We concentrate so much on making sure that we plan successful den and pack meetings and that the boys plan effective troop meetings that sometimes we neglect to consider what makes for an effective committee meeting. Just as with troop meetings, we can divide things up into before the meeting, during the meeting, and after the meeting. In this article we’ll look at what to do before the meeting. Continue reading “Planning committee meetings”
Effective committee meetings: The purpose of meetings
In the last post I opened the topic of how to have effective meetings of your troop or pack committee. Meetings are not effective if they are a random discussion on random topics among whoever bothers to show up, when they show up. You can learn techniques for being effective in your role as committee chair and for accomplishing real results within an efficient time frame. Continue reading “Effective committee meetings: The purpose of meetings”
Effective committee meetings: Introduction
How many times have you been asked to attend a meeting but you had no idea what the meeting was for? It’s like being ambushed or held hostage – you don’t know who’s going to be there, how long it will take, what’s going to be discussed, or – worst of all – what you’ll be asked to be prepared to contribute. It’s an unsettling feeling, something you may dread looking forward to, and certainly that sense of the unknown will be remembered more than what, if anything, was accomplished at the meeting. Sometimes you just walk away and say to yourself, “did we actually do anything?” Continue reading “Effective committee meetings: Introduction”
Advancement’s greater purpose
A recent discussion with members of my troop committee got me thinking as to where advancement stands in the “big picture” of Boy Scouting.
The question raised was how to detect and encourage those Scouts whose time in rank was getting a little long, particularly Second Class scouts. Continue reading “Advancement’s greater purpose”
When they won’t follow
Many regular readers of Scouting Magazine enjoy the feature What Would You Do? in which readers are asked to comment on a problem a Scouter is having in his or her unit. The March-April issue poses the question of how the seven older scouts in a troop should command respect when the 15-20 younger ones won’t follow them. Continue reading “When they won’t follow”