Kris sent the following message to the entire group this morning. I think it warrants a discussion for the larger group of (hopefully) interested people. Since it will be difficult to discuss this question via email, and not everyone has the ability to send an email to the entire group. I am posting it in a forum here, so that we can discuss this:
From Kris:
"I am concerned we are not moving quickly enough and have gotten bogged down in administrative and leadership management. First, please forgive my lack of proper terminology, I will be the first to admit that I do not have the business background nor the strategic planning background or the project management background to speak with any authority or clout, but that has never stopped my from saying what I think so why stop now?
"As I reflect on the type of decision making model or how we are building this organization, it seems to me have adopted a linear model for growth. It feels to me that we make one decision at a time and then move on to the next decision. Such as the bylaws. It seemed we could not continue with other dialogs or planning or action items until that was finalized. Now we have moved on to committees. And then we will move on to the next area. Maybe it is my adhd that kicks in too often, but it seems that as an organization we can multitask and accomplish several goals at once. Last night I was on the conference call with the Unite PA group and other groups are moving so much more quickly than we are. Several groups in one area of PA have established focus groups where each group takes a topic or area of growth (membership, events, advocacy, education, etc,) and work on those at the same time.
"I know people do not like to work in small groups, so maybe if we call them focus groups, where people focus on specific topics we can move things more quickly plus involve more people at one time.
"Another example is the survey. I have had the survey opportunity for about a month and still we have not gotten together and out to the public. It's going now, but having to everything in one large group one issue at a time will bog things down to a snails pace (which is sort of where we are now!). For a lack of a better term, I see more of a starburst approach to planning.And, of course, this program is telling me I am out of words. other thoughts?"