[From the Ontario District's newsletter, The Trillium, issue 61-01, January - March, 2007 , Waldo Redekop, editor.]

Improving communications
— in 2007 and beyond

By Chuck Alexander, District President

The New World Dictionary defines the word communication as “A giving or exchanging of information, signals, or messages by talk, gestures or writing; the means of communicating; a system for sending and receiving messages.”

As promised to the chapter officers who attended our district COTS in January, we now have a system in place, and tested, that allows every officer to communicate with all of their chapter counterparts in every administrative position. That meant downloading 363 names and e-mail addresses and our Webmaster, Alex Beamish and our VP Communications, Waldo Redekop, deserve our thanks in helping this system to be put in place so quickly.  Now every district officer can communicate directly to every chapter enabling them to inform and promote events and programs within their portfolios.

And now, my focus will be on being able to communicate to each and every member directly and this is where I need your help.

I find it hard to understand why chapters have nearly 85 percent of their members registering the member’s e-mail addresses with the Society, but we are, and have been, sitting at a level of 37 percent for nearly two years with the number of members registered on our group Yahoo system.

Our system is monitored and follows strict guidelines approved by the chapter delegates. It is used solely for barbershop-related messages. These guidelines are distributed annually at the House Of Delegates meeting and will again be updated this April in Collingwood.

Other districts within the Society report participation as high as 87 percent in their respective systems, but they do not have to follow the strict federal guidelines on e-mail communications that we do in Canada. Each member has to request that they be put on the group mail list. To do so, all they have to do is send a note to Waldo at communications @ ontariodistrict.com stating their name, the name of their current chapter, and providing him with their e-mail address.

I am going to shortly ask chapter secretaries to print off a list of their members from the Society data base and then compare the list with a list of our current 532 members. They will then be asked to approach each and every member to join the system. In some cases, I have found members on our list but not on the Society’s list.

At your chapters you are provided information on events and programs every meeting night. This is done verbally, through printed handouts or via chapter bulletins. We, at the district level, don’t have that luxury so we have to look to our e-mail system and the quarterly issue of The Trillium.

The health and well being of this district is dependent on getting information directly into your hands. Please consider joining our group Yahoo system. It will make us a better district, I assure you. Help me “Improve communications in 2007 and beyond.”         k