Today's presenter was our own John Suzukida who spoke on the topic of club membership. Maintaining and growing membership is a near universal issue for Rotary and probably all service clubs in today's world. Our own club has given it much thought over the years and tried various recruiting methods. John recounted that, about 5 years ago we decided to put our focus on what we could do as a club to become more attractive to potential members. We decided to focus on becoming more involved in community activities, taking on more projects and having more fun both within and outside of our weekly meetings. This strategy has paid dividends in that we have gone from a low of about 23 members to a current roster of 34. And our new members have been excellent additions, getting quickly involved in club activities. He noted that we have continued to be active through the pandemic, thanks to past president Bill Klumpp acting quickly to set up regular virtual meetings and occasional happy hours through Zoom technology. In terms of where we go from here, John suggested we need to first decide what problem we are trying to solve. Most would agree we should work to add more diversity, including age diversity. We may need to consider alternative meeting times. And we should be cognizant of even minor things such as avoiding jokes and stories that don't resonate with the under-60 crowd. He suggested that, when talking with others about Rotary, we focus on the global reach that Rotary has, which is a strong selling point. Our success with polio eradication around the world is something we can all be very proud of. Our club has a long history of bringing in great outside speakers covering a very broad range of topics. We must continue this as it is another great source of interest to current and future members. When, at long last, we are able to meet again in person, John also encouraged everyone to proactively reach out to visitors to quickly make them feel welcome within the group.August 11 - Club Meeting
Today's presenter was our own John Suzukida who spoke on the topic of club membership. Maintaining and growing membership is a near universal issue for Rotary and probably all service clubs in today's world. Our own club has given it much thought over the years and tried various recruiting methods. John recounted that, about 5 years ago we decided to put our focus on what we could do as a club to become more attractive to potential members. We decided to focus on becoming more involved in community activities, taking on more projects and having more fun both within and outside of our weekly meetings. This strategy has paid dividends in that we have gone from a low of about 23 members to a current roster of 34. And our new members have been excellent additions, getting quickly involved in club activities. He noted that we have continued to be active through the pandemic, thanks to past president Bill Klumpp acting quickly to set up regular virtual meetings and occasional happy hours through Zoom technology. In terms of where we go from here, John suggested we need to first decide what problem we are trying to solve. Most would agree we should work to add more diversity, including age diversity. We may need to consider alternative meeting times. And we should be cognizant of even minor things such as avoiding jokes and stories that don't resonate with the under-60 crowd. He suggested that, when talking with others about Rotary, we focus on the global reach that Rotary has, which is a strong selling point. Our success with polio eradication around the world is something we can all be very proud of. Our club has a long history of bringing in great outside speakers covering a very broad range of topics. We must continue this as it is another great source of interest to current and future members. When, at long last, we are able to meet again in person, John also encouraged everyone to proactively reach out to visitors to quickly make them feel welcome within the group.