[Businessmtg] Rotation, etc.

[Steve Rankin]

Hi folks,

I'm going to weigh in VERY briefly here because we're in the far northern
reaches of the Northwest Territories of Canada and it's costing us dearly to
send/receive email (over $100/week).

RE: doing the same thing over and over vs. fixing what's not broke.  All too
often, Al-Anons bounce from one extreme to the other.  If somethings broken
here, then I'm all for fixing it.  But, first I'd like to know what's
broken, what the suggested fix is, and a reasonable description of how the
suggested fix will work, fits within the both the AFG Traditions and the
meeting's traditions and won't create some new set of problems.

RE: service and commitment.  IMHO,  the AFG fellowship as a whole has
succeeded in developing a membership that by and large isn't willing to go
out of its way to do service.  We see this in f2f meetings at least as much
as we do here at ASP.  Sooooo, I'm not ready to lay the blame for this issue
on something going on here at ASP just yet.

RE:  the amount of time involved in performing the service.  IMHO, it
doesn't need to be a burden.  Since I did the LA job for 10 years, I think I
can speak with authority about the time commitment.  I rarely spent over a
couple of hours weekly - unless we were having a business meeting.  Business
meetings will suck the time right out of the LA's clock even while we're
sleeping.  Personnel issues also take some time, but they were the exception
at once or twice a year.  Frankly, I also believe that the amount of
spiritual growth opportunities that come with the LA job make the commitment
worth it.  I'd like to point out that when I started ASP in 1995, I was in
Grad school.  Then I was an Area Treasurer spending 20+ hours weekly
unraveling a huge financial mess from 1997-1999, and my wife was the
Northern CA Area Chair in AA & I put over 16K miles/year driving her to
business meetings in 2001-02.  Plus, we successfully campaigned our sailboat
on San Francisco Bay, taking the class championship 8 years out of 10.  Plus
I was the web master for the Mercedes-Benz Club of America, plus  . . .  The
point is that I did have a life in addition to being the LA.

The Greeter job does take time, but I don't subscribe to the idea that the
greeter needs to be accessible 24/7.  As I recall we always had 2-3 greeters
during my shift, so they shared the alphabet and covered each other when one
was unavailable.  IMHO, it's OK if some time lapses before a greeters
responds to an inquiry.  Yes, the potential member may be in pain, but
there's also other considerations: (a) only a small portion of inquiries
lead to new members, and (b) the greeters need to find a balance between AFG
service and having a life.

RE: Rotation.  Generally, I take a strict interpretation of rotation of
leadership.  Twice, I've rotated out of Alateen sponsorship after 2 years
because it's what I felt was the right thing to do vs. being one of those
that's a perpetual Alateen sponsor.  I'm also dead-set against those that
serve ad nauseum at Area level in some capacity.  Yuck.  OTOH, there are
some jobs where regular rotation doesn't seem to work well.  The Executive
Director at WSO doesn't rotate on any schedule, for example.  It MAY be that
the LA job is another.  Why?  Well, because  . . .   I'm sorry I just looked
out the window of our RV sitting 10' from this little lake and it's just too
gorgeous out there to be sitting in here.

As usual, if any of this makes sense to you, great.  If not, please think
about it for a bit.

Hugs,
Steve