The Inevitable Weather Disaster and Other Complicating Occurrences: The Meeting Cancellation

The weather outside is frightful, but HECK we have somewhere to go! Too bad - so sad. It’s slippery, it’s nasty, and it’s so not worth the risk. Cancel the meeting. How? What do we do in the interim? To what day do we reschedule?

Canceling will happen at some point. No matter what. Happened to me today actually. We had a freak snowstorm come out of essentially nowhere and drop four inches of precipitation (precipitating madness amongst my grade - parking lot snow ball wars anyone?). The Principal of my school wanted to know if our first meeting would be on or off (since it was off campus, he couldn’t cancel it himself).

To Cancel Or Not to Cancel: That is the Question

It’s a pain to cancel a meeting so you better have a good reason.

1. Are weather conditions safe for travel? Will people be able to arrive and depart safely from the meeting?
2. Is there a major conflicting event or some other reason that more than 75% of your committee cannot attend that meeting?
3. Are you prepared for the meeting?
4. How essential is this meeting for your timeline? Is the meeting time sensitive?

If you can, cancel the meeting in the event of foul weather or major conflict. It is better to reschedule so that more people can come than have it as scheduled.

If you do choose to cancel your meeting, make the cancellation announcement as quickly and as publicly as possible. Soon after, send out the date and time of the make up meeting.

Canceling is about safety and mediating between conflicting events. If conflicts keep occurring at the same time as your events though, stand up and be the Chair. Your Committee needs to know that Prom is a priority too.

the prom chair

What were we Supposed to do Today? ~ The Art of the Agenda

There is a difference between a meeting and a social endeavor. In meetings, a series of tasks and discussions are accomplished, propelling the group along to its eventual end goal. A social endeavor is basically a party and they tend to be less structured. I think that Prom Committee Meetings should be the best of both - all the structure of a good meeting combined with party atmosphere of the social engagement. This post focuses on the primary organizational tool of a good meeting: The Agenda.

It sounds horrific. The word “agenda” reminds me of board rooms, suits and brief cases. What would I want with any of that junk? I’m in HIGH SCHOOL! You only get to be young once!! But hey, my class deserves the best. To give them the best, one must have successful meetings. And so, I turned to my advisor to help me build an agenda.

My wonderful, amazing advisor showed me one of our school’s resources for teachers regarding the creation of successful meetings (see link at bottom). On this page, there is a downloadable file called “Agenda for Learning”. This agenda model directs you to focus on what you want out of a section of the meeting (Outcome), how you’re going to get your meeting attendees to achieve that objective (Process), what advance work you need to do as the Chair (Prework), who will direct that segment of the meeting (Person) and how long that piece will be (Time). The format forces you to think through every aspect of your meeting.

Do I really have to time out how much time I want each topic to have?

Bottom line: yes, you really do. It’s a PAIN in the butt yet it will be worth it. If you know how long you want to spend on something and you have a timekeeper watch your clock, your meeting will have to be concise. People will probably stay more involved, alert and be happier when you wrap up on time. Happy people are typically cooperative people.

the prom chair

Meeting Management

Date:	Time:	Location:
Leader:	Facilitator:	Timekeeper:	Minute-taker:

Working on the Work: The first hour or 70-75% of total meeting time

Purpose/Goal:

Outcome	Process	Prework	Person	Time

http://www2.newcanaan.k12.ct.us/education/components/scrapbook/default.php?sectiondetailid=20662&backPath=L2VkdWNhdGlvbi9jb21wb25lbnRzL3NlYXJjaC9zZWFyY2gucGhwP3NlY3Rpb25kZXRhaWxpZD04

Locating Leaders: Choosing Committee Chairs

Once you draw your volunteers, you have several options: (1) run the whole body of volunteers as a single unit by yourself, (2) Split the volunteers into committees and lead each committee by yourself or (3) Split into committees and select committee chairs to run the committees and report to you. While you might be the Prom Chair, you may actually want to enjoy the process a bit. If you overload your own schedule, planning Prom, I’m sure, won’t be as magical as you might have liked. This is where Committee Chairs come in.

I chose to have Committee Chairs because I believe that the responsibility of the Prom Chair is to coordinate the event and ensure that the night has good flow. While it is possible for one person to try and do everything, I know from past experience that it is more fun to work with people who are just as excited as I might be. It precipitates more ideas, it’s more enjoyable and the end product is even better. Having committee chairs allows me, as the Prom Chair, to manage all of the details, coordinate the night and guarantee strong fluency.

Of course, to have Committee Chairs, you have to pick them. Your best friends you know you get along with? The other major event planners in the school? Totally new blood? People out of the “Popular Crowd”? Selecting chairs (in my opinion) requires some sort of impartial application process, compromise and discussion with those whom you think would make great leaders in the Prom making process.

Chairing a committee is a commitment. I find it very important to make that clear from the get-go. Once I had collected volunteers, I used Facebook and Word of Mouth to ask people to ‘apply’ for Chairman’s positions. I figured that only people who were genuinely interested in embedding themselves in the Prom process would bother to write a paragraph on why they believed they would be strong Committee Chairs. This worked fairly well - I have an extraordinarily dedicated Music Chair, for example. Additionally, I can pull out the paragraph and point to the reasons I picked my Chairs. This is very important as I was criticized for selecting one of my closest friends.

The last semester of Senior Year of High School is busy for everyone. Sometimes, the person you want for Chair may not have the time to dedicate him- or herself completely to the task. Now, you have to compromise and ask your constituents to compromise. A good solution is co-chairing. It allows you to infuse a greater variety of well-qualified individuals into the project AND have the person or people you want in charge of that division as Committee Chair(s).

Naturally, any Committee Chair position is contingent upon your selected person’s time and decisions. Don’t forget to ask the person to serve as that chair and to discuss the responsibilities with that person. It would suck to get to May and find out that your Tickets Management chair has no interest in designing and marketing the tickets that were supposed to go on sale at the end of that week.

Point of Fact: Some people will complain about your selections and criticize you as a person for them. At the end of the day, it’s your decision - you are the Prom Chair. You can’t please everyone. So pick the most qualified people and have fun. You can’t let the fact that some people won’t be happy with your choices bug the heck out of you. Remember - you are the Chair.

the prom chair

We want you for the Senior Prom Committee!!

Anyone can try and do something by him or herself. But where's the fun in that?

To really have an awesome time, you have to choose to work with awesome people. I chose to open Committee to everyone and specifically invited people for specific reasons. I provided those reasons up front and people seemed to respond well. Word of mouth got going and within a week people were finding me to sign up.

According to About.com's "Recruiting Volunteers - Three Approaches" by Joanne Fritz, there are three methods (duh) for recruiting volunteers. This include the Warm Body approach, targeted and concentric circles recruitment. The warm body approach involves canvasing a large audience and hoping that people choose to be involved. It includes giving out brochures, putting up posters, speaking to groups and using media notices (such as local bulletins or, in the high school case, Facebook) as well as the all-powerful Word Of Mouth. I cite Word of Mouth with such importance because without good street cred, your recruitment won't ever really take off.

The Targeted Method consists of first addressing three questions:

• What do we need?
• Who could provide this?
• How can we communicate with them?
• What would motivate them?

And second, specifically seeking out to fulfill those specific roles. I think there are many benefits to this method. For example, you are sure to cover all of your needs and (hopefully) finding a volunteer staff tailored to your exact needs and objects. However, there are drawbacks as well. In my opinion, if you don't "hold open cast call" for at least some of your volunteers, you will lose access to a segment of the population for which you are planning. With an event like Prom especially, I think you should try and draw as many ideas as possible from as many places and sources as possible. The greater the diversity of the Committee, the greater the potential for a more unique and (even more) memorable prom. I think that is really important.

The Concentric Circles Recruitment method seems to be a form of networking to me. You identify two or more organizations or groups that have a history of working with you and you contact them and they call people as so on. I think this is a good idea because it keeps experience in the volunteer loop but it also limits that open cast call.

So - my two cents: You need a combination of all of these approaches to build an experienced but diverse enough Prom Committee. The people who know what works and what doesn't need to stick around but you also need the new blood and new ideas that come with fresh volunteers. "Warm Body Recruitment" (as tragic as it sounds... shudder... it so needs a new name!) is the all important open cast call. NO ONE should be excluded from an opportunity to serve the Class like this. Every person's input and thoughts are valuable. To exclude someone is to deprive the Class of its full potential. Targeted Recruitment allows you to make sure that the needs of your committee are met. It would suck to get going only to realize that none of your Committee Members have experience with Graphics and then figure out you need someone to design the tickets and invitations. Finally, the Concentric Circles method keeps the old blood in the mix - kind of like Obama (new blood) paired up with Joe Biden.

When I was recruiting Prom Committee Members, I asked people specifically, used Facebook to spread the word and drew from Word of Mouth. One time, my class advisor had given me this mountain of magazines just packed full of everything commercial for decorating Prom. One of my friends touched them at the start of a class period and I said, "Ha! You touched them! Now you've got to join the Decorating Committee!" and it was awesome. We got to be funny and have a good time but still be productive. It raised 'the buzz' in that class too which promoted the word-of-mouth street-cred stuff.

Bottom line: while recruiting for Prom Committee, remember:

• Your class will remember this night for a long time. Think about that. A LONG TIME
• Every idea has value - don't cut anybody and try to keep an open mind
• Cover all your bases - really think about what and who you might need down the road
• HAVE FUN!!!!!!! It's Prom!!! It's party planning!!! Don't forget to make your friends back you up
  

the prom chair :)

How to Recruit Volunteers (About.com)

Planning Prom is a BIG Job

I'm the Senior Prom Chair at my high school. For my senior project, I'm attempting to compile a guide to having an awesome prom night. As part of the process, I have to write up my personal reflections and thoughts as I go along. I figured, Keep a Blog on it! I can link it in to the final product and it keeps my journal available to me everywhere! Forgive me though, this is my first blog :S

Event planning is a big job! I've planned a couple of small dances throughout high school and I was on committee for Junior Prom. I've also been president for a couple of clubs. Senior Prom is the event though. Everyone goes on about how you remember it for the rest of your life. I've been to two senior proms - they were pretty good. But we're the CLASS OF 2010! We should be able to top them!!

The idea with this project is to document creating that special night that capstones High School. How do you plan Prom? How do you build a budget or organize committees? People are bound to get stressed - how do you mediate the inevitable conflict? I'm pretty worried about all these things but excited as well. Our first Prom Committee meeting is in two weeks. In a week, I meet with the advisor to try and set up a budget. Right now, I'm trying to build subcommittees and trying to find people to chair those subcommittees. Senior Prom is a big deal. It takes a lot of preparation. I kind of hope that anyone who follows this blog will comment on their past experiences and join me and the Committee on this journey.

Of course, part of the journey is preparing yourself too. Finding a date, getting a dress/tux, what on earth is a 'boutonniere' and more importantly, how do you pin it on your date??? (I've had real issues with the guy's flower in the past. And I'm a girl in case that does come through). Are limos all they're cracked up to be or is there are better way to get to prom? What's the secret to pre-prom parties?

Prom is an American Tradition and there is so much to consider and explore. And to do!!

Days to Prom: 127 days to Senior Prom 2010!

the prom chair