[Businessmtg] Quarterly Business Meetings

[Jerry]

Biz-Pals,

Some of you know that I resigned my List Administrator position about six months short of my full three-year term. At the time I was filling both the LA and Secretary's positions and things were hopping in my personal life. Looking forward to three more business meetings with just a two-week gap in responsibilities between them had become unsustainable for me at the time.

I can't say for sure whether a quarterly cycle, with a six to seven week gap between the BM related responsibilities would have made a difference, but I do believe it would have.

So, as we consider this topic I ask that you ask yourself if it's wise for us to ask our elected trusted servants to serve their three-year terms with only twelve weeks a year when they don't have to be "on" as Steve described it. Another way to look at this is these folks have to be "on" for 120 weeks of their 156 week term in addition to doing their office's other duties.

Another thing: We elect our officers from the ranks of our business meetings. When our Steering Committee members are kept under stress it eventually shows - and I believe getting BM members to stand for vacant or rotating offices is made more difficult (or seemingly impossible) because of this. I believe ASP's history of difficulty in keeping positions filled demonstrates a need for change.

None of us needs more stress. We need less. Service may be busy at times but it doesn't have to be stressful. Our current setup makes it so. Lastly, other than getting our service positions filled, how many really important and necessary topics need addressing every other month? I think very few. Business Meetings every third month could serve us as well as or better than every other month has.

Jerry
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