More BoD <-> Club communication needed

Picking up on a thread started by Len Wheeler entitled "President also Regional Director" in the AGM forum, let me move the thread here and take an oblique tack. While Len may be correct that JCNA Presidents are too busy to deal with their constituents in their region, I think the much, much bigger problem is that BoD members have almost no communication with their regional clubs in the first place.

One of the reasons that local clubs feel isolated from JCNA is that there isn't much communication between JCNA and the clubs. Think about it. The only time a club typically hears from a Bod member is at election time in the Jaguar Journal, from the President each issue, and from Board members when they're fishing for proxy votes at the AGM. Other than that, the clubs are pretty much on their own.

This last AGM demonstrated how the lack of communication and the detachment from the rank-and-file member can create big disagreements.

Dennis E. had the right idea when he formed the Membership Committee. Doug Ingram had some great ideas and tried to pass them along, but how many clubs ever communicated with the Membership Committee? Lou Kairys has now taken over for Doug and I think it's time for the next step. The Membership Committee Chair should be in communication with all the Membership Directors of all the clubs across the country. I'd like to see a Membership Directors' forum established, in which all MDs are automatically enrolled. They'll have a place where they can discuss ideas, try them, and report back. Even if they don't post, at least they'll be reading what's happening with other MDs around the continent. The chair should condense the contributions and submit them to Mike at the Jaguar Journal every couple months. Then everyone can see what's effective at other clubs and get excited about trying it at theirs.

I'm not stopping there, though. I think the JCNA President should chair a club presidents' forum where everyone discusses the problems and successes running a club. Likewise, the JCNA treasurer heads the treasurers' forum; the secretary, a secretaries' forum. Those last two might be a little boring to most of us -- the finer points of keeping books and meeting minutes, but a rousing discussion of Robert's Rules of Order might have been helpful going into the AGM. The JCNA webmaster would lead the webmasters' forum; the Jaguar Journal Editor, the newsletter editors' forum, which already exists, the JCNA Chief Judge in charge of the Chief Judges' forum.

Then from the ranks of the BoD (or volunteers, but preferably the BoD), we'd have directors chairing a Concours' Chairs' forum, the Rallymasters' forum, the Slalom Chairs' forum, and a Tech Directors' forum.

These forums would be open only to those holding the position within each club. If the position at the club is vacant, the forum mail would go to the next person up the org chart (e.g. Chief Judge to Concours Chair, Slalom Chair to Activities Director, Secretary to President). It would be the JCNA chair's job to post occasional tidbits to their forum to start discussions.

The incalculably huge advantage of this is that the BoD would not be some unknown group out there that only intrudes to collect annual dues, but individuals who communicate regularly at various levels of the club hierarchy and help locals do their jobs and expand their clubs..

Thoughts?