Reading all this I'm reminded of at least 3 recent issues that had very conflicting information/speculation that make it hard to know what to believe.
The current British Cycling/SKY doping/tui issues, with the "no smoke without fire" attacks from one side and the constant drip feed of a little bits of info to "clarify and be transparent" from Dave Brailsford. But just releasing little bits over time just seems to fuel the conspiracy theorists. I tend to believe that SKY are clean and honest, but every time I hear another little bit of Dave B not quite answering what seems to be a straight question I get frustrated.
The Brexit vote must go down as the most fact laden campaign ever, the public constantly asking for "the facts" and both sides providing an ever increasing number of facts. The problem being that those facts were often not quite comparing apples with apples, or even worse they were blatant lies. So for anyone taking the time to try and understand the facts it was information overload and too much smoke and mirrors.
There is not enough space here to even touch on the volume of Trump V Clinton conflicting "facts".
So what do we do?
We probably ignore all the "facts" and make a choice based on emotion/heart rather than head (which probably applies to most things in life). An alternative viewpoint might be to chuck some petrol on the fire, stand back, and see what survives.
Membership and levy proposal
Moderators: [nope] cartel, team nopesport
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Electrocuted, the last Board minutes indicate we are being listened to, under item 5.
There are a number of ideas that have arisen either during Board discussions or
during the consultation period which the Board are keen to investigate including:
Taxing clubs based on their membership
Having a differential levy at Local level
Finding a way of fairly asking clubs/associations to make payments to British Orienteering whilst giving them the freedom to decide how to collect it themselves.
It will take a while to investigate these and potentially longer still to implement; in this circumstance the Board agreed the current proposal should continue to be developed and taken to the EGM.
There are a number of ideas that have arisen either during Board discussions or
during the consultation period which the Board are keen to investigate including:
Taxing clubs based on their membership
Having a differential levy at Local level
Finding a way of fairly asking clubs/associations to make payments to British Orienteering whilst giving them the freedom to decide how to collect it themselves.
It will take a while to investigate these and potentially longer still to implement; in this circumstance the Board agreed the current proposal should continue to be developed and taken to the EGM.
- maprun
- diehard
- Posts: 685
- Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 10:37 am
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Spookster wrote:OK Dean, two questions:
1. What things that BOF currently does do you suggest the sport doesn't need to have done?
2. What things do you think should be done by volunteers rather than paid staff? (Are you volunteering to do them?)
Now that you ask:
The only thing of value BO do well is hold an up to date dbase and take/handle the transfer of monies membership fees and arguably the securing of insurance (although this seems to be worthy of more discussion).
I would suspend all your other activity. Remove all the salaried none orienteers who have little to no interest in our sport other than to pay their bills and whom are motivated to pursue money that will secure their salary cheques (a vicious circle).
There used to be a very involved set of committees (Groups) that maintained the sport. The volunteer members (all orienteers at heart) were all suspended when some members of a Group actively did not support the BO line when trying to introduce against the members wishes a 3 tier event system, which may I add has been introduced in all but name through the back door.
Members were invited to reapply for their positions under BO scrutiny......
Membership increase can and will only be increased at local (club) level. Stop taxing the clubs through the levy to pay for inefficient and mis-directed activity and allow them to recruit as/how they see fit. You can ask the clubs with increased membership how much BO have assisted their clubs membership increase ...... I suspect you'll not get many favourable comments.
Rejuvenate the junior programme that was all but destroyed by BO's representatives. Going back to the old Regional Squad model and their appointment of relevant experienced coaches and support staff who are genuinely interested in the sport and it's development of our junior talent. Tony Carlyle / Buzz / Lard would be better advisers of how to achieve this.
The Elite programme and it's promotion of our sport could be funded by the current levy idea without administrator salaries. There is actually quite a lot of money in our sport, just poorly spent / mis-directed. Lard/Buzz would be better advisers in this.
I could go on, but I think you can understand see my point of view and hence you and I are unlikely to agree.
"If A is success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut" Abraham Lincoln
-
LostAgain - diehard
- Posts: 774
- Joined: Thu Jan 06, 2005 2:32 pm
- Location: If only I knew
Re: Membership and levy proposal
If I were to vote in my own financial self-interest, I would vote for no increase or for option 1 (maximum membership increase/lower levy) as I compete in 40 or so events per year, so the extra 20p per event in option 2 would cost me more than I would save through the lower membership fee.
But the trivial extra costs in either of these does really illustrate that all this is about more than the money. It's about the way so many important parts of our lives have been removed from our control by the changes made under the heading of "better governance". I'm not sure we are better governed but I do know we feel we have less say in what goes on and that a significant number (but not all) of the people in charge are never in the Sunday morning car parks where they might hear what we think.
I'll probably vote for the membership fee rise as I do want BO to be properly funded and then I'll try to raise the energy to do something about the lack of genuine accountability though probably life is too short so it may be up to the younger folk.
Still not finally decided though.
But the trivial extra costs in either of these does really illustrate that all this is about more than the money. It's about the way so many important parts of our lives have been removed from our control by the changes made under the heading of "better governance". I'm not sure we are better governed but I do know we feel we have less say in what goes on and that a significant number (but not all) of the people in charge are never in the Sunday morning car parks where they might hear what we think.
I'll probably vote for the membership fee rise as I do want BO to be properly funded and then I'll try to raise the energy to do something about the lack of genuine accountability though probably life is too short so it may be up to the younger folk.
Still not finally decided though.
- yted
- light green
- Posts: 221
- Joined: Wed May 12, 2010 1:53 pm
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Be careful not to mix staff working on SportEngland and SportNorthern Ireland projects with staff employed by members' money. There are only the equivalent of three of them.LostAgain wrote:The only thing of value BO do well is hold an up to date dbase and take/handle the transfer of monies membership fees and arguably the securing of insurance (although this seems to be worthy of more discussion).
I would suspend all your other activity. Remove all the salaried none orienteers who have little to no interest in our sport other than to pay their bills and whom are motivated to pursue money that will secure their salary cheques (a vicious circle).
There still is.LostAgain wrote:There used to be a very involved set of committees (Groups) that maintained the sport.
So I went to your club's committee meeting on Tuesday, partly to hear first hand what they thought about the EGM proposal. They've had a lot of success in growing membership recently. They support the EGM proposal.LostAgain wrote:Membership increase can and will only be increased at local (club) level. Stop taxing the clubs through the levy to pay for inefficient and mis-directed activity and allow them to recruit as/how they see fit. You can ask the clubs with increased membership how much BO have assisted their clubs membership increase ...... I suspect you'll not get many favourable comments.
Agreed. Thanks for letting me know how you see things.LostAgain wrote:I could go on, but I think you can understand see my point of view and hence you and I are unlikely to agree.
Martin Ward, SYO (Chair) & SPOOK.
I'm a 1%er. Are you?
I'm a 1%er. Are you?
-
Spookster - god
- Posts: 2267
- Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 1:49 pm
- Location: Sheffield
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Spookster wrote:Be careful not to mix staff working on SportEngland and SportNorthern Ireland projects with staff employed by members' money. There are only the equivalent of three of them.
That's quite hard to do. There's a staff page listing 15 people...
https://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/staff
If 3 of them are funded by members money, one might guess the other 12 are paid by SE and SNI. Can't figure it out from the accounts either, but they do show that SE/SNI contribute only about 40% of the income and apparently get 80% of the staff. WOC is in there too, but its impossible (for me) to even tell whether that was profitable for BOF.
No doubt this can be reconciled. But when it's all so opaque to the average member, the scepticism is not surprising.
By contrast, the SOA has a nice list of who everyone is and what they do.
http://www.scottish-orienteering.org/so ... #employees
2. What things do you think should be done by volunteers rather than paid staff? (Are you volunteering to do them?)
This seems the wrong way round. Everything should be done by competent volunteers, and the paid staff should then do the things no volunteers wish to do. Look again at the SOA list and tell me which of the volunteers should be replaced by a paid employee?
Last edited by graeme on Thu Oct 20, 2016 7:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.
WOC2024 Edinburgh
Test races at SprintScotland (Alloa/Falkirk) and Euromeeting (near Stirling).
Test races at SprintScotland (Alloa/Falkirk) and Euromeeting (near Stirling).
-
graeme - god
- Posts: 4723
- Joined: Thu Feb 12, 2004 6:04 pm
- Location: struggling with an pɹɐɔ ʇıɯǝ
Re: Membership and levy proposal
I wholeheartedly agree with what lostagain said. Can we have that as a proposal? Is it totally unpractical? What's the problem? I would happily pay 3 x whatever the current levy is, if only the sport was run by orienteers, for orienteers.
- housewife
- green
- Posts: 355
- Joined: Tue Nov 16, 2004 10:28 pm
- Location: probably at work
Re: Membership and levy proposal
And if we can't have that option, can the SOA break away and compete as a home nation at WOC etc in the same way as football does?
- housewife
- green
- Posts: 355
- Joined: Tue Nov 16, 2004 10:28 pm
- Location: probably at work
Re: Membership and levy proposal
graeme wrote:2. What things do you think should be done by volunteers rather than paid staff? (Are you volunteering to do them?)
This seems the wrong way round. Everything should be done by competent volunteers, and the paid staff should then do the things no volunteers wish to do.
And the competent volunteers will come from... where? Bearing in mind that the whole mapscales thing showed just how little respect and gratitude such competent volunteers can expect from members.
- daffdy
- orange
- Posts: 114
- Joined: Mon Oct 24, 2011 12:23 pm
Re: Membership and levy proposal
maprun wrote:Electrocuted, the last Board minutes indicate we are being listened to, under item 5.
There are a number of ideas that have arisen either during Board discussions or
during the consultation period which the Board are keen to investigate including:
Taxing clubs based on their membership
Having a differential levy at Local level
Finding a way of fairly asking clubs/associations to make payments to British Orienteering whilst giving them the freedom to decide how to collect it themselves.
It will take a while to investigate these and potentially longer still to implement; in this circumstance the Board agreed the current proposal should continue to be developed and taken to the EGM.
Yes, but what you have is a Board which says its listening, but putting a proposal to the membership of which it expects us to ratify one of two very similar proposals, neither of which addresses the problems electrocuted talks about. Once ratified, can we really trust the Board not to say "Well you agreed to this" and then to go on to consider whatever the result is as the new baseline and address the increasing scale of levy by proposing to add to that rather than taking away the ludicrous situation of having to pay levy of 33% on local events?
Orienteering - its no walk in the park
- andypat
- god
- Posts: 2856
- Joined: Sat Apr 11, 2009 9:58 pm
- Location: Houston, we have a problem.
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Andypat, there is nothing stopping two members of BO proposing a resolution to the BO secretary fifty days before the 2017 AGM to change the fees and levy. The "difficulty" is making sure the proposal is self-financing. Presumably the cost of the first x many competitors would be reduced, and there would be an increased levy on each competitor over x, so the income raised will be remain around the same. If someone at BO does not have the time, I dare say there are plenty of members with the skills to do the maths. So no real excuse for the board or staff to refuse to assist the proposers in putting forwards an income neutral proposal. This is all hypothetical of course, there is the small matter of the EGM proposal first.
- maprun
- diehard
- Posts: 685
- Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 10:37 am
Re: Membership and levy proposal
graeme wrote:Spookster wrote:2. What things do you think should be done by volunteers rather than paid staff? (Are you volunteering to do them?)
This seems the wrong way round. Everything should be done by competent volunteers, and the paid staff should then do the things no volunteers wish to do.
Yes, but Dean said "Remove all the salaried none orienteers who have little to no interest in our sport other than to pay their bills and whom are motivated to pursue money that will secure their salary cheques (a vicious circle)", and I was trying to challenge that specific point. The ones who do the management accounting, telephone answering, website management, membership database, governance administration, etc, etc, and not easily replaced by volunteer orienteers, because to be honest, most people find that sort of thing fairly boring.
Volunteers who are orienteers would generally rather plan, organise, control, map, coach, be on a committee that deals with those things, etc, where their skill and enthusiasm for orienteering are more relevant and useful.
graeme wrote:... the SOA has a nice list of who everyone is and what they do.
http://www.scottish-orienteering.org/so ... #employees
That is a good list. It would help if BOF had something similar.
Martin Ward, SYO (Chair) & SPOOK.
I'm a 1%er. Are you?
I'm a 1%er. Are you?
-
Spookster - god
- Posts: 2267
- Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 1:49 pm
- Location: Sheffield
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Spookster wrote:The ones who do the management accounting, telephone answering, website management, membership database, governance administration, etc, etc, and not easily replaced by volunteer orienteers, because to be honest, most people find that sort of thing fairly boring.
If BO became an essentially volunteer ran organisation and the membership believed in the organisation and could see that their financial contribution was being well spent and targeted I think you may be surprised at how many of these tasks could be done by volunteers. I think the FRA manages quite well. I am sure you put in many hours on our behalf, for which I thank you, but could this time be better spent on our behalf ?
- website management, almost all clubs have their own website and many volunteers upkeeping them
- all clubs accounts have to be audited and most clubs have accountants as members
- not sure why you feel the need to have a telephone answering service during office hours, appropriate contact routes as used by all clubs should be sufficient.
- Governance admin will grow to the size you want to throw resources at it, to no benefit of the membership. A basic tick-box exercise.
- I agree we may need someone to consistently maintain the membership dbase and collect revenue. Full time job not sure...
Obviously cannot suggest alternatives for etc etc etc
"If A is success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut" Abraham Lincoln
-
LostAgain - diehard
- Posts: 774
- Joined: Thu Jan 06, 2005 2:32 pm
- Location: If only I knew
Re: Membership and levy proposal
Lostagain, a very thought provoking post, and I went online and read up on the FRA and downloaded some of its documents. The current FRA, reminds me of BO back in the days of Tony Walker, the first professional officer. I'm sure I'll be corrected, he had an assistant dealing with the membership and we received The Orienteer as members, and the membership boomed after WOC 1976 in Scotland.
We now have a Chief Executive (CE) with SE experience, recruited presumably partly for his experience at gaining SE grants. The FRA openly declare they do not seek to increase their membership, to avoid putting additional pressure on the fell's environment. I assume this would rule them out of SE funding. The two sports share a very similar characteristics in their members' goals, preferring cheap, well organised and mainly informal events. The different ethos, is BO wants to expand its membership and participation levels. If we don't bring in more younger devotees, the sport will contract rapidly in the UK.
Dare I say it, but I will. Having a professional CE comes at a cost, and SE have said they aren't interested in funding core costs from 2017 onwards. One could argue a professional CE with prior SE experience is core, only if you are in the game of chasing SE grants. I'm not suggesting our CE should be made redundant. But if his skills are necessary to acquire SE grants, then the extra costs should be paid by SE, and our core budget should be corrected to reflect this, both for our benefit and SE's.
This leads to a second thought. From memory we have had professional officers in the past without prior SE experience who gained grants. Does BO require the "additional cost" of a CE, when funding will not include any contribution to core costs, and we run the risk of the marginal costs being underestimated, or SE simply not accepting they are, and the membership ends up incurring them?
We now have a Chief Executive (CE) with SE experience, recruited presumably partly for his experience at gaining SE grants. The FRA openly declare they do not seek to increase their membership, to avoid putting additional pressure on the fell's environment. I assume this would rule them out of SE funding. The two sports share a very similar characteristics in their members' goals, preferring cheap, well organised and mainly informal events. The different ethos, is BO wants to expand its membership and participation levels. If we don't bring in more younger devotees, the sport will contract rapidly in the UK.
Dare I say it, but I will. Having a professional CE comes at a cost, and SE have said they aren't interested in funding core costs from 2017 onwards. One could argue a professional CE with prior SE experience is core, only if you are in the game of chasing SE grants. I'm not suggesting our CE should be made redundant. But if his skills are necessary to acquire SE grants, then the extra costs should be paid by SE, and our core budget should be corrected to reflect this, both for our benefit and SE's.
This leads to a second thought. From memory we have had professional officers in the past without prior SE experience who gained grants. Does BO require the "additional cost" of a CE, when funding will not include any contribution to core costs, and we run the risk of the marginal costs being underestimated, or SE simply not accepting they are, and the membership ends up incurring them?
- maprun
- diehard
- Posts: 685
- Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 10:37 am
Re: Membership and levy proposal
With regard to LostAgain's point about website management, my own club replaced its website recently. We had the choice of a volunteer build website or a professional website, we made the decision to pay for a professional one and I'm really glad we did. Finding a volunteer to do a basic website is realistic, but finding one who can do responsive website designs that are viewable in multiple different devices (tablets, IPhones etc) which can be easily maintained and backed by a content management system isn't so straightforward.
Club (and national) websites are a crucial part of our marketing in an increasingly competitive leisure market - professional is generally better in this case, at least for the critical bits, with volunteers to help where possible, eg maintain content and querying the database to produce reports.
With a volunteer there is the additional problem of control and resistance. Ie the risk that the volunteer wont change 'their' website or the rest of us are too polite to ask. That's not a problem if you pay someone.
Club (and national) websites are a crucial part of our marketing in an increasingly competitive leisure market - professional is generally better in this case, at least for the critical bits, with volunteers to help where possible, eg maintain content and querying the database to produce reports.
With a volunteer there is the additional problem of control and resistance. Ie the risk that the volunteer wont change 'their' website or the rest of us are too polite to ask. That's not a problem if you pay someone.
- SeanC
- god
- Posts: 2251
- Joined: Wed Mar 16, 2005 6:46 pm
- Location: Kent
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 124 guests