Event Photos: New York

Last month, I mentioned that New York's kick-off event at Johnny Utah's was attended by over 100 people. These are some pictures from that great event.

Keeping volunteers engaged

Several alumni chapters are led by a whole team of people rather than just one or two individuals. Keeping all members of the leadership team engaged and involved can be a difficult task. To help with this issue, I want to provide you all with some advice from one of my favorite books, The New Breed: Understanding & Equipping the 21st Century Volunteer by Jonathan McKee and Thomas W. McKee.

One of the best things an individual can do to lead a successful volunteer organization is understand the difference between a “leader” and a “manager.”

According to McKee and McKee, “Leaders set the vision for where an organization is going. Management paves the road to get there.”

When working on chapter programs, it’s easy to get lost in the details and the managing of events and volunteers. To be successful, your leadership team must first know the vision and mission of the group. And they will look to you as a leader to set and define the vision and mission. I recommend taking time at your next meeting to establish mission and vision statements for your group.

Begin by asking these questions provided by McKee and McKee:

1. Who are we?


2. What do we do?


3. Whom do we serve? (Who are our members? Who are our customers? Who are the people who benefit from what we do?)


4. What benefit (service, impact) do we provide for those we serve?


5. Why are we unique (Why are we better at what we do than any other organization or group)?

After answering these questions, develop your mission and vision statements, keeping mind that McKee and McKee define the two as:

A mission statement states your cause. It states why you exist and the service you provide for the people you serve.

A vision statement states your future. It declares where you want to go. A vision statement is strategic—it puts strategic legs on the mission statement to capture the energy of your volunteers.

Once these statements are established, you and your leadership team will be able to better define roles and responsibilities for members of the leadership team and hopefully understanding those roles will help keep each member engaged.

If you do take the time to establish a vision for your group and a mission statement, I hope you will share them with me!

Nationally Televised Games

Last month, I sent you the link for the 2009 football season, this month I want to point out that two of the games will be nationally televised. Those games are:


SMU vs. TCU
October 3, 7p.m. CDT
The MountainWest Sports Network


SMU vs. Houston
October 24, 6:30 p.m. CDT
CBS – C

Chapter Spotlight: San Francisco

On Thursday, April 16, the San Francisco Alumni Chapter held a successful wine tasting event at the Press Club (Co-Founder, Jan Wiginton ’98). 52 Alumni were in attendance and fun was had by all!

Summer fun

Summer is a great time for family oriented chapter events. Some ideas include:


SMU alumni day at a local aquarium or zoo
SMU alumni day at a local sporting event (professional and minor league baseball is a great idea in the summer)
Jazz in the park
Picnic in the park
Shakespeare in the park
Softball or kickball tournaments
Summer BBQ

Regional Committee of the Alumni Board

I work with chapters as your staff liaison, but chapter activities, functions and resources are overseen by the Regional Committee of the Alumni Board. I want to let you know the names of the alumni that will be serving on this committee this board year. This committee has three on-campus meetings every year and meets periodically via conference call. As a chapter leader, you are an ad hoc member of this committee. If you are interested in learning more, please let me know.

Stephen Corley ‘90, Chair

Chris Ainsworth ’94
Robert Cabes ‘91
Doug Linneman ‘99
Dennis Murphree ‘69
Mark Robertson ‘85
Scott Rozzell ‘71
Jesusita Santillan ‘06
Jeff Thrall ‘71

Planning Ahead

As we come to the end of the school and fiscal years, and as you begin planning for the year ahead, I encourage you and your leadership teams to try to plan out your entire next year’s programming calendar. Even if you don’t have venues or ideas completely together, it is good to consider which months you will do events and what kind of events you will host. The sooner you can share such a calendar with me, the better, because I can then compare it to other SMU events I know will be happening in your area. Remember, we encourage you to diversify your programming to include family, cultural and social/networking events. Sit down with your team and talk about what’s going on where you live and when. And keep these questions in mind:

• Which events can we collaborate with?
• What is the best time of year to do certain things?
• What connections do we have as a team that will make our events even better?
• Is there something unique to our city we can plan that can become our “signature” event?
  

And, as always, if you need help, advice or suggestions just drop me a line or give me a call!