[Businessmtg] Agenda Web page.

[Steve Rankin]

Hi ASPers,

I agree with Kim on her ideas regarding Traditions One & Two.

Where we disagree is regarding anonymity and her concept of requesting an Agenda topic, and it appears her concept of the Business Meeting itself. 

Many members of Al-Anon confuse anonymity with secrecy. Al-Anon's Tradition of anonymity has nothing to do with secrecy. There is nothing in our Traditions that tells us to be anonymous WITHIN the fellowship. It is outside the fellowship where we are told to be anonymous - that is because none of us speak for anyone else or for the fellowship. The outside world does not understand our tradition of anonymity, nor can we expect it to. So, our 11th Tradition tells us "we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, films and TV". 

The other side of our principle of anonymity pertains to our equality as people. None of us has more value than any other member, regardless of our years in the program, the length of our service resume, etc. Every one of us has a right to voice our take on a subject, and each of us gets exactly one vote. The old-timer with a million years in Al-Anon needs to listen to the newer members just as much as the new members need to listen to the old-timers. 

How does this apply to requesting an Agenda topic?

We require that members requesting an agenda topic MUST attend the Business Meeting where the topic is discussed. We do this for a couple of reasons.

1.  The member requesting a topic is the one that should present the topic to the Business Meeting. It is their idea, and therefore they are the one that should present their idea to the rest of us. 

2.  This is to prevent members from ambushing Business Meetings with controversial topics, which can be incredibly destructive to the meeting. Unfortunately, this happens and when it does the results to the meeting can be catastrophic. 


Al-Anon service has a foundation based on a balance of authority and responsibility. If members have the authority to create Agenda topics, then it follows that they have the responsibility to show up and follow through.

Naming the page . . .

I'm confused about what could be gained by naming this page " Members Concerns and Ideas".  Actually, that sounds more like an invitation for members to post gripes about ASP, especially when combined with the option of anonymity. 

The purpose of this is to create a page where we post a list of Business Meeting Agenda Requests. The idea is to make the list of requests visible and to prevent requests from falling in the cracks as they have on occasion in the past. The web page is not the place for members to post concerns & ideas - unless they put their concerns & ideas into the form of an Agenda Topic.

Formality of the Business Meeting . . . 

Business meetings are inherently formal affairs compared to recovery meetings. The purpose of our Business Meeting is to conduct the business of ASP. It's important that we understand that we're here to do the business of ASP. This is not a recovery meeting. We do not discuss whatever is on our minds in the business meetings, we follow an agenda. There are no open topics in the business meetings. Yes, we do discuss Traditions and Concepts, however unlike a recovery meeting where we discuss the Traditions and Concepts in general ways, with examples on occasion, in the Business Meeting we discuss Traditions and Concepts as they specifically apply to the issue at hand. This is often an opportunity to discover the difference between expressions we may often hear in an Al-Anon meeting and what is really said in our Traditions and Concepts. Our tradition of anonymity is a classic example of that. 

As for having a Traditions and Concepts discussion in the Business Meeting . . .

We allocate a week to most things in our Business Meetings. A week for the reports and discussion. A week for discussion of each topic. A week for the polling process on motions and elections. Unlike in a f2f meeting where a discussion can involve 20 members in less than an hour, it takes a week -- and sometimes considerably longer - to discuss an issue online.  For example, back in 2005 and 2006 we spent over 3 months of constant discussion before we reached a single consensus and made the first motion. Person A says something that triggers something in Person B, but that doesn't get posted for a day or two. That might trigger something in Person C, etc. The online format is slow and we accept that.

As a result, it's essentially impossible to cover more than 3 topics in a given meeting, and that assumes we don't reach a consensus on anything. If a consensus is reached, then the process slows down even further as we spend a week developing and finalizing the motion and another week for the poll/vote. In other words, unless we have no business to conduct, there is little if any opportunity to have general discussions of the Traditions and Concepts in the Business Meeting.

The good news is that we dedicate days of the week to have those discussions in the recovery meeting via our personal shares of experience, strength and hope.

Love and SERENITY,
Steve