group with a large sustained membership base. I challenge you to think in terms of 100,000 members. A membership base so powerful that no government will take it for granted. That is what is needed, that is what is achievable.

AQ is not a political party:

Indeed we are not a political party. I have never belonged to a political party nor do I wish AQ to evolve into a political party. We are a lobby group. I have joined many lobby groups that I perceive to represent my interests. There is no subtle difference between political parties and lobby groups for when a political party achieves its goal and comes to power it must govern for all. A lobby group in the final analysis is simply a group of likeminded people who wish their interests and concerns defended and represented by and to political parties. That is what I want AQ to do for me and I hope you feel the same way.

AQ has done much for the english cause in Quebec over the past years and no one should diminish its contribution. All of us respect the hard work of the individuals in the trenches. Much of the work indeed does go on "behind the scenes" and indeed it is appropriate that many negotiated political compromises are carried out not in the full play of media attention. However, for AQ to truly expand its role as a lobby organization for the minority communities in Quebec, it must in the end truly reflect the opinions, hopes and desires of its grass roots membership. AQ has historically been a top-down organization, with broad policy issues and political approaches developed at the top of the organization. While it can be argued that policy can only be developed by people with enough knowledge about particular issues, it nevertheless is terribly important for AQ never to lose touch with the grass roots membership and what their prime concerns are.

I would argue that although health and social services and education are very important concerns and a large role for AQ is required in these areas, they are not the paramount concerns of the grass roots. I think many of you would join me in concluding that what the membership is expressing this spring is a desire for AQ to develop a clear vision and definition of itself. None of us are radicals and hotheads and applying labels like these only diminishes all of us. There is so much talent at this convention let us put it to constructive use in achieving a consensus of our vision. We all live here in Quebec by choice and through our lobby group we can effect policy changes to see our vision realized.

A Crisis of Membership:

Whether you are a political party, lobby group or corporation, when you start to lose touch with your constituency it is first reflected in an abandonment of the membership or your customer base. In truth, AQ lost me after 1994. I came back this year because in my capacity as webmaster of www.laurentian.com I had monitored the AQ website for over a year and the use of the internet by the AQ. It was clear to me, AQ was stumbling in the dark here and the very day that William Johnson announced his candidacy, unbeknownst to me, I had placed a call to Constance Middleton Hope to discuss with her if I might do something about the website given the upcoming elections.

I was unable to get any answers or commitment out of AQ to work on their website, and not one to let impediments stand in my way, I picked up the ball and decided to put as much information on LaurentianWeb about the annual general meetings and the convention as possible. I became involved. I wanted to know more how this organization functioned and I have learned much in two months. I want to thank Rob Bull, the director of communications, for his co-operation in providing me with a lot of information.

I believe information flows are a key ingredient in any organization's success and performance. The more you tell people about what is going on and the more you encourage others to participate and tell you what they think and want, the higher the overall performance and responsiveness of the organization. Closed organizations become just that. Whether they are a business that hunkers down in denial and refuses to believe that the competition is producing a better product or an organization like a lobby group that does not respond to the basic needs of its members, both are doomed to extinction.

Alliance Quebec's problem is reflected most dramatically in the membership list. The membership list contains over 14,400 names. As of March 1 1998, only about 2,400 were actual paid up members of AQ in good standing. The attrition rate of membership over the years has been staggering. Let me give you an even more specific and concrete example in one chapter.

Through the courtesy of Robert Girard, the President of the Upper Laurentians Chapter, and with the help of Robert Morgan on the keyboard we entered the entire ULC membership list of 484 names in a modern database that can be searched on any field.

We ran some analysis. Of the 484 names on the Upper Laurentians Membership list only 62 were paid-up as of March 1 1998. The following list shows how many members did not renew in each of the past years since 1986:

45 expired in 1986
22 expired in 1988
35 expired in 1989
19 expired in 1990
54 expired in 1991
36 expired in 1992
10 expired in 1993
12 expired in 1994
47 expired in 1995
32 expired in 1996

This opened my eyes and should open yours as well. It is a staggering attrition rate.

I set out to find the reasons why so many members were not renewing their memberships.

I telephoned over 50 of the expired memberships in the ULC to ask them to please renew and if they did not wish to renew, what was the reason why they felt membership in AQ was not worthwhile. Since the cost of membership ($5.00 or $10.00) is such a low amount, one can discount that it is not because of a financial decision.

The responses can be summed up as follows:

  • Many said they had simply given up on the organization because it did not represent their views.
  • Many felt that they wanted to participate but for one reason or another their voices and concerns were never heard.
  • It was difficult for many to attend meetings because of age and health and transportation difficulties.

    The lesson is clear. Let me put it in more commercial terms. If your customers are not coming back to the store for one reason or another, you must reach out to those customers in a new and innovative way to find out why and then to devise ways to bring them back as customers.

    Proxy Voting:

    These conclusions led me to some critical thinking on how we at the ULC could get people back into the fold and stimulate interest again and retain members over the long term. A look back at the past history of attendance at the Annual General Meetings gives a clear sign. Few people attended in the past although I am pleased this year attendance was way up. How can we involve people in basic decision making at Chapter level to get them to participate and feel more involved?

    If responsibility for decision making is put back into the hands of the general membership, there is much more likelihood of an increased interest in the affairs of the organization and a much higher participation rate. If the member is given no responsibility beyond reading an amateur and poorly formatted, content deficient and ill-timed newsletter produced in a rush once a year, there is little likelihood for continued interest on the member's part

    At the Annual Meeting of the Upper Laurentians Chapter of Alliance Quebec on April 24, 1998 the following resolution was passed:

    Resolved:

    "That a system of voting by proxy be established for General Membership Meetings (as set forth in Article III of the Constitution) to enable all paid-up members of the Upper Laurentians Chapter to express their democratic right by proxy vote at said meetings either on questions of general policy, the election of announced candidates to the Board of Directors, and delegates to the General Council or any other issue that should be placed before the General membership at the discretion of the Board of Directors."

    The resolution received 30 votes in favour, 3 nays and 3 abstentions. I believe it was an overwhelming endorsement. I also believe it was an expression by the grass roots that they want a more inclusive and open approach to the governance of AQ.

    The new Board of the ULC will of course deal with this in the coming year and hopefully the policy will be put in place for next year. The concept of voting by proxy for a slate of directors and general policy issues is a well established practice in public corporations and other organizations. In fact, it is more the norm than the exception. AQ has operated on a policy of exclusion rather than inclusion and the more I mentioned this idea to people in the ULC they became enthused. One can simply ask why not?

    How would it contribute to inclusiveness and membership involvement?

    One. It would force the executive of each chapter to become better organized in the administration of the chapter. Newsletters and mailings would have to be properly scheduled and sent out on time. A more professional approach to business. We are a lobby group that wants to be taken seriously.

    Two. Consistency breeds expectancy. The general membership will expect to get the mailings and the slates of directors, delegates and general policy issues upon which to vote and return the proxy. Participation and most importantly, feedback will increase. Good policy will also flow up from the membership this way. Responsibility towards the organization will grow. There are many who cannot come to meetings but can be valuable contributors to this organization.

    Three. It will also be a way of constantly verifying the mailings and keeping the membership lists up-to- date and accurate. I suspect AQ loses thousands of of dollars a year in mailing costs because the membership lists have not been properly parsed. AQ should aim at a 95% retention rate. This should not be difficult given the cost of membership is so low and the cost of losing each membership is so high. The strength of AQ with 25-50-100,000 members will have much more impact on political lobbying efforts.

    There must be a clear vision on the part of the executive to bring the members into an inclusive and responsive framework. Proxy voting does much to bring this about and I will work to see that proxy voting is adopted as a general business principle across all chapters.

    There is simply no substitution for the inclusiveness and empowerment of each AQ member.

    Use of the internet and new media to encourage communication and membership involvement.

    I come to my next initiative as a well informed expert who can help AQ maximize its use of the new media to reduce costs and draw the entire membership into a closer and responsive framework.

    Let me deal with operating costs for a moment. On April 22, the entire 49 page membership list of the ULC was transmitted by fax to me from head office. It appears from my telephone logs this transmission took 39 minutes. At 15 cents a minute this is not going to break Fort Knox in one call but added up many times over, the communication costs of AQ are substantial. Certainly fax transmission costs could be cut by at least 75% if files are transferred via the internet and with the proper use of e-mail other telephone costs could be reduced accordingly.

    It is not that anyone at AQ is stupid or incompetent. It is that they have never been properly trained to use new tools that would have reduced the cost of transmitting the membership list to me to a zero cost factor. I have internet access. AQ has internet access. It is a fixed monthly expense. The marginal cost of use is zero once the monthly fee is paid.

    In addition, sending the membership list in a modern and compatible file format would allow for immediate loading into client computers already paid for and in operation at the various chapters. There is no additional manual handling of the data.

    Presently, if the ULC wishes a membership list it must request it from downtown and have it faxed to them. They cannot sort their membership list in the most convenient way perhaps for a particular task. Mailing labels have to be generated downtown! It would make far more sense for each chapter to run its membership list locally and periodically upload the list on a routine schedule to head office. It is essentially a distributed database.

    Let me address the use of e-mail. AQ should now be collecting e-mail addresses from all members on line and including these in its membership database. More and more of us will be wired over the coming years and this has vast implications for AQ in responding to members' needs. AQ must be prepared for it. E-mail is fast and cost effective and every chapter should be using it to communicate with the central office. I have addressed over 30 e-mails to the central office in the past month. Not once has a response been in the form of a return e-mail. It has always been a long distance call and for the most part the information could have been transmitted with a zero marginal cost by e-mail.

    Again it is not the fault of those in the trenches. Perhaps the top management of AQ should tend to this in a more businesslike manner. AQ must be brought up to speed on this. Foot dragging and excuses only can go so far. Like any business organization it must seek to make use of limited funding as efficiently as possible. Training people is the key.

    List Servers and Websites:

    While I rarely believe rumours, I can believe that AQ has spent thousands of dollars on its website development and the interactive cd-rom project. I know what it costs to design and run a website. All of AQ's investment in this area has essentially come to naught. Why?

    For a website to be truly interesting, content must change almost everyday. Why would people come back? What AQ has on the website now is what I refer to as "soft information"... it is not particularly event driven information.

    What I did last month for AQ when I put the information up on LaurentianWeb, was to select "hard" event driven information. Information that the media needs and members need now. Things like schedules and rules. Things like CV's and policy statements. The website must become a repository of hard information so that the Gazette reporter goes and checks if the information is there before he calls Rob Bull. Conversely, Rob Bull points the media to the website for routine information rather than sending multiple faxes to media outlets.

    A website is a tool. It is nothing more and nothing less and must be viewed as such.

    How can we increase members' communication and input?

    This leads me to recommend the incorporation of a listserver for AQ. A listserver is nothing more than a computer that I can address a message to and it will automatically bounce or forward that message to all the people who subscribe to that particular newsgroup on the listserver. There would probably be no added cost to what AQ already pays for internet services.

    How would this help AQ? Many of us have written e-mails to AQ expressing our opinions but we never get to see what other members across the province are also sending to AQ. The synergy that can result from the free flow of information never happens. The interactive forum was intended to do this. But interactive forums are for all intents and purposes dead on the net. One has to make a conscious decision to log on and access the website. It is inconvenient and time consuming. Far better to use a list server. The only conscious decision to make is to subscribe to the listserver and as long as you remain subscribed all e-mail addressed to the listserver will be forwarded to you as well.

    Perhaps there is a common thread to the subjects addressed. Perhaps I have a solution for a problem in the Gaspe but I never know they asked the question as I never saw the e-mail. A list server is nothing more than a transmission facility that allows me to send my message to everyone who chooses to receive it. It is entirely in their discretion to subscribe or not. If I have concerns about health care or education, I can express them and get feedback.

    It all gets back to the heart of the matter of what AQ wants to be. Does it want to be an open organization through which information flows freely or does it wish to bunker down in a tight concept of itself governed by a small group of people at the central office to filter and manage information flows?

    Conclusion:

    These are all valid areas to explore from a management point of view. In the end what really matters is participation. More participation will mean a more active and involved membership. More membership means a stronger voice at the political table.

    This is all about approaches to finding solutions. It is about corporate governance. Open to suggestions or closed. Flexible or immutable. Active, involved, creative, bright, intelligent, problem solving people are drawn together naturally. When they encounter obfuscation and needless procedural obstruction, they are turned off.

    I encourage each one of you as a delegate to this convention to re-think AQ. Re-think what the possibilities are, not what the present framework constrains us to. Yes we can still deal effectively as a moderate organization in promoting health care issues and educational issues with the government. But clearly we can be much much more.

    We can find a new promising sense of community with people of likeminded values and ideas and we can do this through an open and inclusive AQ. I urge you to think big and think optimistically at this convention. It is an important milestone in AQ as either it will change to accomodate a much more active membership or it will slide into an irrelevance for even a membership of 4,000 is insignificant to have a political impact today. We must regain those 10,000 lost members and 10,000 more again within 3 years. Everything is possible.

    It has escaped no one. There is a fresh wind in Quebec this spring. The bright side is that after a 25 year winter of dismal and pessimistic social engineering based solely on a divisive approach to governing that has led Quebec down a very sad path of diminished health care, diminished education, a diminished respect for the individual, and a diminished human resource pool , all these things can be reversed. And they will be!

    I am asking you for your support in my bid for a position on the Provincial Board of AQ. I come with optimism and ideas to contribute. I want an open, inclusive organization for anyone who wishes to contribute and be involved.

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