The Sharks are Gone

I spent many, many years working on or with boards of directors of arts organizations. My experiences taught me that it benefited me to try to understand the motivation of each individual director. Many directors, I discovered, used their position to bolster their ego; they did not seek to act in the best interests of the society, they sought to fulfill themselves. And that’s what I ran into and what made me not want to be chair of our Communications, Community Relations & Fundraising Committee.

I’ve been acting as chair of the committee since our AGM, and the biggest tasks facing our committee are the redevelopment of our website, and fundraising. And when I recently wrote an email to all my fellow directors about where I am at in my work on the website redevelopment, I received a snarky email from one director. He is the person who built our existing site. It’s an awful site for the community, but a very handy site for us board members. It is our archive; it is completely ineffective as a public relations tool, and its author clearly does not want anyone messing with it. I got caught in the middle between a president committed to improving out site, and the webmaster of the existing site.

And as for fundraising, I feel incapable of deciding what we should do about fundraising. Hence my letter of yesterday to the board. Dyan has been expecting me to develop a workplan for our committee and I don’t want to do it. We are a committee of 3 but not one of us wants to be the chair, so I was becoming the chair by default. I had to speak up and explain in clear terms that I would not be put in that position. The more work I have done for the clinic, the more work that I am asked to do. It had to stop.

I’m confident I can find a way to stay involved in a support role. I want nothing to do with a leadership role. I feel wonderfully relieved that I spoke up and got the weight off my back.

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I wrote to the people undertaking the monologue festival. They said we’d hear in December if we were chosen, so I assume I wasn’t, but I’ve written to ask for confirmation that I am out. I’m fine with not being chosen, but it would have given me an interesting thing to do had I been selected. However, other things will come my way, I’m sure.

Today has dawned bright and clear, plus it remains mild. Our walk with our dogs this morning will be a great one for all of us. I’ll likely do some yard work today if this bright weather holds. I want to clean up the courtyard and back deck. The cleaning of the rest of the yard can wait until Spring. The entire yard is a disaster after Fall’s storms.