Rotary Club - Index

Rotary Club - A Shared Experience - Index

A Shared Experience 8 February 15, 2008
Membership Thoughts
Oddly enough, good attendance does
not automatically indicate that the
member is an effective Rotarian but
poor attendance is a good early warning
sign of a member who is headed for
resignation. In general, good attendance
is part of being a valuable member. Our
traditions of fellowship and service are
built upon the foundation of weekly faceto-face
meetings. On the flip side, when
a member quits attending regularly we
know there is a narrow window of
opportunity before that member resigns.
Given that we recognize this pattern of
low attendance leading to loss of
membership, what can we do about it?
Here are a few tips.
The club’s membership chair
needs to be kept current on the
attendance figures. Usually the
club secretary does the
attendance report and sends the
totals on to the district. The
secretary should pass along the
detailed attendance report to the
membership chair every month.
Attendance delinquency should
be identified early. We all miss
occasional meetings for very
legitimate reasons but we are
looking here for the members
who suddenly miss 2 or 3
meetings in a row for no apparent
reason. At this point many clubs
have standard notices or emails
which are sent out.
Members who are identified
through the club’s attendance
tracking as being a potential
dropout should be contacted in
person or at least by phone. The
best person to do this is the
member’s sponsor or, if that is
not possible, by the membership
chair. The tone of the contact
should be concerned, not
punitive. For example, “John,
we’ve missed you at Rotary
lately. Have you had some
problem that kept you from
coming? Is there anything we can
do to help?”
In some cases there may be a
personal problem, perhaps illness
of the Rotarian or family member,
perhaps business pressures,
perhaps a death in the family. In
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