District Governor 2000-2001

Continuity

Are past presidents past?

(November 1999 Issue)

A past president was present at the private meeting with Governor Dipo Sani preceding his official visit to the club. He asked Governor Dipo and his delegation why many club presidents had become apparently dormant and inactive after their presidency. Some said they needed a very much deserved break; some lingered on for a while before they finally disappeared from the radar screen and into the oblivion; while some simply went into immediate hibernation. Still others left the club and Rotary and became members of the largest unorganized organization in the world ever, namely the organization of ex-Rotarians!

It may sound funny, except that it isn’t. It is not funny at all. This is serious business and the future of our movement could depend on whether we can bring back past presidents to our system and restore the very much needed continuity.

You have probably heard experienced Rotarians describing the importance to Rotary of each and every Rotarian. For recent literature reference, turn to page 24 of the Proceedings of the 38th District Conference of RI District 3450, where then RI Director Edgar C Hatcher Jr was recorded to have said that “the most important person in Rotary is the individual who does the work down in the trenches and gets the work done that elevates the quality of life of those people less fortunate.” Yes, Rotary does have high regard for every Rotarian, and quite rightly so, but Rotary International also attaches great importance to the leaders among Rotarians. To start with, a past president is also a Rotarian and hence by definition is much valued. In addition, RI would invest a lot more on him. Thus, every district governor must undergo vigorous and systematic training before he takes up office. This will not only ensure that he would do a good job during his governorship, but will also enable him to provide the mandatory training for his presidents and district officials. The system has been designed to put sufficient Rotary into every club president that would last him longer, much longer than the year of his presidency.

Now, all past presidents were presidents and by definition well trained and experienced Rotarians and leaders in Rotary. All of them had tasted the joy of successful service projects, fun and fellowship, and the love and support of their club members, perhaps some more than others though. They had been trained with their fellow presidents of their years by their respective governors to appreciate, interpret and impart the various Rotary themes and the Rotary ideal of service. In short, each and every past president is a tremendous asset, not only to his club, but also to the district and the Rotary world. To allow past presidents to become inactive is no different from putting valuable assets on ice and frozen, which no business and professional people worth their salt would even contemplate to do in the business world.

Past presidents have a lot to offer. They make excellent Rotary Foundation Committee chairmen, public relations consultants, bulletin editors, group leaders, trainers, mentors for young members, negotiators and advisors generally. Indeed, the immediate past president is often made in charge of organizing Rotary Information sessions. In short, they are adept in every job, for they have seen them all.

You may ask how the young members can gain the necessary experience if these past presidents continue with what they have been doing and doing so well. This is indeed a good question, and let me explain. First and foremost, being active does not necessarily mean taking up offices or retaining authority, including the power to veto club decisions. I go back to my favourite elements of leadership, leading and following. Effective leadership means being able to steer the club in the right direction and achieve the common objective. This is where seasoned leaders, namely past presidents, can do better than others. Past presidents can give the young members plenty of room to manoeuvre; allow them to lead and allow themselves to be led; watch over them without stifling them; lead them without directing them; and above all, motivate them to achieve and to lead.

On the other hand, younger members can also learn to appreciate the worth of past presidents and accord them the respect they deserve. They should have regard to the fact that these worthy men and women before them have individually or collectively helped build up the club and the district. They must understand that they are not there to compete with their predecessors or to outshine them. Above all, they are also club members. Thus, when they seek advice, they should do so with an open mind, rather than in a perfunctory manner. They would do better to dispense with the mindset about the old being ancient and the past being past. Very importantly, in the interest of continuity, they owe it to themselves and to the membership to explain why when they depart from well established practices and when they apparently ignore their predecessors’ advice.

Once again, continuity means all members working together towards the common objective of service; and keeping past presidents active helps.

ENDS

District Governor 2000-2001

Continuity

Effective clubs, the making of

(October 1999 Issue)

By now, you would have heard that the Nominating Committee for President of Rotary International in 2001-02, having functioned in accordance with the RI Bylaws, had unanimously nominated Richard D King of the Rotary Club of Niles (Fremont), California, USA for the office of President of Rotary International for the year 2001-02. If no Rotary club nominates a qualified candidate by 1 December 1999, Richard King will be elected at the 2000 RI Convention to succeed Frank Devlyn of Mexico on 1 July 2001, more than 20 months from now.

You would observe that the procedures for nominating Rotary leaders, including the RI President, are laid down in details in the RI Manual of Procedure, last revised in 1998, which is billed as “A Reference Manual for Rotary Leaders”. These procedures are applicable and indeed recommended for every level of leadership in the Rotary system, including the club and district level, and are designed so that the key people will be selected or elected at least 18 months before they take up offices. It does seem that Rotary has every intention and would bend over backwards to ensure that we have a system that can achieve and maintain continuity in Rotary leadership.

The September promulgation would mean that our good friend Richard King can now begin to plan for his year. In our district, we are now taking steps to assemble a Nominating Committee to return a worthy Rotarian to be Governor-Nominee to work with Richard King. Similarly, at the club level, each club should start planning for an election meeting to return its President-elect for 2001-02 before the end of the year. I therefore find it somewhat disturbing that a few clubs in the district have yet to decide on who to take up the office of the respective presidents-elect for 2000-01. I urge the membership and in particular the Board of Directors of these clubs to make haste, in the interest of continuity for Rotary in general and for their clubs in particular.

The earlier a club returns its future leader, the better that particular leader will be able to prepare for the year in which he is elected to lead the club. Many of you would have heard this from Governor Dipo Sani, “There are no such thing as a strong or weak club, but there are strong or weak presidents.” More often than not, presidents are strong or made stronger because they have taken time to prepare for their presidency, and an essential part of the preparation is to build up a team and to find the right people to do the right job.

In most clubs in the district, the membership will elect the Board of Directors, although the views of the president-elect and his predecessors can be persuasive. I would like to believe that the membership of most clubs would take the matter with the seriousness it deserves, but we live in an imperfect world and accidents can happen. Some members were volunteered to take up offices, while others were put on the Board for the wrong reasons. This could result in a rather weak board, which in turn could result in poor club decisions or no decision at all. The situation would manifest itself worst when a club president assigns an unwilling or ill-equipped member to be chairman of any one of the four avenues of service committees. Let me elaborate.

The role of the four committee chairmen of each club can never be over-emphasized. Individually, they plan activities in the respective avenues of service, and between them they help to ensure a balanced program for the club. Because of this, most clubs would assign experienced Rotarians and very often past presidents to be chairmen, and quite rightly so. Only in very exceptional circumstances should new members be assigned for these duties, and when they are, the club should ensure that they would be properly trained and orientated before they take up offices, either at the District Assembly or by the appropriate District Officials.

This is not to say that new members should not be assigned work on such committees. On the contrary, every effort should be made to appoint them as committee members as early as possible, preferably shortly after induction. Over time, they will gain the necessary experience and be ready to assume committee chairmanship. This would be conducive to the maintenance of continuity in the club programs and help strengthen club leadership.

District Governor 2000-2001

Continuity
By John Wan

Multi-Year Projects

(September 1999 Issue)

Governor Dipo always stresses the importance of continuity in his speeches to Rotary clubs during his Official Visits. He would ask Rotarians to recall the number of occasions their club leadership had abandoned projects initiated by their past leadership in order to start theirs, only to find out at leisure that theirs were put aside equally unceremoniously by their successors. True, I recall the many agonizing hours I spent listening to debates on whether to take up projects that straddle two or more presidencies. Some quoted chapters and verses from Rotary literature while others cited examples from past practices in or outside the District to support their respective points of view. Not surprisingly, often the Board would rather err on the conservative side, resulting in worthy and meaningful projects being left on the wayside, often forgotten and never to be picked up again. “All these would change from now on,” Governor Dipo assures us, and one hopes that will be the case.

But this will be the case. Indeed it must be the case if we are to continue to live up the Rotary ideal of “Service Above Self”, provide humanitarian service, encourage high ethical standards in all vocations and help build goodwill and peace in the world. As our world leader Carlo Ravizza has said, achieving continuity requires a great and meaningful change in attitude. It means respecting the programs of our predecessors and working as a team with our successors. This is precisely what your district leadership have been doing. All of us now work as a team. We have only one objective, which is to put more Rotary in the District membership, and we are determined to succeed. We are conscious that it means hard work, it means accountability and openness, it means putting away our ego, and above all, it means trusting and supporting each other. To some people, this may appear to be a fundamental change. It may well be, but we believe it will be a change for the better, and more importantly, we are not changing for changing sake. We believe that this attitude change will help foster continuity in the District, and we hope that the membership of the District will copy. After all, I would like to believe that most of us have joined Rotary because of the ideals Rotary stands for. These ideals have motivated generations of Rotarians to serve their fellow human beings generously and with humility, and which have made them credible people along the way. It would be wrong to abandon them for worldly and other unworthy motives.

Looking back, our District does have fine examples in clubs which have been carrying on multi-year projects, and very good projects too. At the risk of being invidious, I would mention a few. We have Admiralty sponsoring the Outstanding Disabled Persons Award, New Territories sponsoring awards to recognise students who made the most progress, Hong Kong Harbour continuing with their support for a resource centre for mentally handicapped children in Tuen Mun, Kingspark Hong Kong working with the Spina Bifida Children Support Group, Tolo Harbour sponsoring drama competitions among youths, and many others, not forgetting the many Rotaract and Interact clubs being sponsored by clubs in Hong Kong and Macau. Many of these projects and programs have been designed for children and young people and thus take on a particularly special meaning in this New Generations Month. Long may these clubs continue with these meaningful projects.