Mike Raffety, DTM, PID

Similarly to when I ran for ID, I’m going to publish what it cost to run for Second Vice President, for the benefit of anyone who may follow in my shoes.  Here’s the entry for the ID costs.

The first step was the announcement at the end of the August 2010 convention.  I was an outgoing director, so the convention registration and hotel costs were reduced; most would probably not count that as part of the campaign.  However, I had announcement cards to hand out on Saturday night, since that would be my only chance to see most of the voters before the next annual convention.  2,500 cards cost $126 (M13 Graphics is great!).

I made a strategic decision to not attend any district conferences other than my own district.  The campaign rules limit me to attending only Toastmasters events in my home region, and I already had good relationships with the leaders in all eight districts.  I felt the expensive weekends that might be spent on those would be better used to reach out to other districts with phone calls.  This meant I had essentially zero travel costs (other than the convention itself), a sharp contrast to my ID campaign (which was mostly travel costs, within the region).

The November mailing (International Officer Candidate Survey, IOCS) was an e-mail, so no costs there.  I also avoided some costs by working with a talented campaign committee member to create the graphics, instead of hiring a designer.

For some fall and spring district conferences, I sent out tabletop signs (11×17 inches with folding wings, FedEx Kinko’s does a nice job of printing and dry-mounting on foamcore board) and announcement cards.  That’s an area where I could have done more.  The ones I did cost about $300 (with postage).  I also had 5,000 more announcement cards printed in preparation for the spring conferences, that was another $126 (yes, same price, they lowered prices and I ordered with more advance notice).

I hired a photographer friend to shoot some more photos to use ($250) — I didn’t end up doing much with them besides rotate them through my Facebook campaign page.  I primarily used the very nice professional photograph I did from my ID campaign.

I attended the February 2011 mid-year board meeting in Portland, Oregon, to hear the nominating committee (ILC) announcement first-hand, but it probably wasn’t necessary (neither of the two nominated candidates attended).  I thought it was a good chance to network, and a good excuse for a weekend getaway to a city I always wanted to see.  That was about $900 for airfare and hotel.

There was a lot of phone calls to trio members, but I did most of them on the weekend (free nights and weekends on my cell phone plan), and for the international calls, I signed up for a discounted international call program with my carrier, as well as using Skype.  This was maybe $200 total added cost.  My campaign committee was also making a lot of calls, but they used a similar strategy to control costs.

The August mailing to 600 voters (trios, IPDGs, and PIDs/PIPs) had three pieces in a customized envelope:

• a cover letter
• a trifold color campaign brochure
• a B&W biographical sheet (since as a floor candidate, that wouldn’t be included in the candidates brochure WHQ was providing at the convention)

That was $290 for 2,500 brochures (the rest were for the convention), and I printed the rest myself.  The postage was $400; maybe a third of the recipients were overseas and more expensive to send.

For the convention, I did a full registration, though didn’t get to attend any educational sessions.  That was $630, plus about $500 for the hotel (seven nights with some room service and restaurant charges), and the hotel also (unexpectedly) charged me $125 to receive the ten boxes with my campaign materials.

I found an on-line appointment booking service to handle trio interview requests, that was $36 for three months, very much worth it.  It worked well to access it on my smartphone, and it handled confirmation e-mails and rescheduling.

The main candidates corner handouts were the trifold color brochures and bio sheets that were included in the campaign mailing.  There were also 1,000 customized pens ($264) and 300 campaign pins split across 1.5″ and 3″ (with photo) sizes ($231).

Each district got a printed copy of the 2010-11 district directory (I’ve created these for four years now, and they were very popular the first year, when I ran for ID).  It also included a CD-ROM in the back.  I had a FedEx Kinko’s in Las Vegas near the hotel print those, that was $385, plus $130 for the report binders and CD-ROMs (I burned those myself at home).  12 districts didn’t meet with me, so I mailed those out afterwards for $49.

The key giveaway though, which was mainly for the trio members, was the 300 page-a-day calendars with Toastmasters tips and anniversaries and deadlines on most every page, which cost $2,244.  Not cheap, but very popular and widely appreciated.

Campaign workers had 25 printed vests to wear in an assortment of sizes, those were $300 with printing, but really looked professional and increased our visibility in the crowds.  The candidate corner tabletop had a poster for $197 (again, the local FedEx Kinko’s, much easier than trying to ship a 30″ x 40″ board, same as I did for ID in Calgary).  I also bought some plexiglas brochure display stands for the table ($30).

Grand total: $7,713

Was it worth it?  Yes, I think so, even though I didn’t win.  It did cost somewhat less than my ID campaign (back in the regional nomination days), despite having far more voters to cover.

I learned a lot about leadership in this past year, more than at any time previous in my Toastmasters experience (and I include service on the board when I say that).  It would have been nice to win, sure, but no regrets.  What would I have done differently or better?  That’s a different post.

I met with over 60 districts during five days (it was quite a marathon, at 20 minutes each for 4-6 hours at a time on end), and there were some common and reasonable concerns I’d like to document here.

1. We need some form of club officer training for distant clubs.  I believe we could set a policy limiting it to clubs 50 miles or more from any district-sponsored training (so the majority of clubs would continue to attend the existing face-to-face training).  The distance training could either be an interactive videoconference with existing district training (as D21 has been piloting for three years), or it could be WHQ-produced computer-based training.  For the latter, it would need to be participatory, asking questions of understanding along the way (but not a “test”), so someone doesn’t just hit “play”, go do their laundry, and come back an hour later, all “trained”.  Also, I think it would be reasonable to require that all seven officers be trained if the club chooses this option.
2. We need much more transparency and openness.  The board needs to announce what is on their agenda (“we’re looking at a possible dues increase”), we need to know promptly when decisions are made, we need to know the details about the decision, and we need to know why the decision was made.  The dues increase is exhibit A here, and while there’s been a sort-of acknowledgment that it should have been announced much earlier, I haven’t seen an actual apology from the powers-that-be.  Learning how to accept blame and acknowledging a mistake is a very important leadership lesson.
3. There’s no huge concern about the dues increase itself, just in how and when it was communicated, and the lack of clear reason for it.  A few districts in particularly hard-hit areas are going to be most troubled by it.
4. Providing materials on-line, and quickly.  People were excited to hear that the contest materials were soon to be available on-line, but they wanted more, if not everything (it’s trivial to produce a PDF version and post it on the web site, as is already done for visually-impaired members).  The planned online availability of contest materials was given very short notice (like the dues), and this has led to unnecessary expense, since many clubs and districts had already ordered them on paper.  (I recommended asking WHQ for a refund on recent contest kit orders.)
5. We need to become truly global with local contract printing of materials for members who don’t want to or cannot download and print their own (with faster delivery at lower cost), and setting dues in local currencies with local banks collecting them (our members and clubs and districts should not have to shoulder the currency exchange risk).  This would also enable us to easily subsidize clubs in developing countries, like Papua New Guinea or Rwanda, as an investment in the future (like Youth Communications).
6. Many were interested in reduced dues for students, the unemployed, and perhaps senior citizens, like many other organizations do.
7. An alternative academic calendar option is needed for college clubs, with different deadlines for electing club officers and making dues payments (perhaps paying for a full year at a time).
8. There was a lot of concern about member retention, especially with the dues increase.  My best recommendation to address that is to ensure clubs have strong mentoring programs — someone taking a personal interest, asking the member “What’s your next speech topic?”, “Can I hear you practice it?”, “When are you giving it?”, is the best way to keep members coming back.
9. The rebranding is generally pretty exciting, though there’s concern that, for the ordinary potential guest who is looking to improve their communications skills, the new Toastmasters tagline (“Where leaders are made”) will not immediately tell them we have the solution.
10. Many people asked how I could get the most International Officer Candidate Survey (IOCS) votes, but not be nominated.  I have long believed we need to reassess how the ILC works (before I was even a 2VP candidate), with a few options coming to mind.  One is to provide a detailed scoring system (like our speech contests) so the ILC members can objectively consider the candidates.  Another is to abolish the ILC, and either let everyone run (we really need to use preferential voting to avoid the revotes when no one gets a majority at the August business meeting, just like speech contest scoring), or take the top three from the IOCS (others can run from the floor), essentially turning the IOCS into a primary election (probably need to add the Lieutenant Governors to the IOCS voters).  Another indication of the need to reform the ILC is that there were originally two candidates for Region V International Director, both well-qualified, yet the ILC nominated just one of them.  When is one candidate ever better than two?  We need to devolve the nomination of director candidates to Regional Leadership Committees (RLCs), where they’ll be much more familiar with the candidates.
11. WHQ could facilitate candidate interviews at the August convention by making sure there’s some sort of appropriate place to hold them, and perhaps even provide a centralized appointment system.
12. We need to strengthen the district nominating committees with appropriate training.  All too often, the Division Governor and Lt. Gov’r of Marketing races are uncontested.  The nominating committees need to understand that seeking out good candidates is part of their mission, not just screening people who have already stepped forward.  Stronger district leadership will produce better districts that can more effectively help their clubs and members.

Aside from the above, I have to wonder what the other 12 districts were busy doing.  I know at least a couple said they were too busy attending educational sessions at the convention to meet with me.  I wish they understood that one of the key reasons their trip was paid for was so that they could assess the candidates and make an informed vote.

The daily Toastmasters calendars I handed out (with the big red bow on the cover) were very popular.  I had printed 300 of them, primarily for the trios, but towards the end, on Friday, we started giving them away to people who asked.  Perhaps the TI store will produce something similar in the near future.

There’s a lot of ideas above, some easy, some complicated, but I think they all are important concerns that need to be addressed in the near future by the board of directors with world headquarters.